|
Nigeria to promote regional
integration, says Atiku
Bamidele
Osha
Reporter, Lagos
Supported by key institutions
like the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs (NIIA), the Institute
for Peace and Conflict Resolution, the National War College (AFSTRAG), Nigeria will in the
21st century give regional integration a new
direction.
This assertion was made by Vice President, Atiku
Abubakar at the occasion marking the NIIA Founders� Day held in Lagos on
Monday where he said that Nigeria was professionally poised to impact
positively with a knowledge based approach in the West African sub region
and beyond.
In a lecture entitled The
ECOWAS Agenda: Promoting Good Governance, Peace and Stability, Sustainable
Development which he
delivered at the occasion, ECOWAS Executive Secretary, Dr. Mohamed Ibn
Chambas pointed out that the prospects of achieving the Millenium
Development Goals (MDGs) aimed at reducing poverty by half in year 2015,
do not, at the moment, look bright in West Africa. He said the region was
most unlikely to have reduced poverty by 2015 at current average annual
growth rates of 4 to 4.5 per cent and population average annual growth
rates of 3.5 per cent.
Chambas prescribed that for
the region to significantly make an impact on the pervasive and
excruciating poverty in the region, it needs to be growing at the rate of
7 per cent and above.
He said in order to step up
economic performance among ECOWAS member States, regional integration was
important.
be mainstreamed into the
development agenda, pointing out that, � The regional approach can bring
the additional impetus to raise the level of economic performance.� He
said it was for this reason that ECOWAS embraced and took ownership of the
New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD) to give momentum to its
regional integration efforts.
The regional body is
elaborating a Regional Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper to take a look at
the regional dimension of poverty and map out a collective strategy,
through national efforts for tackling poverty.
Chambas paid tributes to
President Olusegun Obasanjo for accepting the challenge of leadership in
the sub-region. � President Obasanjo has been untiring in his efforts in
search of durable peace; be it in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea Bissau or
more recently in Cote d�Ivoire. He has demonstrated deep commitment and
African solidarity to fellow Africans in their hour of need. In the
process, he has extended Nigeria�s resources and exceptional talent with
the deployment of troops when they were needed as in Sierra Leone and
Liberia, and by sending experienced mediators and envoys to hotbeds of
conflict.�
| 
