The Minister of State for Budget and National Planning, Prince Clem Agba, has said state governors were partly responsible for the rising rate of poverty nationwide.
Agba accused the states of neglecting the rural areas and focusing development on state capitals alone.
He said the development has further encouraged higher rural-urban drift, putting pressure on cities’ infrastructure, and enabled jobless migrants to constitute security threats in urban centers
The outgoing minister spoke at the end-of-tenure press briefing on the achievements of the ministry.
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According to him, President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration has improved the state of infrastructure in the country by 20 per cent compared to what he met on the ground upon assumption of office in 2015.
He also said the country needs $2.3 trillion to bridge existing infrastructural gaps adding that the government is required to spend N150 billion annually over 10 years to fix infrastructure.
Agaba however pointed out that since August 21, 2019, when he was sworn in as minister, the ministry under his watch has recorded numerous achievements including the development and implementation of critical growth and development blueprint for the country.
“Overall, we inspected and inaugurated federal government Projects in the country. We developed a citizen-based web app-The Eyemark- to enable Nigerians in the country and in the Diaspora to track the execution of capital projects and report progress to the government. We saw to the implementation of Grid 3 Technology, which deploys Geospatial data for evidence-based decision making and promotion of effective coordination,” he said.
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