- May reintroduce monthly sanitation
As governments at global, national, and sub-national levels develop strategies and tactics to mitigate the impact of climate change realities in their respective territories, the Kaduna State House of Assembly (KSHA) has declared its intention to revive aggressive tree planting in the State through the Ministry of environment and natural resources.
The Assembly is also considering reintroduction of monthly sanitation exercises in its 255 political wards spread across the 23 local government areas to keep the state greener and cleaner.
Chairman, House Committee on Environment, Usman Danlami Stingo who stated this at the opening of a two-day engagement to foster civil society-lawmakers collaboration for effective and sustainable climate action in Kaduna State, held at the Common Room of the Assembly, added that the concerned government authorities would go beyond theory in revamping trees planting in the State.
The engagement was organised by Bridge That Gap Initiative in collaboration with the Network of Civil Society in Environment (NCSE) with support from the Nigerian Conservative Foundation (NCF) and the Nigerian Climate Justice Alliance.
According to the lawmaker, “we are glad that the State Assembly is being carried along in this climate change campaign. We appreciate all you do to ensure the House succeeds in its mandate and the state moves forward. We are proud to say Kaduna State is a pacesetter where a programme of this nature is replicated in other states.
“Denial is the major challenge of climate change which may be because a lot of people have no means to engage institutions to access information on how to address climate change but are rather concerned about how to survive based on limited ideas that existed within their immediate environment.
“Climate change is here with us and there is no pretense whether it is there. So we want to see how we can mitigate this challenge in diverse ways and we are happy that the CSOs are there to offer support.
“We are also happy that Kaduna is the first state where this kind of engagement is happening at the sub-national. It means we are a pacesetter and that we will maintain.
“Having realised that trees are being felled indiscriminately without aforestation, we deem it fit that the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources go back to planting trees across the state.
“Secondly, if you move around the state, you will see indiscriminate refuse dump all over the houses, major and back streets which means brewing ground for disease and blockade of waterways.
“So once trees are planted and the environment is clean, we will have hygienic and safe communities which will increase the life span of our people”, he said.
Also speaking, Chairman, Information, NGO and Development Partners, KSHA, Henry Marah said, “we welcome engagements like this because the issue of climate change is awaiting disaster we all must work together to address.
“It has been said that the year 2023 is the warmest so far and we don’t know what 2024 will bring. So engagements like this get us educated and open our eyes to know more about what to do to forestall future crises.
“We will engage our people and at the same time work with the CSOs on relevant bills and motions that will help us to mitigate against this climate change’.
Earlier, Executive Director, Bridge That Gap, Gloria Kasang Bulus said the initiative was the first effort at strengthening the CS-Legislature engagement and accountability platform towards sectoral outcomes with a resolve for better outcomes environment protection, climate action, and sustainable natural resource management in Kaduna State.
“This 2-day stakeholder engagement will provide a platform for interaction between the Legislature, CSOs, academia, media, and development partners towards facilitating the actualisation of a permanent citizens’ legislative dialogue mechanism on environment protection, climate change, and natural resources management in the State”.
The engagement was in continuation of ongoing efforts to improve citizens-legislators engagement at the sub-national level towards an improved engagement with constituents in the area of representation, oversight, and legislation for better service delivery in environment protection and natural resources management.