The World Bank and UNDP have promised to assist states in Nigeria to achieve development and economic growth through the Nigeria Governors Forum (NGF) Secretariat. Mr Onno Ruhl, Country Director of the World Bank, made the promise on Wednesday at a stakeholders’ meeting on State Peer Review Mechanism (SPRM) to kick-start an induction programme for governors-elect in Nigeria.

He said that the World Bank particularly, had been looking forward to assisting states in Nigeria achieve their development drives and had decided to open dialogue with the NGF Secretariat to achieve the goal.

Ruhl said that the World Bank would work with the NGF through its State Peer Review Mechanism (SPRM) initiated by it to ensure healthy competition among governors with the objective of ensuring equal development across the country.

“We will like to open up a dialogue with the NGF to see how we can use the SPRM to effect change and development across the states of the federation. We are going to open a dialogue because that is the only way we can make our contributions and support the development of the country,” Ruhl said.

He commended the NGF peer review initiative, adding that it was bound to drive development in states because of the healthy competition it created among governors. Mrs Ade Lekotje, the Country Director of UNDP, while commending the peer review initiative, said that it was one of the most important and innovative programmes for promoting good governance in Africa.

She added that such exercise had been known to provide benchmark for self evaluation, monitoring and development of states which was critical to the development of every country. She said that the UNDP had in place a Programme to support the development of Nigeria‘s capacity and to fight poverty and other manifestation of underdevelopment.

She said that to have maximum effect, UNDP had streamlined intervention to focus on 14 states in the country. She added that it had also developed relationship with the NGF on how best to support development at the state level. Lekotje, said that the UNDP encouraged the sharing of best practices amongst states as derived from the peer review exercise. Gov. Bukola Saraki of Kwara and NGF Chairman, expressed optimism that with the SPRM, the future of the country was bright to ensure development and improve the economy.