Ndubuisi Francis in Abuja
The federal government has reaffirmed its commitment to meet the deadline of October 2016, which it had slated as the deadline to fix the United Nations building in Abuja that came under a devastating bomb attack by Boko Haram terrorists in 2013.
The Minister of Budget and National Planning, Senator Udoma Udo Udoma, gave the reassurance while receiving a delegation of the UN Resident Coordinator and United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Resident Representative in Nigeria, Ms. Fatma Samoura, who paid him a courtesy visit in his office.
Udoma, who was responding to the disclosure that 1,900 UN staff are presently suffering office accommodation inconveniences, said: “Our government is sorry about the present UN Office accommodation inconvenience. I shall effectively liaise with the Federal Capital Territory Administration and Ministry of Foreign Affairs to ensure that the October 2016 rebuilding deadline of the Nigeria’s UN building is met. All that is required for the staff to move into the building will be addressed.”
He stated that the present administration was highly security conscious, adding that terrorism had been curtailed and that the country is a safer place today.
Udoma commended the UNDP for their efforts and assistance towards the rehabilitation of the North east region of Nigeria, which ravaged by insurgency.
“We note with satisfaction your efforts to help Nigeria rebuild the north eastern states, it is our biggest challenge today, we want to restore normalcy in that region, fix all the inhuman destruction done by Boko Haram and get the affected population back to their vital agrarian livelihood,” the minister said.
A statement issued by the Director (Information) in the Budget and National Planning Ministry said Samoura, had revealed that the UN System immensely supported Nigeria over the years, assuring that they are unrelenting.
Samoura enumerated some of the support areas to include: technical assistance on zero-based budgeting preparation, development and installation of the Development Assistance Data Base (DAD) Phase One for tracking and management of Aid inflow from development partners in the country; support the coordination of development partners in the country through the National Donors’ Consultative Forum.
Others are support to the National Aid Coordination Secretariat hosted by the Ministry of Budget and National Planning to strengthen the Aid coordination system at the states level as well as the UNDP support to INEC Electoral Reforms Project through the Democratic Governance for Development (DGD).
