Northern governors seek speedy release of GGW funds

The Federal Government promised to give the money to the states under the Great Green Wall (GGW) project.The decision of the governors to step into the matter followed the request made by the Nigerian Frontline Action Initiative on Desertification (NIFSAID), an association of Commissioners of Environment of the 11 northern states, on them to do […]

The Federal Government promised to give the money to the states under the Great Green Wall (GGW) project.
The decision of the governors to step into the matter followed the request made by the Nigerian Frontline Action Initiative on Desertification (NIFSAID), an association of Commissioners of Environment of the 11 northern states, on them to do so.  
The NIFSAID reminded the NSGF that only N300 million out of the N10 billion pledged for the project has been released so far by the federal government.
Chairman of the NIFSAID, Mukhtar Lugga, Commissioner for Environment, Zamfara State, told the governors that the recent approval of N10 billion by President Goodluck Jonathan for the implementation of the Great Green Wall in the 11 frontline states remained undoubtedly the most decisive action taken to combat desertification in northern Nigeria.
He said: “If implemented well, the programme will go a long way in repositioning the affected areas and contribute to the restoration of the region to the good old days of economic boom.
“Regrettably, early in the 1st year of its implementation, there seems to be obvious teething problems that may hamper the success of the project as envisaged by the architects of the project. So far, the states have only received about N300 million for the purchase and planting of seedlings which have been carried out since August last year. There has not been any activity in the field since then. Virtually all the plants have withered off and died as a result of lack of water, protection for the plants and other logistics provided for in the work plan. Extra work has to be put in salvaging the situation as the success of the project depends on how many trees survive.”
Governor Babangida Aliyu, who is the chairman of the NSGF, decried the delay in the release of the money to the committee, saying that the governors will include the issue of desertification plaguing the region among topics for discussion during the centenary celebration of the country.
He said, “The issue of desertification has gone beyond partisanship, all hands must be on the deck to solve this problem once and for all.”
Aliyu urged his colleagues to mount a vigorous campaign against desertification so that people will be aware of the problem and what government is doing to arrest it.
The governor disclosed that in their last meeting, the issue of desertification was extensively discussed and would be presented at the forthcoming constitutional conference.  
“We have agreed to send our best hands to the conference, they are to argue in favour of including the issue of desertification as part of the revenue sharing formula,” he revealed.
Daily Trust check in the presidency, where the project is been supervised, reveals that a lot of stride had been made in ensuring that the project was well implemented as witnessed in Senegal.
A source told Daily Trust that already, an implementation committee for the project has been constituted and began work, noting that the inability of the committee to access the N10 billion was responsible for the grumblings from the concerned states.
The source went further to say that the states have not helped matters as they have failed to pay their counterpart-fund for the project.
The Federal Ministry of Environment had, in late 2013, advertised for consultants to undertake the various components of the project including the drilling of boreholes to water the trees.
The Great Green Wall is a planned project to plant a wall of trees across Africa at the southern edge of the Sahara desert as a means of preventing desertification. It was developed by the African Union to address the detrimental social, economic and environmental impacts of land degradation and desertification in the Sahel and the Sahara.
It will be recalled that Vice President Nnamdi Sambo said at the second meeting of the National Council on Shelterbelt and Afforestation, recently, that the programme “is not just planting trees to stop deforestation and desertification, it has to do with the whole eco-system in which water, plant, animal and others would be given attention.”
On the issue of funding, Sambo said that N10 billion has been approved by the federal government for the Great Green Wall project.  He said, from the said amount, N3.3 billion is to be used for 2013 work plan.   
After scrutinising the roadmap and the work plan of the project, the council noted that there should also be a plan for sustainability of the project and community involvement.  It also observed that young people and school children should be sensitised on the need to plant trees.