The UK Parliament’s International Development Committee published today their report on the work of the country’s Department for International Development (DFID) in Nigeria.
The DFID claim that their work in Nigeria “is focused on helping the Nigeria Government to do better with its own resources”.
The report “highlights regional inequalities and the depth of poverty and instability in the north of the country, despite the re-establishment of democratic civilian rule in 1999 and sustained economic growth over the past 20 years”.
It states: “With 120 million people living below or only just above the poverty line, 10% of the world’s mothers who die in childbirth and 16% of the world’s out of school children, the scale and depth of development challenges in Nigeria are significant. Despite the re-establishment of democratic civilian rule in 1999 and decades of impressive economic growth, the vast potential of Africa’s most populous nation has yet to be realised.
The proceeds of economic successes, largely from the oil sector, have not been shared evenly, with the concentration of poverty in the North contributing to marginalisation and a surge in violence that has killed thousands and devastated the lives of many millions more. Women and girls, particularly in the North, face substantial barriers to empowerment in the form of cultural, social, political and economic disadvantages. Oil wealth has sustained an exclusive political system driven by patronage, and has undermined the accountability of elites to citizens. While the election of the reformist President Muhammadu Buhari in 2015 gives cause for optimism, there is an urgent need to deliver necessary reforms to the economy and structures and processes of governance.”
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