Ebonyi State governor, Francis Nwifiru’s appeal to the federal government to establish a natural disaster fund from which the state can draw to handle some of the disasters he claimed have affected the area is amusing to say the least.. It is an intriguing reminder of the governors’ tendency to seek what, in our view, is an easy way out of routine administrative challenges using cheap slush funds provided by a conniving federal government.
Nwifuru told a team from the Revenue Mobilisation, Allocation and Fiscal Commission that Ebonyi has faced numerous disasters recently and therefore needed funding support from the federal government, hence his call for the establishment of a Natural Disaster Fund.
Clearly, the call is aimed at establishing agencies that will ultimately create more bureaucracy with the attendant waste of public funds. Nigeria is not short of agencies and/or commissions responsible for addressing or mitigating disasters, whether natural or man-made.
A country with regional development commissions to address the critical challenges of all the component states, a country with a National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) supported by state equivalents in each of the 36 states and the FCT, and an Ecological Fund domiciled in the office of the secretary to the federation, all saddled with the responsibility of addressing disasters and other critical development challenges, has no reason to seek to establish yet another agency under any guise as suggested by Nwifuru.
The Governor knows that, for Ebonyi State, the newly established South East Development Commission (SEDC) is responsible for addressing the vital development needs of the states in the catchment zone.
In any case, funding for all essential intervention agencies, whether NEMA, SEDC, or the Ecological Fund, originates from the same source: the Federation Account. How, then, can additional agency be created for the same purpose when the source of funding has neither changed nor enhanced?
The snag is in the management of these resources. The challenge has always been proper fund management. For example, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), 36 states received N22.90 billion as ecological funding from the Federation Account Allocation Committee (FAAC) between January and May 2025.
The fund aims to address environmental issues such as erosion, desertification, flooding, oil spills, and drought. However, states recorded flood disasters with very little or no remedial measures, suggesting that the ecological funds in most states were mismanaged.
Rather than calling for the establishment of a new agency to manage disasters, Governor Nwifuru should scrutinise how his colleagues, governors, utilise the monthly allocations they receive from the federation account. We must state, that a key issue with these funds is mismanagement. Governors spend them as if they were their personal money, often on trivialities and to sustain political patronage.
It is evident that the core issue is a spending problem, not a revenue problem. In Nwifuru’s Ebonyi, why should establishing an international airport be a priority? Although the project predates his administration, Ebonyi clearly does not need an airport, as most airports in the country have been declared unviable.
Already, the Ebonyi state government has spent over N50 billion on constructing the Chuba Okadigbo International Airport. In fact, Governor Nwifuru’s administration allocated over N20 billion to rehabilitate the airport’s runway, a project that is clearly not a priority for the state or its people.
Both Governor Nwifuru and his predecessor, David Umahi, who established the airport, recognise that only a small proportion of the state’s citizens can afford air travel. The claim that the airport will position the state as a centre of economic activity is unattainable because the government has not been able to effectively address the challenges of the state’s largely agrarian economy.
Had the money spent on the airport project been used wisely and invested in profitable ventures, would the state not be in a better position to effectively address the disasters being complained about?
In our opinion, Governor Nwifuru’s call for the federal government to establish the Natural Disaster Fund is ill-advised. No nation solves problems by creating multiple agencies with overlapping roles.
Nigerians are calling for the full implementation of the Stephen Orosanye Panel report, which, quite rightly, in the view of most well-meaning Nigerians, recommended abolishing and, in some cases, merging certain ministries, departments, and government agencies.
We firmly believe that there is no need to establish additional agencies now or in the near future, especially when existing ones can effectively address the challenges being raised in the case of Ebonyi state.
