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Regional Stability Tops Lake Chad Governors’ Resolutions in Maiduguri

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Regional stability, peace and sustainable development on Friday topped the resolutions adopted at the concluded 5th edition of the Lake Chad Basin Governors’ Forum (LCBGF) meeting in Maiduguri.

The resolutions were adopted in a communique signed by Brig.-Gen. Mahamadou Lamme, the Chairman, Draft Communique Committee, and the Governor of Diffa Province in the Republic of Niger in Maiduguri.

The week-long LCBGF’s meeting which had 1,000 delegates in attendance brought together governors from the Republics of Cameroon, Chad, Niger, and Nigeria.

“The LCB Governors’ Forum recognised and commended the substantial achievements made under the Regional Strategy for Stabilisation, Recovery, and Resilience of the Areas-affected by Boko Haram insurgency in the Lake Chad Basin Region (RS SRR) which have significantly contributed to stabilisation, peace, and sustainable development in the Lake Chad Basin region.

“In the light of the significant progress made in the implementation of the RS SRR, the LCB Governors’ Forum commended the governments of the Lake Chad Basin countries, regional institutions, and international partners for their unwavering commitment to stabilisation, peacebuilding, and sustainable development.

“The Forum welcomed the efforts of the LCBC and its partners in facilitating the technical validation of the adjusted RS SRR in 2024 and encourages the LCBC Council of Ministers and the AU Peace and Security Council to endorse the revised strategy.

“The Forum also reaffirmed the commitment to strengthen partnerships with the private sector, international financial institutions, and regional development banks to mobilise financing for the RS SRR.

“The LCBC Governors also commended the Governors of the eight most affected territories of the Lake Chad Basin (LCB) in Cameroon, Chad, Niger, and Nigeria for their steadfast political leadership, unwavering commitment, and strong support for the effective implementation of the RS SRR in their respective territories.

“The forum also acknowledged the substantial progress achieved in advancing stabilisation, peace, and sustainable development across the LCB region since the inaugural meeting of the Forum in May 2018 in Maiduguri, Nigeria.

“The forum commends the significant contributions and achievements of the Multinational Joint Task Force (MNJTF) and the troop-contributing countries of the LCBC—Cameroon, Chad, Niger, Nigeria, and Benin—in combating non-state armed groups, notably Boko Haram and the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP).

“These efforts have greatly reduced the threat posed by these terrorist groups, enhanced civilian protection, and compelled many members of these groups to surrender.

“The forum further emphasised its commitment to redouble efforts and further strengthen the MNJTF and other efforts to completely eliminate the continued threat posed by Boko Haram, ISWAP, and other terrorist groups in the region,” the communique stated.

It recognised the AU’s unwavering commitment to the MNJTF, as reflected in the communiqué of the 97th meeting of the AU Peace and Security Council, and commended the role of national and sub-national governments, regional and sub-regional institutions, and partners in addressing the challenges posed by exits from areas controlled by terrorist groups.

The communique commended the technical validation of the Community-Based Reconciliation and Reintegration Policy (CBRR) and encouraged its endorsement at the next LCBC Council of Ministers meeting.

It, however, called on the member states to implement the policy effectively.

The communique also endorsed the recommendation of the 5th Steering Committee of the LCBC to develop a Regional Policy on Transitional Justice for the Lake Chad Basin region.

It underscored the critical need for the rehabilitation and reintegration of former associates of Boko Haram and ISWAP who have left these groups, while calling on LCB states, institutions, and partners to provide the necessary human and material resources to address this challenge effectively.

The communique also acknowledged the progress made in addressing the humanitarian situation in the region, but noted with concern that the effects of by climate change, illiteracy, youth unemployment, severe economic challenges, and frequent natural disasters still persist in the region.

It stressed the disproportionate impact of the security crisis on vulnerable populations, particularly women, children, and reaffirmed the need to protect and assist all affected civilians in compliance with humanitarian principles and international law.

It noted with concern the suspension of donor support for Niger’s National Window of the Regional Stabilization Facility (RSF), which could negatively impact progress across the region, and called for a concerted effort to urgently address this challenge.

The communique welcomed the establishment of the Special Multi-Partner Delivery Fund (SMDF) and the Nexus Funding Facility (NFF) as vital mechanisms to support and coordinate stabilisation, recovery, and resilience initiatives across the region.

It also reaffirmed the forum’s commitment to advancing stabilisation, recovery, and resilience in the region while in this regard, the Forum committed itself to ensure member states strengthen strategic support to, and operational capacity of the Multinational Joint Task Force (MNJTF) and invest in transborder security.

The communique resolved to ensure member states effectively occupy the Lake Chad Islands as a means of strengthening transboundary security, with a focus on securing and controlling the waterways as well as ensure that remnant of all Non-State Armed Groups are completely neutralised in all the member states.

It pledged to intensify efforts to combat illicit trade of arms, and illicit drug trafficking and drug abuse, especially among youth and scale up climate resilient initiatives and environmental protection efforts to support the rehabilitation of the Lake Chad Basin ecosystems and biodiversity.

The communique committed itself to strengthen collaboration with traditional rulers, especially in facilitating reconciliation and reintegration processes as well as strengthen women and youth engagement in stabilisation, recovery, and resilience initiatives, ensuring their needs and priorities are effectively addressed.

It also agreed to enhance the role of civil society and traditional authorities in designing, implementing, and monitoring regional stabilisation, recovery, and resilience efforts as well work with the LCBC on advocacy and fundraising with partners and donors towards continuation of stabilisation activities in Niger.

The communique promised to facilitate the establishment of “Free trade Zones” in the Lake Chad region, as a means of promoting cross-border trade and economic connectivity while Identifying and investing in the construction and rehabilitation of cross-border roads as a means of promoting transboundary trade and strengthening security.

It announced its readiness to update and facilitate the implementation of the Territorial Action Plans (TAPs) to align with the adjusted RS SRR and strengthen resource mobilisation efforts through the Special Multi-Partner Delivery Fund (SMDF) and the Nexus Funding Facility (NFF), and other regional funding initiatives to drive impactful and sustained progress.

The communique also thanked President Bola Tinubu, the host, Gov. Mai Mala Buni of Yobe and the people of Nigeria for their hospitality.

It expressed appreciation to the Governor of Hadjer-Lamis, Ildjima Abdraman of the Republic of Chad for her leadership and commitment in steering the forum between 2023 and 2024.

The communique commended the acceptance of the Chairmanship of the LCBGF by its new Chairman, Gov. Mai Mala Buni of Yobe. (NAN)

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el-Rufai – Not Your Accidental Critic.

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By Simon Imobo-Tswam

Mallam Nasir el-Rufai, the immediate-past governor of Kaduna state, is in the news, again.

His criticism of the Bola Tinubu government has triggered royal groans and not so royal moans.

I wish to state, upfront, and boldly too, that he is not an accidental critic.

He has the history.
I state, also, that this piece has no caveats.

For sure, the man excites our emotions for reasons sublime, and reasons, bizarre.

While some cannot stand his brand of politics or his forceful speechifying, others find it difficult reconciling his mega ideas and his lion-style courage with his petite frame.

Yes, he is a small-statured man; and not many big-bodied people believe that small-framed men should be loud or should dare to hog headlines for weeks on end in their presence.

Plus, el-Rufai has an ascerbic tongue which, when trained on opponents, leaves them with damaging political, emotional and psychological lacerations. And loud wailing and cacophony become the natural outcomes in such camps!

Furthermore, he has a very sharp intellect. And he has honed that to a point where he has become a suave, articulate and persuasive speaker, with a potential for even demagoguery.

el-Rufai is, therefore, not one to shy away from deploying his awesome intellectual endowments to advance his causes, promote his viewpoints or to blunt opposing voices.

When he talks, marshalling his points so clearly and so compellingly, the juggernaut leaves many of us overwhelmed, stupefied and even stranded. That’s when, in exasperation, some of us call him a “midget” or “dwarf”!

But such a pejorative characterisation only makes our nightmare more nightmarish: for the life of this nimble “midget” is still the dream of many shuffling giants!

Look at the roll-call: Special Adviser to a military head of state, director-general of a first-grade Federal parastatal, cabinet minister, a brain-box of President Obasanjo’s reform agenda, co-founder of a consequential political party, two-term governor of Kaduna state and now, the enfant terrible of the ruling APC.

So, clearly, what el-Rufai lacks in physique, God has superfluously compensated him with an overflowing intellect. But this is both a liability and asset.

When the APC juggernaut airs his opinions with his inimitably forceful candour, profound erudition and insightful analyses, his critics want to shout him down. When he holds his peace, his admirers wonder why he is quiet, and goad him to say something.

So, in talking, he stirs the hornets’ nest; and in his silence, he becomes the object of our intense curiosity. It’s something of a dilemma.

In our secondary school days (those of my generation can relate or recall), we read/had a text entitled: The Dilemma of a Ghost.” We can modify that title to fit our context thus: “The Dilemma of a Critic.”

But we don’t pity el-Rufai or query the critics of the critic – after all, the critic himself spares none when he sees the need to. But we should avoid tagging him “the Accidental Critic.” He has paid his dues in the public space. So, while he may style himself as “the Accidental Public Servant,” he is, by no means an “Accidental Critic.”

First, when you are a stickler for excellence, you naturally model criticism by default; you automatically become a critic of mediocrity, inefficiency, slothfulness and tardiness.

But in practical terms, in the Obasanjo dispensation when el-Rufai came to national limelight, he criticised the chronic lethargy of the bureaucracy, the sloppiness in the Federal cabinet, and the then budding corruption in hallowed places.

He was also a vociferous critic of both the Yar’adua and the Goodluck Jonathan administrations, accusing both of incapacity, insincerity and inefficiency.

And in the Buhari government during which he served as governor, el-Rufai wrote about three memos to the president, expressing his unease with the slow-pace of social change.

Additionally, Nasir el-Rufai was among the governors who sued the Buhari presidency over its currency re-design policy, faulting both the need and the timing! He also opposed Buhari’s bid to have another Northerner succeed him after his eight-year tenure in Aso Rock.

That’s el-Rufai for you. He is a critic who doesn’t even respect table manners: he talks at the table, with a fork in hand and between mouthfuls.

He may not be a career-critic, a social media warrior or a dyed-in-the-wool critic, but he is no accident to criticism or in talking truth to power.

And that brings us to the present. If the man has a history of criticism – why are some people trying to pin his dissatisfactions with this government on his failed ministerial quest? When he criticised the Yar’adua, Jonathan and Buhari governments – was it because of missed ministerial opportunities too?

We must outgrow this penchant for importing trivia into serious conversations with the aim of obfuscating the flow and diverting attention. It is beneath us.

But even this ministerial thing – let’s talk about it, briefly. We are all witnesses to history or the backstory. In the race to 2023, there were promises, dissuasions and persuasions.

With 2023 sealed and delivered, were the promises kept?
If so, is the joke really on the former governor or on those to whom trust also means trash?

So, is el-Rufai’s criticism of Tinubu’s nepotism (he prefers cronyism) justified? A look at all those in control of the commanding heights of the Nigerian economy, including the Armed Services, makes countering the charge a most embarrassing venture.

Hailers may see it as “merit,” but that can only be true if merit is a plant that only flourishes in the South-West, and particularly Lagos!

What the rest of us see is micro-nationalism, the inauguration of a Golden Age, not for Nigeria, but for one of the over 300 ethnicities that comprise her. It’s, indeed, a Golden Age that’s not altogether golden.

It may be tempting to refer el-Rufai to the eight years of Buhari’s nepotism and his silence. But dare we now compare the unschooled Buhari, with the cosmopolitan Tinubu who schooled in America, worked with multinational corporations across the globe and built Lagos, vAfrica’s biggest economic megapolis?

Dare we suggest that Lagos, the Centre of Excellence, now copies from Katsina, and that the Renewed Hope Agenda was merely Next Level politics?

And it’s not that the nepotism and the cronyism are delivering results. As Suleiman A. Suleiman has put it: “Fat people are becoming slim; and slim people are dying.” And if people cannot eat, can they save or live with hope?

These are the issues. This is the ugly reality.

But they are not new issues. They are only enjoying prime discussion and raising adrenaline levels because el-Rufai has added his voice to it.

That’s the midget’s influence. Even outside the power loop, he stands today as one of the North’s most consequential, most magnetic and most sophisticated politicians. This is why what he says – whether casually or seriously – carries weight. The less perceptive may dismiss the small man, but not the serious power-players.

And let no one be deceived by the lie that el-Rufai is a liar. Doesn’t being a liar make him a family member? And doesn’t that burnish his political credentials and make him a very important member of the political class? Aren’t some of us (or our heroes) thieves, witches, cultists, murderers, perjurers, con-artists, addicts and all?

And, by the way, since when have the masses been averse to lies on the campaign trail?

This is why I believe it is in his party’s interest to listen to him, and take remedial measures. Already, he is a presidential material, and he may graduate into a presidential candidate. It can complicate things.

If the party and the government go on with the dismissive attitude, I fear that el-Rufai may double up on forging strategic alliances and renewing friendships, all geared towards harnessing the general discontent in the land, turning the pervasive anger into revolutionary energy and, possibly, weaponising same for as much political capital as possible, Come 2027.

Imobo-Tswam, a retired newspaper editor, writes from Abuja. He can be reached at simonpita2008@gmail.com

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2 killed, 6 Injured as Lagos Building Under Construction Collapses

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Ikorodu Building Collapse
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The Lagos State Emergency Management Agency (LASEMA) has extricated two adult males, with six injured persons from a building under construction that collapsed in Odoriwu Estate in Lekki area of the state.

The agency’s Permanent Secretary, Dr Olufemi Oke-Osanyintolu, confirmed this in a statement on  Wednesday in Lagos.

Oke-Osanyintolu said the incident happened around 14.

25hrs.

“Following distress calls received through the 767 and 112 emergency toll-free lines at 14.25hrs today, LASEMA activated its Response Team from the Lekki and Cappa Bases.

“Upon arrival at 14.

48hrs at the incident scene, it was discovered that a three-storey building under construction had collapsed at aforementioned location.

“So far, two adult males have been extricated from rubbles of the collapsed building, while six seriously injured adult males had been rescued and administered immediate medical care by the LRU Pre-Hospital Care Unit.

“They had been transported to Marina General Hospital for further treatment after the administration of the first medical care,”he said.

He also said the immediate cause of the incident was yet to be ascertained, adding that further investigations would be conducted.

“The agency’s heavy duty equipment was deployed to the incident scene and is still in operation.

“Search and Rescue Operation is still ongoing and Update to follow,” he said.

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PDP Leaders Urge Adediran to Rejoin Party

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The People’s Democratic Party (PDP) National Secretary, Mr Ude Okoye, has led other party chieftains to visit the party’s 2023 Lagos State governorship candidate, Abdul-Azeez Adediran, over his resignation.

This is contained in a statement on Wednesday in Lagos by Adediran’s spokesman, Mr Gbenga Ogunleye.

Daily Asset recalls that Adediran, leader of the Lagos4Lagos Movement, announced his resignation from the PDP on Monday, citing betrayal and lack of discipline.

Barely 48 hours after leaving the party, PDP leaders visited Adediran at his Abuja office, urging him to reconsider his decision and return to the party.

Ogunleye said the PDP leaders pleaded with Adediran to revisit his decision and withdraw his resignation from the party.

“The National Secretary of the PDP, Ude Okoye, former National Publicity Secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, and ex-House of Representatives member, Shina Peller, visited Adediran.

“They urged him to reconsider his resignation and return to the PDP,” Ogunleye said.

The delegation acknowledged Adediran’s reasons for leaving but encouraged him to stage a comeback.

“While appreciating their support, Adediran assured them of his willingness to collaborate with friends in his political journey, in spite of differences in political alignment,” Ogunleye stated.

Adediran said on Monday he left the party with his supporters across the 20 Local Government Areas and 37 Local Council Development Areas of Lagos State.

He attributed his decision to betrayal by party elders and the PDP’s inability to resolve its internal crisis in Lagos State.

He stated that his next political move would be revealed in the coming months. (NAN)

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