President Muhammadu Buhari has urged international financial
institutions to assist member states in cushioning the negative impact
of the pandemic in the spirit of solidarity.
President Buhari
said the assistance includes extending concessional loans, technical
support, lowering of tariff on medical equipment and consumables,
sharing of expertise in case management, adopting open trade policies,
as well as outright debt cancellation.
Already, countries
ravaged by the COVID-19 pandemic have been seeking loans from
international financial institutions like the World Bank and
International Monetary Fund (IMF) among others.
“Within the
spirit of South-South cooperation, we must also assist one another,
particularly the less developed and less endowed member states with
technical, medical, and financial assistance.
“It is by so
doing that we can rightly claim to uphold the Bandung Principles of
equality, mutual interests, and cooperation,” President Buhari said this
on Monday in Abuja while participating in a virtual Summit of Heads of
State and Government of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM).
The
President, who said only a collective international approach would
mitigate the devastating effect of COVID-19, assured that the Federal
Government would intensify efforts to monitor, test and isolate more
people, especially at the community level.
He added that
national, regional and global strategies would be required to tackle the
pandemic, which, he said, had ravaged humanity and caused unprecedented
devastation to the well-being of people, their livelihoods, and global
economy.
“The theme of this extra-ordinary Summit ‘United
Against COVID-19 Pandemic,’ aptly reflects the importance for a
proactive approach and the need for multilateral cooperation in finding
quick solutions to the challenges that COVID-19 pandemic poses to our
nations.
“Since the outbreak of the disease, countries have made
concerted efforts to limit the spread of the pandemic within and
outside their borders as well as treating those infected by the virus.
“Two
weeks ago, we in West Africa came together to work out a common
sub-regional response to the crisis. The summit appointed me the
Champion to lead our efforts on fighting the pandemic in our region,” he
added in a statement issued Monday by his spokesperson, Femi Adesina.
President
Buhari said the task before the international community remains
daunting, and more needs to be done to reduce the impact of COVID-19.
According to him, “It is now clearly evident that no nation can
independently and singlehandedly tackle a pandemic of this nature which
is no respecter of borders, regions or status.
“Invariably,
enhancing multilateral cooperation through exchange and sharing of best
practices is imperative to overcome the disease.
We must,
therefore, form a united front against this common enemy by being
coordinated and timely in our responses. “Furthermore, we must all
encourage and empower our scientists and medical experts to join the
quest for a vaccine and cure to this universal plague.’’
He also
told Heads of State and Government of the Non-Aligned Movement that the
central role of the United Nations and the World Health Organization
(WHO) in fighting the pandemic must be acknowledged and leveraged for
the benefit of all member nations.
