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OPINION

Nigeria and the Next National Assembly

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By Ebun-Olu Adegboruwa

Come June 13, 2023 or thereabout, the leadership of the National Assembly will be up for a change, the present set having been elected on June 11, 2019, with Ahmed Lawan (APC) and Femi Gbajabiamila (APC) in charge as President of the Senate and Speaker of the House of Representatives respectively.

They were anointed to take over the leadership of the National Assembly in 2015 following the victory of their political party at the general elections, but that was not to be, as certain influential members of the APC lobbied the opposition lawmakers to upset the applecart, thus throwing forward Bukola Saraki and Yakubu Dogara as leaders instead.

The lobbying in the present dispensation has been very intense, with all manner of permutations and calculations, from zoning to merit, being bandied to canvass support for certain interests. Some have posited that zoning, faith and gender should play major roles in the recruitment process, given the composition of the leadership of the major political parties.

Deliberately and without mincing words, the framers of the Constitution established the Legislature as the First Arm of government, because law is needed to define all other aspects of human existence.

It is thus expected that through its additional powers of approval and oversight functions, the legislature will work to curb the excesses of the executive arm of government, especially in situations where retired politicians have hijacked the democratic process, having in their prime tasted power and are not unwilling to hand over to others. These factors have shot the legislature into national focus, especially the leadership.

The National Assembly is a bicameral legislature consisting of 109 members of the Senate and 360 members of the House of Representatives, modelled after the federal Congress of the United States and meant to guarantee equal representation. In the current 9th National Assembly, the APC has 66 seats in the Senate, PDP 38, NNPP 1 and YPP 1 whilst in the House of Representatives, the APC has 227 seats, PDP 121, APGA 4, NNPP 3, ADC 1 and PRP 1.

Three seats are vacant in the Senate while one seat is vacant in the House of Representatives. In the 10th National Assembly that will be inaugurated in June, APC has 59 senators, PDP 36, LP 8, SDP 2 NNPP 2, APGA 1 and YPP 1. In this composition, the ruling party has 59 senators whilst the opposition parties altogether have 50, which gives renewed strength for diversity. In the House of Representatives, the APC has 162 seats, PDP 102, LP 34, NNPP 18, APGA 4, ADC 2, SDP 2 and YPP 1.

What this has shown is that it is not possible for the ruling party to foist any candidate upon the National Assembly, even though the same scenario played out in the 9th Assembly with the opposition parties unable to pull their weight when it mattered most.

Notwithstanding the seeming plurality of representation, the 9th National Assembly has not been able to assert itself as an autonomous institution, preferring rather to treasure political party affiliation over and above the national interest. In that dispensation, the executive arm of government was always certain of maximum support and approval of all proposals and requests, no matter how unpopular, injurious or backward. In the jurisdiction for which our legislative arm has been patterned, there is the robust system of separation of powers and the doctrine of checks and balances.

The three arms of government are expected to operate independently and complimentarily, not dependent upon or patronizing, in the manner that the 9th Assembly has carried on. No doubt it is good to have a responsible legislature for the purpose of harmonization and development but when it gets to the level where the executive is always right, then such level of dubious cooperation should worry all lovers of true democracy.

A legislature that cannot supervise and check the excesses of the executive is not worth its name at all. Truth is, such an assembly of persons cannot claim to represent anyone, when the chips are down. They represent only themselves, only their interests and their stomachs. However, the 9th Asssembly was able to conclude the process of the amendment of the Constitution and it also gave us the new Electoral Act, with all its booby traps.

Owing largely to the independent mode of its leadership recruitment, the 8th National Assembly under Saraki and Dogara turned out to be one of the best ever, at least in taming the monstrous executive arm. You can imagine what would have happened under Saraki should the Central Bank of Nigeria dream of the calamitous project of Naira redesign or the needless loans that the federal government has embarked upon in its dying days.

It was not business as usual in the National Assembly under Saraki and Dogara, as the legislators asserted their powers to the fullest and held the executive down to follow due process, at all times. As an appointee of the President, you would have to prepare very well for your screening, and ministries and other government agencies had to sit up to defend their budgets and actions.

They were very daring, courageous and they took steps to protect the people from an overbearing executive. It was little wonder then that the ruling party did all its best to ensure that most members of that collective did not return to the 9th National Assembly. But Nigeria has paid dearly for that selfish agenda as the 9th National Assembly operated more like a weeping institution, a clearing house and a reporting Chamber, where elected representatives of the people stoop to beg directors of parastatals to attend public hearings, at times issuing empty threats without any follow-up action and granting virtually all the requests of the executive. Having succeeded in installing its cronies in positions of authority at the National Assembly, the executive has since then embarked upon mindless borrowings, putting our nation at the mercy of shylock imperialists, who whimsically drafted contracts that threaten even our cherished sovereignty, at times in their own language. Yes, it is a National Assembly that prides itself in ‘reporting’ errant serving ministers and heads of parastatals who defy its summons, to the President.

As elected representatives of the people, the National Assembly is expected to assert the will of the people by invoking the relevant provisions of the constitution in the discharge of their statutory responsibilities of law making, supervising the executive arm and also to prevent waste and corruption.

Lawmakers who scramble for constituency projects cannot be in the best position to make laws that will impact the people positively. So much has been invested in the National Assembly in order to guarantee optimum performance and so the leadership of such a crucial organ should not be a matter of political patronage or reward for perceived electoral support.

We cannot afford the misfortune of parading elected representatives who are whipped along the lines of executive preferences, all the time. There has to be a balance of power and of forces, for our nation to ever dream of attaining the expected growth that our leaders have touted so often.

In choosing the leadership of the 10th National Assembly therefore, the most important criteria should be competence, which can also include experience, qualification and indeed reputation.

As the saying goes, the fish gets rotten from the head, so the kind of leaders to be entrusted with the management of the National Assembly is key to our national development. Of course we need to be sensitive to issues of gender parity, faith and indeed zoning, all of which could be accommodated in the primary consideration of merit as indeed it is possible for the right candidate to possess all these features all at once. Although the tradition is for the ranking members-elect of the political party with the highest number to produce the leadership of the National Assembly, it does not have to be along party lines, given that the laws governing the choice of leadership is internal to the legislature.

For instance, the opposition parties, either in the name of “the Greater Majority” or any other forum, can swing the tide if they remain united. In this regard, legislators should be allowed to vote according to their convictions, not vote buying.

The news filtering that certain candidates for the leadership are campaigning with dollars to garner support should be a disqualifying factor, if at all it is true. Security agencies should beam their searchlight on the members-elect to monitor their activities, especially their finances.

We cannot afford to reduce the next leadership of the National Assembly to commercial ventures to be sold to the highest bidders, as once corruption has been laid upon the foundation of that hallowed institution, then we can all predict what would happen in the next four years.

Members-elect are thus enjoined to discountenance the APC contraption of leadership by zoning. I vote for an independent, vibrant and active National Assembly.

Adegboruwa, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), writes from Lagos

OPINION

Kemi Badenoch: It’s Time for a Rethink

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By Tunde Rahman

Kemi Badenoch’s ill-advised denigration of Nigeria has refused to go away.

Her belittlement of the country of her ancestry is still generating passionate public discourse within and outside the media space, and it appears the matter will not go away anytime soon.

Exasperated by Kemi Badenoch’s misguided attacks on Nigeria, Vice President Kashim Shettima recently counselled her to drop the Kemi in her name and bleach her ebony skin to white to further appease her Tory party and British establishment.

And perturbed and seemingly lost by all that, my daughter, Kemi Mushinat, who recently graduated in communication studies, asked what was wrong with the name Kemi.
There is nothing wrong with the name, I explained. But a lot is wrong with Kemi Badenoch (Nee Adegoke), the leader of the British opposition Conservative Party, who opted to behave, as the Yoruba would describe it, “bi omo ale to fi owo osi ju we ile baba e”, meaning like a child who would go out to denigrate her ancestry by pointing the offensive finger at her roots.

Honour and dignity are inherent in the name Oluwakemi, indeed in any name. But what confers dignity, what glorifies a name, is the character the bearer brings into it. Kemi Badenoch left much to be desired, disparaging Nigeria, our motherland. She painted a gory picture of her growing up years in Nigeria from the middle of the ’80s to around 1996, highlighting stories of poverty, infrastructure decay, decadence, corruption, police excesses, and leadership failure. Perhaps some of her narratives could be true, particularly in the time that immediately followed the National Party of Nigeria (NPN) misrule and the indiscretion of the emergent military regime.

However, her stories reek of generalisations and prejudices often associated with most analyses by a section of Western media and commentators. They view Nigeria with their jaundiced lenses, describing the country as made of a Muslim north and Christian south, oblivious of the various Christian minorities in the north and the plethora of Muslims in the south and the multiplicity of ethnic groups in the two divides that make a mockery of any analysis of a monolithic north or south. They view us Africans with many unproven, unorthodox assumptions.

My problem is with Badenoch, an African, whichever way you slice it, and the character she has chosen. When Vice President Shettima lambasted her for demeaning Nigeria, Kemi Badenoch thought she had a clincher. “I find it interesting that everybody defines me as Nigerian,” she said. “I identify less with the country than with the specific ethnicity (Yoruba). That’s what I am. I have nothing in common with the people from the north of the country, the Boko Haram where the Islamism is; those were our ethnic enemies and yet you end up being lumped in with those people.”

In that statement, the Tory leader disavowed Nigeria and excoriated the north but exalted the Yoruba. She repudiated the whole, attacking one part of the nation but embracing another. Kemi Badenoch grossly misfired, hiding under the finger of ethnic nationalism.

Perhaps it would have been pardonable if, for instance, she opposed Nigeria’s federal system and canvassed regionalism or confederacy. To condemn one race and elevate another is like playing one part against another. That utterance is dangerous in a diverse and volatile society like ours. The north (read the Hausa-Fulani, Kanuri, Tiv, Birom, Mangu, Ibira, Nupe, and many others who cohabit the entire northern region) is no enemy of the Yoruba as Badenoch insinuated.

The north voted massively for Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, a Yoruba man, to emerge president in 2023, as they did for the late Bashorun MKO Abiola, the winner of the annulled June 12 election in 1993. To label them the enemies of the Yoruba is condemnable.

Badenoch’s Yoruba roots emphasise good character and promote good neighbourliness, religious harmony, peaceful co-existence, respect for elders, and respect for other people’s rights. That is why Yoruba intermarry with members of different ethnic groups. It’s also commonplace in Yorubaland to find members of the same family having adherents of Islam and Christianity cohabiting together without any hassles. Boko Haram or its last vestiges poses a security challenge, perhaps a religious and sociopolitical challenge, for Nigeria, not just for the north or the north-east which is why the government and our armed forces have battled to a standstill and are still battling the insurgents.

Therefore, the values the UK Conservative leader espoused did not represent the Yoruba. They are not the values the Yoruba would showcase, uphold, and promote. Yoruba has a rich history of culture, tradition, leadership, and loyalty to constituted authority.

Badenoch’s formative years, which she derided with negative stories of decadence, perfidy, and corruption, were part of Nigeria’s dark periods when the military held the country and the people by the jugular.

Is Kemi Badenoch now giving the impression that nothing has changed in Nigeria, particularly in Lagos, where she grew up after birth in London? Is she giving the impression there have not been significant improvements in the standard of living and infrastructure, with the rehabilitation of existing roads and opening up of new ones; in transportation with the multi-modal system complemented by water transportation and now the rail system, among other things?

Despite its challenges, there is no doubt there has been a remarkable development in Lagos from the foundation laid by then Governor Bola Ahmed Tinubu (now President Tinubu) from 1999 to 2007 till the present Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu to the point that Lagos has emerged as one of largest economies in Africa. Lagos State has made significant progress across all indices of development such that if it were a country, it would have ranked the sixth largest economy on the continent.

What has emerged in the entire Kemi Badenoch’s saga is her seeming double-face or multiple-face. When she was campaigning to represent her diverse Dulwich and West Norwood Constituency in the UK Parliament in 2010, she had appealed to the Nigerian community, comprising Yoruba, Hausa-Fulani and Igbo, under the aegis of “Nigerians for Kemi Badenoch,” pleading for help in the election.

A campaign document that surfaced on social media showed she had reached out to all Nigerians in that constituency while highlighting her roots. In that document, Badenoch had said to her Nigerian supporters: “I need your help. I’m running for parliament in the 2010 UK general elections. The race is very tight. Last year, the News of the World surveyed this constituency, and the forecast was that I would win. Things are much tougher this year as the party has dropped nationally in the polls. I need your help.

“I am asking for your help now to support a Nigerian trying to improve our national image and do something great here.”

After winning the election, however, she deployed her situation in Nigeria as a talking point to rally support for her policies, for which she was accused of exploiting her roots for political gains.

Her rhetoric has drastically changed with her emergence as the Leader of the Conservative Party. In the carriage, conduct and statements, she is now out to please the White establishment, particularly the White wing of her Conservative Party, subjugating her people to make Britain look good. She doesn’t mind running down anyone, including the Nigerian people and the British blacks generally.

Will this advance her politics or status? I do not think so. The British respect culture and tradition. Running down a country’s history and culture may not attract much attention. Britain also respects her relations with other countries, particularly Nigeria, given our age-long relationship. Nigeria is a significant trade and investment partner of the UK in Africa. According to the UK Department for Business and Trade, as of December 20 2024, the total trade in goods and services (exports plus imports) between the UK and Nigeria amounted to £7.2 billion in the four quarters up to the end of Q2 2024, an increase of 1.2% or £86 million in current prices from the four quarters to the end of Q2 2023.

Britain would not want to harm that substantial trade partnership and excellent relationship between the two countries in any way.

Also, several Badenoch’s Conservative Party members do not share her attitude towards Nigeria. In Zanzibar, I recently ran into Jake Berry, a top Tory Party member and former cabinet member in the UK. While discussing the Badenoch matter, he said most Conservative Party members disagreed with her.

Kemi Badenoch has recorded an outstanding achievement in two decades of entering British politics. She joined the Conservative Party at the age of 25. Today, she stands not just as the Leader of the biggest party in Britain’s history but also as the highest black person in the United Kingdom. Her extraordinary accomplishment should have been used to inspire young people to achieve similar feats and as a foundation to inspire positive change in her country of origin, not to denigrate Nigeria or cause division and disaffection among her people. It is not too late for Badenoch to rethink and toe the line of rectitude.

Rahman is the senior special assistant on media matters to President Tinubu.

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OPINION

In the Matter of GTBank’s Persecution of Poor Bloggers

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By Chidi Anselm Odinkalu

By the time Muhammadu Buhari ran for a second presidential term in 2019, it seemed clear that the judicial process in many parts of the country had been actively co-opted in the intimidation of civic opponents of the government, both real and imagined.

The case of Steven Kefas was a defining moment in that process.

Steven was a compelling activist and amplifier of the crisis of human security in Southern Kaduna under former governor, Nasir el-Rufai.

For this, el-Rufai arranged his abduction from his residence in Rivers State on 8 May 2019. From there they bundled Steven into interminable detention in Kaduna, on the imagined crime of criminally defaming Cafra Caino, an acolyte of the governor who was also chair of the Kajuru Local Government Council.

For this invented crime, el-Rufai had Steven charged before a Magistrate in Kaduna, who refused him bail even when the crime was clearly a misdemeanour. Steven renewed his application for bail before the Federal High Court in Kaduna where the presiding judge, Peter Mallong, incredulously ruled that his suit was “an abuse of court process” because the Magistrate had previously refused bail. Turning judicial precedent on its head, Peter Mallong held that the decision of the Magistrate was binding on the Federal High Court.

Gloria Ballason, who argued Steven’s case, was also my lawyer when el-Rufai sought to abduct me too in circumstances that would have been not dissimilar to what he did to Steven. On the eve of the presidential election in 2019, el-Rufai went public with claims of the massacre of scores of Fulanis in Kajuru, a community against which he appeared to have an implacable beef. The following morning, I publicly rebutted his claims. The security services were pointedly unable to support his claims.

After the 2019 elections, el-Rufai instructed my prosecution before the Magistrates Court in Kaduna on the fanciful charges of incitement and injurious falsehood. The case did not even have a charge number. The magistrate called up the case on two successive occasions and, when I did not show up, decided the time was ripe to issue a warrant for my abduction. Contrary to my entitlements under the Nigerian constitution, they did not even bother to bring the charges to my attention. It seemed as if the entire objective from the beginning was to set me up for abduction.

Informed off-record about the case by sympathetic law enforcement agents subsequently, Gloria Ballason first issued filings objecting to how the court had chosen to proceed. Thereafter, she instituted proceedings before Peter Mallong’s Federal High Court in Kaduna against el-Rufai and the police, arising out of these facts, alleging the breach of my constitutional rights.

One year after the case was instituted, in October 2020, Peter Mallong issued his decision. He claimed that the affidavit in support of my court processes, sworn to by a litigation clerk in the law firm of my lawyers, was incompetent because the deponent was someone other than me. It was as if he had never heard of the Fundamental Rights (Enforcement Procedure) Rules, which allowed for what the litigation clerk did. As a result, Peter Mallong said my case was incompetent and his court lacked jurisdiction over it. After holding that he lacked jurisdiction, however, Peter Mallong went on to “dismiss” my case.

The judgment was manifestly crooked on the face of the record. A judge can only dismiss a case that s/he has had the opportunity to consider but a judge cannot consider a case over which s/he lacks jurisdiction. So, a judge who rules that he or she lacks jurisdiction cannot thereafter decide to dismiss the same case. That is exactly what Peter Mallong did. Having accomplished such crookedness, he then went on to award punitive costs against me.

It was this kind of casuistic and crooked jurisprudence that emboldened el-Rufai and his ilk to routinise the persecution of Nigerian citizens by abduction under the cover of law. I was lucky. Steven Kefas was not. Gloria Ballason’s tenacity and an international campaign eventually enabled to Steven to make bail after 162 days in pre-trial detention in Kaduna prison.

According to Steven, while he suffered prolonged pre-trial detention for an imaginary crime framed against him for being a critic of government, he witnessed kidnappers caught in the act being released without charges. Steven’s explanation is that: “What the oppressive elites do in Nigeria is that they will hire rogue lawyers to help them draft all manner of petitions to get critics and ‘enemies of the government’ abducted and locked up….”

This appears to be the perfect description for what is happening in an ongoing case involving the prosecution of Precious Eze, Olawale Olurotimi, Rowland Olonishuwa and Seun Odunlami before the Federal High Court in Lagos. The accused are all bloggers who run different platforms as citizen journalists or aggregators.

On 19 September, Country Hill, a law firm acting on behalf of Guaranty Trust Holding Company (GTCO) and its CEO, Segun Agbaje, wrote a petition in which they complained against the accused for what they called “acts of cyberbullying, criminal extortions (sic) and conducts (sic) likely to cause a breach of public peace” arising reportedly from material published on their blogs about Guaranty Trust Bank (GTBank). Importantly, the complaint omitted any mention of the sums that any of the suspects allegedly extorted or sought to. Subsequent investigation by the police showed clearly that upon the material being brought to their attention by intermediaries, the suspects had voluntarily pulled down the publications complained of.

Acting on this petition, nevertheless, the police promptly arrested and detained Precious Eze and Olawale Olurotimi, both of who have been held in pre-trial custody since then. By the date you read this, each of them would have been in pre-trial custody for over 91 days. That is more than double the maximum duration of 42 days of pre-trial custody allowed by the Administration of Criminal Justice Act.

It took the police just four days to conclude investigation. Michael Abu, the chief superintendent of Police (CSP) who led the investigation into GTBank’s petition, wrote in his report of 23 September, with reference to Precious Eze and Olawale Olurotimi, that “these types of people be used as scapegoat” and recommended that they be “charged  to court for the offence (sic) of conspiracy, cyberbullying, attempt to extort money through fraudulent means and conduct likely to cause the breach of peace.”

On 14 October, the police re-arraigned them. Ten days later, the amended charges filed against them included six counts of cyberbullying and two each of conspiracy and extortion. To prosecute them, GTBank secured the “fiat” of the Inspector General of Police to instruct a high-powered team of ten lawyers, including three Senior Advocates of Nigeria (SANs). This is a classic example of “oppressive elites” capturing the criminal process for destructive purposes against poor citizens.

Until now, the people who orchestrate these kinds of travesties and their judicial and legal co-travelers have enjoyed earthly impunity. Judges like Peter Mallong made this possible. The one lesson, however, of the Dele Farotimi case is that citizens now have the wherewithal to make these kinds of perversion of the legal and criminal process costly for those who orchestrate them.

In this case of Precious Eze and Olawale Olurotimi, that should be even moreso, given that the travesty is procured at the instance of a commercial and corporate actor. We are both citizens and customers. In this dual capacity we have the muscle to resist the determined conspiracy of politicians and corporates who seek to muzzle and destroy an informed and responsible civics. It is not too late for GTBank to retrace its steps.

Odinkalu, a lawyer, teaches at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and can be reached through chidi.odinkalu@tufts.edu.

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OPINION

Why 53.9% of Nigerian Children are Multi-dimensionally Poor – Report

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The Situation Analysis (SitAn) of Children in Nigeria Report has identified some of the reasons why 53.

9 per cent of children in the country are multi-dimensionally poor.

The report, launched during the 2024 World Children’s Day celebration on Nov. 20, is a policy document prepared by the Federal Government with support from the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) to identify and understand specific child issues.

According to the report, corruption, unemployment, lack of political will, violence and insurgency and inadequate investment in social sectors play significant roles in making Nigerian children poor.

It added that displacement and resettlement place additional pressure on existing resources, further exacerbating child poverty in Nigeria.

The report defined child poverty as “a situation where children experience deprivation of the material, spiritual and emotional resources needed to stay alive, develop and thrive, thus leaving them unable to enjoy their rights, achieve their full potential and participate as full and equal members of society.”

It stated that the seven poverty indicators for children are: health, water, sanitation, nutrition, shelter, education and information.

Explaining the Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) analysis, the report noted that across the 36 states of the federation and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), disparities exist in the multi-dimensional poverty of children.

It added that “in Osun State, the incidence of poverty was lowest at 17.5 per cent, incidence of deprivation was 35.5 per cent and the Human Development Index (HDI) ranking was 14th in Nigeria.

“In Sokoto State, the incidence of poverty was very high at 89.9 per cent, incidence of deprivation was 50.4 per cent and the HDI ranking was 37 per cent.

“In Lagos State, poverty incidence was 27.8 per cent, incidence of deprivation was 36.8 per cent, while the HDI ranking was one per cent.”

The report indicated that when disaggregated by rural and urban, 29.7 per cent of urban children were multi-dimensionally poor against 65.7 per cent of rural children.

It added that children living in Sokoto State 80.4 per cent, Kebbi 74.9 per cent and Zamfara 74 per cent were worse off, experiencing the highest multidimensional deprivation.

“On the other hand, less than 20 per cent of children living in Edo (19 per cent) and Lagos State (17.3 per cent) were multi-dimensionally poor.

“Multi-dimensionally poor children living in Sokoto State deprived in 74.1 per cent of the total number of deprivations compared to 57.7 per cent of children living in Lagos.”

It said that households with higher number of members and/or children show higher multidimensional deprivation rates than smaller households.

It also implied that children in homes with uneducated household heads and/or mothers are more likely to be multi-dimensionally poor compared with children whose household heads attained secondary or higher education levels.

It stated that a larger proportion of children with illiterate mothers are multi-dimensionally poor than children with literate mothers.

“A striking case of multiple deprivations among children can be observed in the case of Almajiri children.

“These children are always on the move and are deprived of decent living conditions, good food and nutrition, water and basic sanitation, access to healthcare facilities, access to education and parental care.

“They are also deprived protection from violence and abuse, participation in decisions affecting their lives, and are often subjected to child labour and abuse.

“They are also taken advantage of during times of conflict and often obliged to carry arms.”

To ameliorate the situation, the report recommended that stakeholders should play certain roles.

It said that family and close caregivers should play crucial roles in alleviating child poverty and securing protection for children.

The report notes that children in poverty depend greatly on the existence of public healthcare, education and social services to develop capabilities and learn to function.

It added that these institutions and their programmes therefore must be inclusive and structured in an affordable and accessible way and be used by children who need them.

“Effective governance at all levels will ensure sound policy, equitable spread and judicious use of resources for investments that enhance household livelihoods, reduce poverty and foster the rights of children.

“Government needs to support families and households by providing minimum income that is sustainable to ensure that financial barriers do not prevent children from reaching their potential.”

Report says that SitAn was first published in 2022 primarily based on household survey data from the Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS 2016-2017) and the Demographic and Health Survey (DHS 2018).

An updated version was published and launched in 2024 to support government’s efforts to shape policies and shift investment patterns to benefit Nigerian children. (NAN)

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