Foreign News
UNGA 78: Tinubu Harps on Sustainable Environment for Investment in Africa
President Bola Tinubu has emphasised the importance of creating sustainable environment for investment opportunities in Agriculture to strive in Africa to achieve food security in the continent.
Tinubu said this at the High Level Meeting on “Attracting investments in Land Restoration, Food Systems, and Rural Transformation in Africa”.
It was organised by the African Union Development Agency-New Partnership for Africa’s Development (AUDA-NEPAD) Nigeria on sidelines of the 78th session of UN General Assembly in New York.
The UN correspondent of the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the event was organised by AUDA-NEPAD Nigeria Secretariat in collaboration with its counterpart AUDA-NEPAD Continental.
The event was aimed at exploring innovation solutions, investment opportunities, and partnerships to enhance productivity, resilience, and sustainable in African agriculture, focusing on smallholder farmers.
Tinubu, who was represented by Sen. Abdulaziz Yar’dua, Chairman, Senate Committee on Nigerian Army, stressed the need for smallholders’ farmers in Nigeria and the continent at large to access financing to boost farming.
Tinubu also lamented the impact of poor governance and insecurity on agriculture in the continent.
“In Africa today one of the biggest factors inhibiting agricultural practices is the issue of poor governance by our fellow states, which has taken its toll on so many developments in Africa.
“It’s important to highlight this point because most of the inhibiting factors I believe are manifestation of this poor governance.
“And this has led to conflicts and political instability in most of the Africa or some of the African countries.
“These regions that are affected by these conflicts and political instability, of course, cannot be said to be able to have any agricultural activities, because this will disrupt it and it will lead to food insecurity,’’ he said.
According to him, the other critical factor is the issue of climate change, noting that Africa is highly vulnerable to climate change, as it brings unpredictable weather patterns, prolonged droughts and flooding.
“Other factors are land degradation, limited access to financing. If we look at some of the African countries, a case of Nigeria, the small rural farmers and farming communities in the rural areas do not have access to financing.
“We have 774 local government areas in Nigeria and I think just a little over 300 of the local governments which you call counties here have bank branches.
“So even the financial institutions in Nigeria are not able to cover all the local government areas we have.
“So is quite difficult for the rural farmer who will have to travel sometimes one to 200 kilometers to be able to access finance. So, this is a very big problem.’’
The Nigerian leader, however, expressed optimistic that the gathering would create opportunity to brainstorm on ways to help rural communities and farmers to get access to finance.
Another big issue, he said, was the issue of infrastructure gaps, noting that some of the rural farmers do not have good access roads to evacuate their produce to the markets.
“And technology of course is another factor. There is a need to have technology adoption which is limited in nature in most of the rural communities.
“Then we have the issue of policy and regulation by government. You have inconsistencies in policies and some of the African countries as it affects, land tenure, land reformation, agriculture itself.
“We also have the issue of cumbersome regulatory processes, which can also include international finance institutions to come in and assist in agricultural production in most of the African countries.’’
Tinubu, however, said that those challenges could degrade and reduce agricultural practices, especially in most African countries and urged the participants to step up efforts to address them.
Similarly, Chief Executive Officer AUDA-NEPAD, Ms Nardos Bekele-Thomas spoke on addressing some the challenges by coordinating all the available resources in the continent.
According to her, coordination is critical and all the countries in Africa should work together, adding that working together will make a difference while fragmented effort will not help.
In addition, Bekele-Thomas said it was important to expand the economy through agriculture and remove restrictions to assessing financing for smallholder farmers.
“We need to put as many stakeholders in the economy, which means that we have to set the women and we have to empower them to be part of the transformation that takes place.
“All these requires a judicious mix of inputs, ingredients that will go into each and thus, it’s not restoration. We need the resources; we need the human capital, we need the training, we need the capacity.
“We need institutions to get the same thing with food security, in terms of agricultural productivity and production.
“We need to put these ingredients and also the core value supply chain is critically important because we’re talking about the food systems.
“All these require whole collaborative efforts and everybody should be working toward to achieve that,’’ she said. (NAN)
Anglophone separatists in Cameroon have announced a period of “safe travel passage” and halted fighting ahead of Pope Leo XIV’s visit to the conflict‑hit region this week.
Leaders of several armed and secessionist groups said the three‑day measure was in recognition of the “profound spiritual importance” of the papal visit, which starts on Wednesday, and the need to safeguard civilian life.
In a statement from Unity Alliance which brings the groups together – they said they would facilitate the movement of those celebrating the visit. The government is yet to comment.
A near-decade of violence in the English-speaking regions has left at least 6,000 dead and many more forced from their homes.
Pope Leo is currently in Algeria for a second day as part of his 11-day tour of the continent, in which he will also visit Cameroon, Angola and Equatorial Guinea.
Peace is one of the major themes of his visit.
The pontiff arrived in Algeria on Monday, marking the first visit by any pope to the predominantly Sunni Muslim country.
It is also the birthplace of St Augustine, and Leo XIV is the first pontiff from the order to follow his teachings.
He is currently in Annaba where the saint was a bishop – and in the afternoon, is expected to celebrate Mass at the Basilica of Saint Augustine.
The Pope’s second country stop is Cameroon, where he will visit Bamenda, the capital of the country’s North-West region.
The city is regarded as the centre of Cameroon’s conflict between Anglophone separatists and state forces.
A national dialogue organised by the government in 2019 failed to end the violence in the country’s two English‑speaking regions.
Unity Alliance said the decision to pause the fighting “reflects a deliberate commitment to responsibility, restraint, and respect for human dignity, even in the context of ongoing conflict.”
It added that the Pope’s visit should remain “spiritual” and “pastoral” in nature, and warned against any politicisation of the event.
While the Cameroonian, francophone-dominated government has not reacted to the announcement, authorities say appropriate measures had been taken to ensure security in cities scheduled to host the Pope.
Pope Leo’s visit to Bamenda is seen as a symbolic effort by the Catholic Church to promote peace and reconciliation. He is expected to hold a meeting for peace in the city’s Saint-Joseph’s Cathedral.
Officials said all sites to be attended by the Pope will be free of charge for visitors.
Pope Leo’s wide-ranging tour will include stops in 11 cities across the four countries. It is his second major foreign visit since being elected to the papacy last year, and reflects the importance of Catholicism in Africa.
More than a fifth of the world’s Catholics are in Africa, some 288 million people, according to figures from 2024.
President Donald Trump on Sunday ordered a US naval blockade of the Strait of Hormuz in response to Iran’s “unyielding” refusal to give up its nuclear ambitions during peace talks in Islamabad.
While acknowledging that the marathon negotiations in Pakistan had gone “well” and “most points were agreed to,” Trump said Tehran had refused to concede on the issue of its nuclear program.
“Effective immediately, the United States Navy, the Finest in the World, will begin the process of BLOCKADING any and all Ships trying to enter, or leave, the Strait of Hormuz,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform.
“Any Iranian who fires at us, or at peaceful vessels, will be Blown To Hell!”
US Vice President JD Vance left Pakistan without a deal after weekend talks with a team led by Iran’s parliamentary speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf — the highest-level meeting between the two sides since the 1979 Islamic revolution.
Tehran’s delegation also included Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi.
“We leave here with a very simple proposal, a method of understanding that is our final and best offer. We’ll see if the Iranians accept it,” Vance told reporters.
In two lengthy posts on Truth Social, Trump slammed Iran for promising to open the Strait of Hormuz, a strategic waterway through which a fifth of the world’s crude oil passes, and “knowingly” failing to deliver.
“They say they put mines in the water, even though all of their Navy, and most of their ‘mine droppers,’ have been completely blown up. They may have done so, but what ship owner would want to take the chance?” Trump said.
Iran had effectively blocked the Strait of Hormuz for weeks, since the United States and Israel launched a bombing campaign against the Islamic republic more than six weeks ago.
On Saturday, the US military announced that two US warships had transited the strait at the start of a mine clearance operation.
British barrister Martin Hackett has been appointed as The Gambia’s first special prosecutor to try those responsible for human rights abuses carried out during the 22-year rule of ex-President Yahya Jammeh, which ended when he went into exile in 2017.
Hackett will head a newly created office charged with dealing with the cases from a period characterised by widespread repression, enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings.
The Truth, Reconciliation and Reparations Commission (TRRC) was set up to document the extent of the alleged abuses.
In its final report, handed to current President Adama Barrow in 2021, it identified those most responsible and recommended their prosecution.
The TRRC, which heard harrowing testimony from victims, former security operatives and other witnesses, also called for reparations to be paid to the victims, warning that failure to act risked entrenching impunity.
The TRRC has started phased compensation payments, starting with victims of abuses committed shortly after the 1994 coup when Jammeh first came to power.
But for many survivors, financial compensation is secondary to accountability.
Among the most notorious cases highlighted by the TRRC were the 2004 killing of journalist Deyda Hydara and the murder of more than 50 mainly West African migrants, executed by security forces after being wrongly accused of plotting a coup.
A handful of perpetrators have already been convicted abroad under the principle of universal jurisdiction, including former members of the notorious paramilitary unit and death squad known as “the Junglers” – some of whom have been jailed in Germany and the US.
The appointment of Hackett, who has previously served at the UN-backed Special Tribunal for Lebanon and who investigated war crimes committed by senior military commanders during the Kosovo war, is seen as a decisive step towards domestic accountability.
Attorney General Dawda Jallow was quoted as saying that Hackett had a four-year mandate and was chosen from a wide selection of candidates.
Jammeh, who refused to co-operate with the TRRC, only left power at the insistence of regional leaders.
They sent in troops to The Gambia when he refused to step down after his shock election defeat in December 2016.
Now aged 60, Jammeh has previously denied wrongdoing and is believed to be living in exile in Equatorial Guinea.
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