President Muhammadu Buhari is back in the country after attending the One Planet Summit in Paris, the capital of France.
He was received on Thursday evening by some state governors, including Abdullahi Ganduje of Kano State at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport in Abuja.
The President, who departed Nigeria on Monday, joined more than 60 Heads of State and governments, as well as representatives of non-governmental and private organisations at the One Planet Summit in France.
He had appealed to the international community to support his country’s commitment to reducing the negative effects of the climate change.
He had also told the gathering that his administration was actively promoting technologies and practices for reducing greenhouse gas emissions among others.
On the effects of climate change on Nigeria, President Buhari had said that its implications which include erratic rainfall, erosion, and desertification among others were already evident in the country.
According to his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Mr Femi Adesina, he said Nigeria had no other option than to join countries across the world to fight climate change.
Adesina, who was on ChannelsTV’s Politics Today, Wednesday, said the President made three specific requests at the conference.
Giving a breakdown of each request, he said had: “Number one, finance; to recharge Lake Chad will mean diverting water from the Congo basin and some other rivers in Africa. It takes a lot of money which all the African countries in the Lake Chad basin cannot afford; the West will have to support.
“Then he asked for technical support; you know that fighting climate change requires technology which Nigeria does not have. So he looks towards the West for that technical support and then, he talked about capacity building.
“The people that are going to spearhead that fight need to have their capacities built, and so, Nigeria is looking towards the West for those three things – finance, technical support and capacity building.”
