Bayo Akinloye

Total Projects: 14, North only: 7, North and others: 7

Northern States alone: $1bn, North and others: $2.9bn

Contrary to President Muhammadu Buhari’s claim on Friday that his discussion with the President of the World Bank Group, Jim Yong Kim, was twisted, a huge chunk of the financial institution-backed projects in partnership with the Federal Government is based in the North, SUNDAY PUNCH can report.

The President has always been accused by his critics of favouring the northern part of the country, citing lopsidedness in various appointments made by his administration.

The latest criticism took place when Kim, divulged that Buhari had asked the bank to concentrate on northern Nigeria.

The Presidency, however, said what the President asked for was “rebuilding of the beleaguered North-East.”

But critics argued that the explanation was not tenable because Buhari was not a president of the North or North-East alone and should be canvassing for development of all parts of Nigeria, equally affected by different types of disasters.

SUNDAY PUNCH’s findings on Saturday on the World Bank website, projects.worldbank.org, showed that out of the 14 World Bank-sponsored projects in the country, seven are exclusively for the North, while six others are meant for the whole nation (South-West, South-South, South-East, North-West, North-East, North Central and North West); and the remaining one is for Lagos State. Titled ‘Projects and Operations’, these projects were listed under June 2015 – June 2017 projects.

The implication is that in addition to solely getting the lion’s share of the projects, the North also shared in the remaining 50 per cent with the South-West, South-East and South-South.

The projects exclusive to the northern region worth $1bn are: Multi-Sectoral Crisis Recovery Project for North-eastern Nigeria ($200m; Borno, Yobe and Adamawa); State Education Program Investment Project ($100m; North-East states); Community and Social Development Project ($75m; Borno, Yobe, Adamawa, Taraba, Bauchi, and Gombe); Youth Employment and Social Support Project ($100m; Borno, Yobe, Adamawa, Taraba, Bauchi, and Gombe States); Additional Financing Nigeria State Health Investment Project ($125m; Bauchi, Borno, Gombe, Taraba and Yobe) and the Third National Fadama Development Project ($50m; selected area in the North-East). The seventh northern project worth $350m is for the Kaduna State Economic Transformation Program-for-Results Project $350m. The KSETPRP, which was approved in June 2017, is expected to close on March 31, 2021.

Projects worth $2.9bn were earmarked for the nation which northern states are also expected to benefit from. They are: Better Education Service Delivery for All ($611m); Mineral Sector Support for Economic Diversification Project ($150m); NEITI Reporting Compliance ($0.32m); the Polio Eradication Support Project ($125m); National Social Safety Nets Project ($1.8b); and $200m-Agro-Processing, Agricultural Productivity Enhancement and Livelihood Improvement Support Project specifically designed for Kano, Kaduna, Lagos, Cross River, Kogi, Enugu and three other states.

There was also the Third Lagos State Development Policy Operation ($200m), a stand-alone project which was approved on June 26, 2015 and ended on December 31, 2016.

The World Bank documents did not contain any programme or project specifically designed for the South-East, South-South and the Middle Belt regions since Buhari got into power.

A document containing the details of the project on the bank’s website explained the purpose of the Kaduna project thus: “The development objective of Kaduna State Economic Transformation Programme-for-Results Project for Nigeria is to improve the business enabling environment and strengthen fiscal management and accountability in Kaduna State. This operation is fully aligned with the World Bank. Group’s Country Partnership Strategy for the Federal Republic of Nigeria for FY14–FY17. This Programme-for-Results focuses on increasing the number of jobs in the modern private sector and boosting the productivity of traditional economic sectors. Another important and complementary focus of the PforR is to support Kaduna State to increase its fiscal space and enhance expenditure effectiveness to boost investments in human capital and physical assets sustainably.”

According to the bank’s documents, the $200m-MSCRP, meant for only North-East states, is to “support the government of Nigeria towards rehabilitating and improving critical service delivery infrastructure, improve the livelihood opportunities of conflict and displacement-affected communities, and strengthen social cohesion in the North-East states of Borno, Yobe and Adamawa; and in the event of an eligible crisis or emergency, to provide immediate and effective response to the said eligible crisis or emergency.”

Similarly, the SEPIV’s objective is to finance activities to support the Federal Government’s emergency programme for the North-East to address teachers’ needs in conflict-and-displacement-affected areas; strengthen school-level management and accountability for the improvement of education quality through school grants funding; “and to enhance technical assistance to address the needs of the North-East.”

For the CSDP, the World Bank will finance the costs associated with scaling up project activities in Borno, Yobe, Adamawa, Taraba, Bauchi, and Gombe states to support the provision of basic social and natural resource management infrastructure and services to returnees and host communities with the main goal of assisting their resettlement, recovery, and welfare.

The fund, the document said, would also be “used to provide trauma and psychosocial support to returnee households and internally displaced groups and individuals, as a form of social assistance intervention.”

Shedding light on why half of the projects were exclusively allocated to the North and no special projects for the other regions, the World Bank boss at a press conference in Washington DC, United States, on Thursday, had disclosed that the bank focused more on the region based on Buhari’s request.

“You know, in my very first meeting with President Buhari, he said specifically that he would like us to shift our focus to the northern region of Nigeria and we’ve done that. Now, it has been very difficult. The work there has been very difficult...

Read More @ http://punchng.com/north-got-lions-share-of-world-bank-projects-under-buhari-documents/

Woe to whoever is surprised by this thread
The person needs a brain transplant

Buhari made it clear in America shortly after the elections that those regions that gave him 5% should not expect the same treatment as those regions that gave him 97%...

Buhari is a man of his words
We have seen dogs and baboons soak in blood
We have seen the pythons dancing
We have seen a more powerful and proud herdsmen
The corruption and nepotism in the country is mind boggling while there is a rising Hunger and despair in the land

Never have we had it this bad
Buhari is the only president on earth who has spent more time away from his country while in office...
The most tribal and vindictive man alive...
Buhari is a curse to Nigeria

President of the Fulani, North and Muslims. One Nigeria is a scam, it's either we restructure or break up.

That's why they want to deceive the current gullible nigerians with restructuring, why north secretly gets 95%, and the remaining 5% goes to the south.

That is the northern way, and Buhari was just hiding behind a finger denying the obvious. His antecedents speaks volume. Most of the money meant for those projects will be stolen, people that steals and divert food and funds meant for IDP.

This is just the beginning. More revelations about Buhari's pro-North programmes will make some of his diehard supporters to commit suicide.

Remember he paid over £2b to Boko Haram in exchange for 81girls that were never lost.