By Cross Udo, Abuja
A group under the aegis of the Civil Society Organisation on Community Advancement and Humanitarian Empowerment Initiative (CSCHEI) yesterday lamented that available data showed that Nigeria is far backward in the domestication of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in all the states and local government areas.
The group has also called on the Federal Government to create a Civil Society Commission.
Speaking in Abuja, at the formal launch of the CSCHEI’s projects and programmes, the coordinator of the group, Kunle Yusuff, said the Commission would be charged with the responsibilities of coordinating the affairs of the over 45,000 registered non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in the country.
According to him, “It’s been a long time we’ve been struggling to have a Commission of Civil Society in Nigeria. We started this call about 7-8 years ago. The Civil Society Commission has not been approved. We started Disability Commission, it has been approved; we are part of the people who started the Diaspora Commission that has been approved and it’s now an agency of the federal government.
“We hope that in a few years to come, the civil society as a Commission of the federal government would also be approved. So, what we are doing now at CSCHEI is coordinating, promoting, supervising, mobilising all the registered NGOs, and CBOs within the context of community, social and humanitarian empowerment in Nigeria.
“It may interest you to know that presently we have over 45,000 registered civil society and NGOs in Nigeria but almost 17,242 are within the component of community social development and humanitarian empowerment. It is my privilege to inform all of you sitting here that out of this 17,242 at the moment CSCHEI has access to 7300 various NGOs working on social initiatives.”
Yusuff argued that one of the mandates of the proposed Commission would be to ensure the domestication of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in all the states and local governments in the country.
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“Our mandate is to domesticate SDGs in all the local governments in the states. The data has proven that Nigeria is far backward as far as the SDGs are concerned. In 2015, 196 nations signed into SDGs. Every year at UNGA you will see a rating of each country and how they perform. Unfortunately, right now, our rating is on the lower side of the radar and I hope with the establishment of this body and platform, your contributions will also be meaningful in achieving the SGDs 2030.”
*Ex-Speaker Bankole charges youth to take initiatives for leadership
Former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Dimeji Bankole, who chaired the launch, charged the audience, mostly youth, to take initiative and hustle for themselves as nobody would give power to them.
He equally said most of them who have held power in the past and are still holding power have embarrassed the youth enough and must move on.
He said “You must go out and hustle for yourselves. I think some of us who have held political offices or are holding political offices, I think we’ve embarrassed you enough. So it is up to you guys to get to move on.”
