• Thursday, March 28, 2024
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UN DSG, Governors meet to review COVID-19 response

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The governors under the umbrella of Nigeria Governors Forum on Tuesday met the United Nations Deputy Secretary-General, Amina Mohammed, in Abuja to review the response to COVID-19 pandemic.

The meeting was part of her tour of some West African States including Ghana, Sierra Leone, Chad, Niger, and Nigeria.

The Chairman of the NGF and Governor of Ekiti State, Kayode Fayemi, enumerated some of the challenges in the country and how the pandemic affected the nation’s economy at all levels.

Fayemi, according to a statement by the NGF’s Head of Media, Abdulrazaque Bello-Barkindo, said although the virus hit Nigeria in March 2020, later than other countries, its impact had been ravaging with over 64,090 confirmed cases and 1,154 deaths.

Other impacts, he said, included the fall in oil prices, contracting tax base, loss of sources of livelihood, unemployment, youth restiveness (ENDSARS Protest), increasing inflation rate, worsening exchange rate, the decline in productivity due to necessary lockdown measures initiated globally and nationally.

Explaining how the various states handled the pandemic at the subnational level, Fayemi stated that as a responsive group, the NGF worked in collaboration, co-opting ideas and welcoming support from critical stakeholders including partners and the private sector.

The statement said, “At the wake of the pandemic, we worked with the Federal Government to ensure the Nigeria Center for Disease Control (NCDC), Presidential Task Force (PTF), National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) and the Federal Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development got all the support it required in delivering swift containment measures”.

“At the National Economic Council (NEC) level, we developed a COVID-19 response plan encompassing health, economic and socio-economic, immediate to medium-term measures needed to combat the virus and its impact.

“At the subnational level, we set up intervention funds, social investment programmes, distributed palliatives, launched tax incentive programmes to protect and support livelihoods as well as businesses.

“This is reflected in our 2020 amended State budgets of which 10 percent was earmarked for COVID-19 response expenditures and the recent partner interventions undertaken by states including the World Bank $750 million States Fiscal Transparency, Accountability and Sustainability (SFTAS) additional financing, $750 million COVID-19 Action Recovery and Economic Stimulus (CARES) programme for results and the $100 million Regional Disease Surveillance Systems Enhancement (REDISSE).”

The governor also told Amina Mohammed that the pandemic had compelled governors to see the need for retooling themselves, on how best to become accountable to the electorate.

Two Governors: Umaru Fintiri (Adamawa) and Senator Hope Uzodinma, (Imo) attended the meeting while more than 20 others joined by zoom from their respective states.

Responding to their pleas for assistance from the UN, the Deputy Secretary-General said that the UN does not write checks but creates an environment for those who have the checks to do so.

She commended the governors for the mature manner with which they handled the ENDSARS demonstrations, even though she regretted that some ugly influences eventually contaminated the protests.

She advised the nation’s leadership to see young people as an asset or else they would not eventually have a peaceful retirement.