FG on Tuesday inaugurated a 13-member Presidential Committee that will help in reviewing a number and strategy for resourcing Nigerians foreign missions worldwide.
Inaugurating this committee, Mr. Boss Mustapha, who is the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, explained that the action is to help Mr. President, Muhammed Buhari to tackle the root cause of the critical state of affairs of Nigerian diplomatic missions.
This, he mentioned that, is in addition to the missions’ impact on the image of Nigeria in particular arena in general.
Mr. Boss Mustapha said “As we are all aware, our diplomatic missions around the world are currently been faced with multifaceted challenges following, among others, the scale of perennial indebtedness they find themselves”
He added that “This poses attendant damage to our nation’s integrity. Consequent upon these, Mr. President has gone ahead to approve the constitution of this Presidential Committee”.
“Let me recall at this point, some cost saving measures taken by previous administration in this regard including; reducing the number and size of missions, authorizing concurrent accreditation to other countries, enhancing and also prioritizing budgetary releases to Missions”.
He went to say that the committee will identify challenges, make adequate recommendations on sustainable steps to be taken as well as identifying reasons why previous measures by the previous government were not effective.
Speaking on behalf of other members, Amb. Martin Uhomoibhi Committee’s Chairman thanked the President and the SGF for the honor of such task.
Uhomoibhi went ahead to affirm the committee readiness to do all things within their capacities to fulfill demands and confidence reposed on them by President Buhari.