North: Highly Impoverished region- Osinbajo

The Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo, has expressed concern over the poverty in the country despite her position as the largest economy in Africa, immense population and status as the sixth largest producer of oil.

Speaking at the Northern Reawakening Forum Summit on Saturday at the Transcorp Hilton, Abuja, Osinbajo observed that in the 19 northern states of Nigeria, the human development indices “are by far poorer than the rest of the country.”

 

VP. Yemi Osinbajo

But he stressed that the challenges are the same across the country, saying “the difference is not of a kind but in degrees,” according to a statement by the Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity to the Vice President, Laolu Akande. However said the Federal Government is committed to tackling issues that affected Nigerians in any part of the country.

He said, “The Northern states occupy about 70 per cent of the land mass of the country, they also have the highest infant and maternal mortality rates in the country, the lowest rate of child enrolment in schools, highest number of unemployed young people, highest level of poverty and faces the challenge of inter-ethic and inter-religious conflict including the Boko Haram terrorism.”

The VP said the Northern Nigerian Economic Summit of 2012 was the first forum to draw attention to some of the depressing statistics about the condition of the North.

According to him, the Buhari administration has been very active in interventions in the North-East, due to the immediacy of the crisis in that axis of the nation.

Applauding the theme of the Summit, “Building a Safe, Secure and Economically Inclusive Northern Nigeria”, the VP decried the derailment from the foundations set by the founding fathers which has led to the challenges confronting the country.