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Vanguard, lUESDAY. fE8IIWUIY 15. 2011-39
ENVIRONMENT WATCH
Lagos Climate Change Summit task Stakeholders BY KINGSLEY ADEGBOYE iSingfrOm the threeday summit on climate hange at the weekend, stakeholders at the 3"' edition of the annual summit organized by Lagos State Government have recommended that Lagos State should consider the adoption of the functional assessment framework approach to climate change actions as a way of facilitating the implementation of adaptation strategies. The 16-point communique issued at the end of the threeday event which took place at the prestigious Eko Hotel & Suites, Victoria Island, Lagos also noted that the state government should dialogue with business and international institutions with a view to setting short and long-term emission reduction targets to be incorporated into Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions (NAMAs) for Nigeria, developing a carbon stock exchange mechanism and policies that put effective price on carbon in order to make investors re-assess investment values and redirect their investments appropriately as well as putting in place energy and transportation policies that will encourage energy efficiency and the use of renewable energy while creating jobs. The document added that Lagos State should adopt a participatory and multidimensional approach to climate change risk assessment in its development programmes and include appropriate climate change insurance mechanism in order to hedge against the impact of climate change and' also be able to decide on the right mix between mitigation and adaptation. . The stakeholders further recommended. that Lagos State Government should take ad. vantage of the great job creation potentWs of clean energy systems by. training or retraining the citizenry in clean energy technologies, just as the State Government which has ultimate responsibility for the protection of the people of the State as well as their properties, should take climate change scenarios into account in planning and budgeting for disaster response. According to the communique, to avoid or minimize consequences of. human rights violations from climate change effects, Lagos State Government needs to strengthen stakeholder consultation While taking actions to combat climate change impacts, While the state Lagos State should adopt a participatory and multidimensional approach to climate change risk assessment in its development programmes and include appropriate climate Change insurance mechanism in order to hedge against the impact of climate change and also be able to decide on the right mix between mitigation and adaptation. Recommending that there is need for a new legal regime in the country for dealing with
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just concluded 3rd climate change summit organised By Lagos State
intra-national migrations and population displacements, the document said this legal regime should be built upon existing human rights laws and principles. The participants noted that in the area of climate change actions, the Lagos State Government must design a longterm strategy for building the
capacity to link knowledge 9f cjimate change to action, develop and implement a plan of action as well as deliver on development objectives. In order to finance her Climate Change activities, the stakeholders recommended that the State Government should leverage funds from public sources, CDM projects
and the private sector, while the state government should commit itself to a capacity-forclimate-change agenda comprising building up the multidiSciplinary communities of practice to assess GHG emissions, climate-related risks and vulnerabilities, and mitigation and adaptation options, providing conditions for
enhancing the scientific and technical capacity of researchers to help understand climate change adaptation and vulnerability, developing and making widely available participatory approaches to vulnerability assessment, encouraging broad dissemination of indigenous knowledge on climate change.
Cross riverhousingunits for civil servants rea,dy aqgust . ,;. ~JOHNBOSCO'· .communities, which have A~BAI~WURU,CALABAR. ,. delayed the work," he said. .: ,. Architect Adamu said the first A boui2~OOfthe610i;o~iIig'{200 units would be completed .t-\.u:nits constructed ill " .':.in .six months as foundation Akpab~yo near Calah!U for . would be raised next week Civil~l'ublicServantsllythe ; .adding that materials are bulk Cross' River State c;ovemment ,'purchased from various is exjiect~ to be comple~ in companies while the sand, Angust this year.. ,:,,>.~. gravels and labors are source Bl,lt .the landlorQ c{)mmunity . locally. Atimbo.iS complainIDg that the He said the project has a State Government still, owes minor digression from the them. Nll million, being initial conceptualization stating balilllce .of the compensation that it would no more be for the economic !;rops in the mortgaged to civil servants as vast mass of lands that was earlier planned but would be acqUired for the project. , placed on out right sale to them The Assistant. Project and other members of the Ma,nager of Aso Investment public. and Pevelopment Company On the cost of the houses he PLC, that is handling the said that none of the structures construction work, Architect would be less than N3million. Mandela Adamu said "We can also do mortgage for although, the project was billed interested buyers who would for completion last year,' his pay for a long time. It is going company was only mobilized to to be a contributory saving site December, 2010 and scheme with our finance out fit, mentioned hitches from the Aso savings. All Y(Ju need do community among others as is to give us details about your some of the draw backs. job status and all of that as a "They initially wanted us to civil or public servant", the pay N500 per linear measure Assistant Project Manager excavation work, but we had to mentioned. He further disclosed that the talk and talk till we arrived at N200 and that actually took'us housing units include three time. It was not a one day thing. bedroom detached bungalow, Besides, there are other factors three bedrooms Semi detached still from the land lord bungalow, two bedrooms
detached bungalow, . tw.o· bedroom semi detached bungalow and p)le bedroom' terrace bungalow among others. Adamu ruled out logistic problems adding:that the job would be dilliverec\ on record time. . . The· State Governor,LiYel lmoke had in 2008 performed. the ground_breaking.·: ..Jor housing estate for 'civil serVants in the state assuring that the project which was to be on jointly funded' would be completed in 2010. But the commu.nity demanding the compensation is claiming that the N11million is the balance of the compensation for the land' belonging to the three landlord communities of Ikot Asuquo Ukut, Ikot Ansa Archibong and Atimbo, for roads bisecting their communities constructed at the instance of sitting 'the housing projects on their land. The communities also want the 100 housing units free since the government has taken a larger expanse of land even as those whose houses and lands were usurped into the project are till date stranded. They argue that although. government has paid for economic trees, but compensation for their land
has notb~\h:l :paid, whereas';more ofJheif.'lari(l continues to" be seized'(Qr: the project. Acco~ to them, since thE} initial 'plan of government to mortgil¥'~ houses to civil servants .bi!YQ been changed ~o:, outrigp.t.s~to tJ1e public, it was '.' neces~ar:y :.:·to .. review the' arrangeinei1H~' their favor . hencethe(:an'fo'cl00 housing, units ,to 1;heID'{ree to compensate." for the 19ss.:cif iheir farm landand land sj:laf:e. YO)lth.#a,der of the lkot' Asuquo,: U\<ut community, Princjl... 'Edet Hogan who commented on the develllpment said they gave out the vasl'land mass because goverrunent had caused them to believe ·giving out the land would be for sitting industries and thus.beneficial to them but alas it turned out to be residential buildings which according to him would only have little impact on them. Again, he remarked that the state officials had written to them with the purpose of taking the entire land for the project but that attracted a swift response as the community resisted that only a portion of the community land was given out and not the entire land as earlier insinuated.