Poverty, Insecurity in Northern Nigeria should be declared national emergency – Dogara

Former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara, has opined that the that the insecurity and poverty escalating in northern Nigeria must be treated as a national emergency not a regional concern, saying that it has become so dire in the country.
Speaking on Tuesday during a panel session at the Nigeria Investment and Industrialisation Summit, NNIIS, 2025 organised by the Northern Elders Forum, NEF, in Abuja, Dogara expressed concern at the worsening bloodshed across the region.
The former Speaker said the magnitude of killings in the North had spiritual implications, pointing out that with the kind of bloodletting that the region is witnessing, as a person of faith, one will know that the region is operating under a curse because it is human blood.
He explained that the effect of a curse is that one sweat without results, saying that it is the reason why Northerners are sweating in that part of the country without any tangible outcome.
The former Speaker insisted that security must be the top priority before any meaningful development could occur, urging governors in the 19 northern states to pool resources to combat the menace for the region to move forward in all sphere of life.
He suggested that if it would mean pulling all the 19 northern states’ resources together to tackle insecurity, they must do it, if not all their conversations here will amount to nothing.
Dogara also urged the region to stop depending on external solutions, saying northerners must take charge of their own destiny and embrace radical, transformative action to move the region forward by taking their destiny into their own hands.
He argued that without the development of the region’s vast population, Nigeria’s overall progress would remain stalled.
He believed that the development of northern Nigeria is not a regional prerogative but must be seen as a national emergency, believing that if the vast number of people we have in the North are not developed, Nigeria is going nowhere.
The summit deliberated extensively on four key themes: Power – bridging energy deficits through decentralisation and partnerships.; Agriculture – shifting from subsistence to agro-industrial transformation; Digital Economy & Innovation – leveraging technology to unlock growth; Mining – promoting inclusive and sustainable exploitation of mineral resources.