The Federal Government has again challenged governors on the need to address the level of poverty among rural dwellers to make life more meaningful for rural communities.

The Minister of State for Budget and National Planning, Clement Agba, said this while addressing State House correspondents at the end of the virtual meeting of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) in Abuja on Wednesday.

Agba stated that the governors must brace up and do more to alleviate poverty in rural communities across the country.

The minister said: “In the course of working on the national development plan, we looked at previous plans and said why they didn’t do as much as was expected.

”We also looked at the issues of the National Social Investment Programme.

“At the federal level, the government is putting out so much money but not seeing so much reflection, in terms of money that has been put into alleviating poverty, which is one of the reasons the government also put in place the national poverty reduction with growth strategy.

“But if the federal government puts the entire income that it earns into all of this without some form of complementarity from the State governments in playing their part. It will seem as if we are throwing money in the pond.

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“The governors are basically only functioning in their state capitals, and democracy that we preach about is delivering the greatest goods to the greatest number of people.

“And from our demographic, it shows that the greatest numbers of our people live in rural areas, but the governors are not working in the rural areas.

”Right now 70 per cent of our people live in rural areas. They produce 90 per cent of what we eat. And unfortunately, 60 per cent  of what they produce is lost due to post-harvest loss and it does not get to the market.”

Also addressing the correspondents on the outcome of the FEC meeting, the Attorney General and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, disclosed that the council approved N630 million for the engagement of a consultancy services firm.

Malami stated that the firm will assist the nation in the deployment of technology that will help reduce risks and damages associated with the award of contracts.

He said the memo presented by the Ministry of Justice would help address all forms of deficiencies associated with contracts that expose the nation to higher risks and damages.

“This memo is intended to bring about a new development in contract administration in Nigeria, by way of deployment of technology, building capacity and specialisation, and developing a continuous checklist of all existing contracts.

”It also intends to ensure that the interest of the Nigerian government in all contracts to be considered by Ministries, Department and Agencies, are adequately addressed, to ensure that the government is not subjected to higher risks as it relates to damages and deficiency in contracts that it may sign with third parties.

“At the end of the day, the council approved the contract for consultancy services in the sum of N630, 132, 750 inclusive of the 7.5 percent value added tax, with a completion period of six months,” the AGF said.

The Star