COP26<\/p>\n
ABUJA \u2013 President Muhammadu Bu\u00adhari on Tuesday took a position on the COP26 Climate Change Summit held in Glasgow, Scot\u00adland.<\/p>\n
He said that many of the so-called rich and industrialised nations contributing signifi\u00adcantly to global emissions were merely paying lip service to issues of climate change sus\u00adtainability.<\/p>\n
The president while but\u00adtressing his position, alleged that there was a grand plot by the world leaders to stop fund\u00ading for fossil fuel, not minding that in practical terms, what this means is the phasing out of coal, which fuels electricity by as much as 70 percent in countries such as India and 86 percent in South Africa; stop\u00adping their banks from funding projects in the petroleum sector including gas and switching to electric vehicles; decarbonising polluting industries like cement and steel; creating forests to ab\u00adsorb carbon dioxide; and install\u00ading more solar power plants in a short period of time.<\/p>\n
Senior Special Assistant to President Muhammadu Buhari on Media and Public\u00adity, Garba Shehu, who made a cursory assessment of the global summit, said it was dis\u00adappointing that at the event which attracted one hundred and twenty presidents and heads of government from across the globe converging on Glasgow, Scotland to figure out how to slow down global warming, some of the world\u2019s biggest emitters, China, with 11 percent contribution to global warming, and Russia did not register their presence.<\/p>\n
Shehu said his principal, President Buhari, made a strong point that the summit wasn\u2019t just about the regur\u00adgitation of Nigeria\u2019s commit\u00adment to climate change but an important message to the rich nations of the world that we in Africa have heard enough of them talking their talk: it\u2019s high time they walked their talk.<\/p>\n
Also chiding the world leaders, the presidency noted that Nigeria-as did all the coun\u00adtries in developing world -came there to say we are eager to con\u00adtribute to a greener planet, even though we are, for all practical purposes, non-emitters \u2013 Afri\u00adca on the overall is responsible for a mere five percent of global emissions.<\/p>\n
Buhari noted that Africa is nonetheless feeling cheated, op\u00adpressed and lied to by the rich nations.<\/p>\n
He also took to his speech to criticise the rich countries, the major emitters which brought the world\u2019s climate to this sor\u00adry state for making promises toward climate finance that till date, have remained hollow.<\/p>\n
Buhari cautioned the world leaders that the goal of tran\u00adsitioning from fossil fuel to clean energy, reaching a net zero ambition for green house emission would require critical infrastructure to be in place in developing countries.<\/p>\n
\u201cParties to the Paris Agree\u00adment are expected to transition from fossil fuel to clean energy and reach a net zero ambition for greenhouse gases emission.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe agree that net zero am\u00adbition can lead to economic transformation across all sec\u00adtors. It is a good ambition, but it requires critical infrastruc\u00adture in place, including for re\u00adnewable energy. Therefore, in Nigeria, it will take us longer time to get to net zero,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Making a case for financial support, the president stated that attaining national and glob\u00adal climate change goals would require adequate and sustained technical and financial support to developing countries.<\/p>\n
He added that greater efforts should be channeled towards assisting developing countries to meet their Nationally Deter\u00admined Contributions (NDCs) commitments through the pledges made by the developed countries to provide at least $100 billion yearly.<\/p>\n
The Nigerian leader noted that easier access to climate fi\u00adnance had become imperative because of the COVID-19 pan\u00addemic, which really battered the economies of developing countries.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
COP26 ABUJA \u2013 President Muhammadu Bu\u00adhari on Tuesday took a position on the COP26 Climate Change Summit held in Glasgow, Scot\u00adland. He said that many of the so-called rich and industrialised nations contributing signifi\u00adcantly to global emissions were merely paying lip service to issues of climate change sus\u00adtainability. The president while but\u00adtressing his position, alleged […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":204687,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-226495","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world"],"yoast_head":"\n