Day: June 3, 2023

The Campaign for Democracy (CD), a pro-democracy, civil society and human rights organisation, has backed President Bola Tinubu on the removal of fuel subsidy.

The group made this known in a communique issued by its North Central Executive Committee at the end of its meeting on Friday in Minna, a copy of which was made available to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja on Saturday.

The communique was jointly signed by the Chairman, North Central Zone, Dr Abdullahi Mohammed, and Secretary General, Mr Abdulwahid Adeniran.

They urged the president to restructure the nation’s security architecture to effectively tackle the challenge of insecurity as well as Nigeria as a country.

They said the expectation of Nigerians were high in tandem with the renewed hope principle and focused policy of the administration.

According to the communique, the removal of the fuel subsidy was long overdue and welcome the development for the good of Nigerians.

The group also urged the government to do the needful by putting necessary palliative policy measures and logistics to soften the hardship that might accompany the new paradigm shift among the citizens.

“That there is a need for national task force comprising of the Army, Police, Customs, Navy, Air Force, Civil Defence and non-state actors, civil society, among other stakeholders, to check the arbitrary price increase of the product, stop exploitation of the people by fuel marketers and their collaborators/dealers to tarnish the image of the new administration in the eyes of the public,” they said.

The group also called on stakeholders in the educational sector to come up with solutions to the challenges of 12.3 million out-of-school in Nigeria as a result of insecurity.

They also advocated that the president should give directions to child education through resettlement of IDPs, tackle banditry, poverty, food insecurity and socio- economic challenges confronting the nation.

The group recommended that federal government policy programme implementation be adopted at sub-national state and local governments for the benefit of Nigerians.

According to them, this synergy is key towards collaborative building of the country.

Besides, CD called on Tinubu to restructure the nation’s security architecture for better performance to further curb crimes and criminalities.

They however commended the Armed Forces of Nigeria for taking the battle against insurgency, kidnapping and banditry to the door steps of the criminals.

According to the group, the battle against insecurity is winnable by our gallant military men and officers in the theatre of the war.

They therefore called on all stakeholders to support Tinubu toward physical and economically restructuring of Nigeria for the common interest of all.

The group congratulated the new governor and deputy governor of Niger, advising them to partner with all relevant stakeholders for the peace and development of the state.

“We appeal to the incoming government to take the welfare of civil servants seriously by providing motivational incentives to improve the working conditions of workers and ensure commensurate take home wages and salaries are paid as of when due,” the group urged.

Source: News Agency of Nigeria

More than 902,000 hectares of land is readied for planting tree seedlings this Ethiopian rainy season, according to Ethiopian Forestry Development (EFD).

Ethiopia has managed to plant 25 billion seedlings in the past 4 years through the Green Legacy Initiative.

EFD Deputy Director General Motuma Tolera told ENA that the comprehensive activity carried out through the initiative is a successful project that has mobilized massive public participation like the Great Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD).

He noted that planting trees is not a matter of choice but survival for Ethiopians because unless millions of seedlings are not planted every year, we will be exposed to serious dangers caused by climate change.

“The Green Legacy Initiative is not a matter of choice as most of our mountain areas are being severely degraded,” the deputy director general said, adding that recent studies show that millions of hectares of land are also going to deteriorate unless they are quickly covered with trees. There is a lot of soil erosion.”

According to him, over 7 billion seedlings are prepared so far to plant more than 6.5 billion tree seedlings. For this reason, the tree seedlings are readied for planting after research was conducted to identify what kind of saplings to plant, in what kind of environment, and what kind of soil.

Subsequently, over 902,000 hectares of land is prepared for planting seedlings.

Motuma added that the community’s participation has been improving from time to time in seed selection, planting, and caring for the trees.

More than 250 million saplings were planted in Oromia, Sidama, South, SouthWest Ethiopia regions, and Dre Dawa City Administration during this belg season.

Source: Ethiopian News Agency

A consultation forum is being held in Adama city to gather inputs for draft proclamation on protection and support of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs).

The consultation was organized by the Ministry of Peace, the Ministry of Justice, International Organization for Migration (IOM) and UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency.

Representatives of human rights institutions, civil associations, higher education institutions and other pertinent stakeholders are attending the forum, it was indicated. During the occasion, State Minister of Peace, Seyoum Mesfin said that a large number of citizens, including mothers and children, have been displaced by man-made and natural disasters in the past years.

There was no legal framework to provide complete support to IDPs in Ethiopia, he elaborated.

To this end, he stated the draft protection and support proclamation for IDPs, which is in the process of preparation, will help to provide them with humanitarian aid, protection of rights, and render other support.

According to international experience, governments have limited capacity to fully assist IDPs, so, they engage local and international aid organizations, the state minister said. Moreover, he elaborated that the preparation of draft proclamation is underway to overcome multiple challenges facing citizens, which resulted from internal displacement, due to man-made and natural calamities legally and in coordinated manner.

According to the draft proclamation, a national IDP protection and support council will be established, which will be accountable to the prime minister.

The Council will be headed by the deputy prime minister and will consist of various federal and regional government bodies, religious institutions, as well as other relevant entities, it was indicated.

Source: Ethiopian News Agency