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• UN Deputy SG urges climate finance surge before SDG deadline
• Sterling One Foundation CEO calls for action-oriented partnerships
• UNHCR Rep warns of escalating displacement
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From Juliana Taiwo-Obalonye, Abuja
Vice President Kashim Shettima, at the Africa Social Impact Summit (ASIS) High-Level Policy Engagement, called for reframing Africa’s development from expenditure to investment through blended finance and private enterprise.
He was represented by the Technical Adviser to the Vice President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria on Women, Youth Engagement, and Impact, Hajia Hauwa Liman, at the event hosted by the Office of the Vice President at the State House Conference Centre, in partnership with the Sterling One Foundation and the United Nations Nigeria. The event focused on “Scaling Action – Driving Inclusive Growth Through Policy and Innovation.”
He stressed that national success hinges on “the clarity of judgment and the courage of conviction that defines the solution it chooses,” positioning the summit as a space to “listen with humility, to reason with honesty, and to act with purpose.”
Shettima hailed ASIS’s growth over four editions into a key platform for converting “intent into execution,” spotlighting the launches of the Business Coalition for Education and the Women and Financial and Economic Inclusion Platform (WIFI).
“Government as a whole cannot solve Africa’s development challenges,” he said. “Our responsibility today is to reframe it as an investment—in human capital, productive systems, climate resilience, infrastructure, and inclusive markets.”
He dismissed reliance on aid, asserting, “The future of this continent will not be financed by aid and loans. It will be financed by patient capital, catalytic capital, blended finance, and private enterprise developed, deployed at scale, and guided by impact.”
Defining impact investing as “strategic capitalism” that builds civil society, educated workforces, and sustainable ecosystems, Shettima outlined Nigeria’s reforms under President Bola Tinubu in education, health, financial inclusion, and digital infrastructure. “We are building national resource architectures, not to impress donors, but to serve citizens,” he noted, welcoming ASIS as a hub for “co-investment, co-design, and co-delivery.”
Shettima urged unity among policymakers, the private sector, civil society, and youth: “Development is not done to people. It is done with them.” He warned against fragmentation, calling to “close the gap between promise and performance,” and predicted that history would judge leaders by “the systems we built” and “the institutions we strengthened.”
With just five years until the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) deadline, UN Deputy Secretary-General, Amina Mohammed, in a virtual message, warned that global progress has “faltered and, in many instances, regressed,” calling for urgent reforms amid rising debt, declining investment, and climate impacts hitting vulnerable nations hardest.
Mohammed highlighted stark inequities: “Today, 3 billion people reside in countries that allocate more resources to interest payments than to vital sectors like health and education.” She described the situation as “untenable,” noting how nations contributing least to the climate crisis bear its brunt.
Mohammed outlined three priorities from last week’s international climate conference: “First, catalysing a large-scale investment in sustainable development. Second, addressing the inter-climate debt and environmental crisis. And third, reforming the international financial architecture to better serve the most vulnerable among us.”
Emphasising Africa’s leadership, she praised initiatives like Mission 300, which aims to connect 300 million people to affordable, reliable clean electricity, and economy-wide nationally determined contributions (NDCs) that integrate climate action with energy, food systems, jobs, and growth. “Africa is already grappling with the dire consequences of the climate crisis,” she said, adding, “African nations are crafting blueprints for a just transition.”
However, she stressed that ambition requires support: “The ambitious goals you set must be met with commensurate support. Excellencies, friends, Africa is stepping up with vision, leadership, and courageous commitments. Now is the time for the international community to rise to the occasion.”
Mohammed called for a “new surge of global solidarity from governments, development banks, the private sector, and philanthropic organizations to unlock the finance, the technology, and the partnerships essential for transformative change.” UN coordinators across Africa are working with governments and the private sector to turn plans into on-the-ground impact, she noted.
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“Let us unite in solidarity to forge [a] sustainable future for all,” the UN Deputy Secretary-General concluded.
In her remarks, CEO of Sterling One Foundation, Olapeju Ibekwe, urged leaders from government, the private sector, and civil society to shift from ideas to execution.
Ibekwe emphasised that the “gathering is not simply another convening. It represents the defining shift from talk to action—from ideas, institutions, and communication systems that we all need to have.”
She highlighted ASIS’s role in uniting public leadership, private capital, government institutions, and social innovators to tackle Africa’s complex challenges collaboratively and sustainably. “That has been made possible because of partnership,” Ibekwe stated, expressing deep gratitude to founding partners like the UN system in Nigeria, finance institutions, foundations, corporates, and NGOs.
Ibekwe detailed achievements in blended finance for education, health, and humanitarian aid, as well as cross-sector partnerships expanding access to services for women, youth, and underserved communities. “From financial inclusion frameworks reaching millions of women and youth, to education partnerships expanding foundational learning, to climate resilience—these platforms have mobilised capital for adaptation and innovation,” she noted.
The summit marked a “new chapter” with the launches of the Business Coalition for Innovation and the Women and Financial and Economic Inclusion Platform (WIFI), an African Union initiative debuting in Nigeria. Ibekwe described them as “institutional infrastructure for impact, designed not for pilots, [but] for national scale—not for announcement, but for execution.”
“At Sterling One Foundation, our commitment has always been to move beyond child support to systems change, beyond interventions to institutions, and beyond access to outcomes,” she declared. Ibekwe positioned Nigeria as a leader in Africa’s development, stating, “Nigeria is not only participating in Africa’s development story—Nigeria is shaping, is delivering architecture.”
She concluded by thanking partners, including UN colleagues, government leaders, corporate executives, and civil society, signalling that “today’s engagement signals something powerful… Let us remember not for what was said, but for what is done.”
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) representative delivered a stark presentation at the summit, detailing Nigeria’s spiralling internal displacement crisis amid conflicts, insurgencies, flooding, and terrorism, and urging a pivot from aid handouts to market-driven jobs and private sector investment.
He outlined crises in the north, northwest, and east, stating, “We are seeing over the past few decades… conflict… flooding, more insurgencies, terrorism, and a series of issues that are now confounding. And as a result of these crises, we have seen large-scale displacement.”
Globally, he said, displacement has hit record highs, with “117 million people in this place” – larger than most countries’ populations – including Nigeria’s share as 3.5% of the total. Locally, there are “2.6 million who are internally displaced within the country,” including “400,000 black men… living in a wheelchair, in a family room, and in a shack” in Borno State camps, with numbers rising over three years.
He lamented that funding has plummeted despite growing needs: “Last year, we lost less than $200 million in response… less than 20% of 2023 funding, and this year, we are going to get even less.” This shortfall, he said, compounds vulnerabilities, as displaced farmers lose land access, jobs, and income, fuelling “child labour… sex for food… exploitation” during lean seasons when crops fail.
He stressed that communities demand self-reliance: “What we want are jobs. Give us a way to earn a living so that we can take care of ourselves and take care of our families. These are displaced communities. These are desperate people in desperate circumstances.” Handouts are “unsustainable,” he added; proximity solutions exist, like arable land “45 minutes” from Borno camps, ripe for market-based livelihoods over “freebies.”
Praising Nigeria’s generosity – hosting refugees from 40 countries – he endorsed the Vice President’s adoption of the UN Secretary-General’s internal displacement agenda and state action plans. He called for a “whole-of-society approach,” lamenting missed investments in unstable areas: “We are missing out on opportunities where the parents are willing to invest.”
