The National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) has reaffirmed its commitment to the actualization of the Sahel Resilience Project to address disaster risks in Nigeria.
The Director-General of NEMA, Mustapha Habib Ahmed stated this during the visit by a joint mission on the Sahel Resilience Project from the Embassy of Sweden in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and the project implementation team from the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) to NEMA headquarters in Abuja, the nation’s capital.
In a statement by the Head of Media and Public Relations, Mr Manzo Ezekiel, the Director-General said; “It was in tandem with the Federal Government agenda of building resilience to Disaster risks and improving the livelihoods of Nigerians under President Muhammadu Buhari, the Sahel region, with its distinctive fragile ecosystem and economy driven by extreme weather condition, poverty, insecurity, political unrest, terrorism and climate change phenomena will no doubt drive immense benefit from this intervention project.”
Mr Ahmed added that, “Moreover regional development as envisioned in the Sahel Resilience project will surely engender global positive impacts in Nigeria and will also permeate the entire Sahel states of West Africa. This is bearing in mind that even under normal circumstances Nigeria serves as the centre of gravity for commerce, industry, immigration and exchange of goods and services for the entire West Africa region.”
The team leader, Ms Annar Tjarvar who is the Counsellor and Program Manager of Environment, Climate Change and Renewable Energy at the Embassy of Sweden in Addis Ababa, said the visit was part of the efforts to promote trans-border implementation of the Sahel Resilience Project.
“It also aimed at engaging relevant stakeholders on implementation strategies of Disaster Risk Reduction, Climate Change adaptation as well as the progress made on the SENDAI framework Monitor and implementation policy in Nigeria.”
The Government of Sweden were commended for being the sole sponsor of the project which is expected to strengthen disaster risk reduction and build the resilience of the greater Sahel Region and Nigeria in particular.
PIAK
