The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr. Godfrey Onyeama says lack of adequate funding is hampering the ministry efforts to deliver on its mandate.
Onyeama made this known at a meeting with the House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs in Abuja on Thursday. The minister said that funding had been a perennial problem for the ministry and appealed to the National Assembly to help address the problem.
“Our missions abroad get their fund too late and when it comes, they are already in too much debt and cannot function well,” he said.
Onyeama said that the officials of the ministry serve and carry out their duties under very difficult conditions.
“We tried closing some of our missions but we discovered that closing them was even more costly than keeping them running at a certain level,” he said.
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The minister said that downsizing foreign missions would not speak well of Nigeria in the International Community. He said that Nigeria has missions in about 100 countries requiring lots of travelling to deliver on the ministry’s mandate.
Onyeama said for the ministry to function effectively, there was a need for modern information technology which the ministry lacked.
The minister, however, said workers of the ministry were doing their best in spite of the challenges. (NAN)
