Stakeholders in disaster management in collaboration with the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) has drafted a new policy on national disaster management framework that will help Nigerians respond to issues of disaster and emergency.

  The Director-General of NEMA, AVM, Audu Bida (rtd) noted this on Wednesday in Abuja that the need for effective collaborative synergy among stakeholders is to ensure that disaster risk is reduced among others, which has prompted NEMA to undertake a process that will go round the entire country.

Mr Audu Bida said that the preparation of the draft which involves stakeholders is to prepare, reduce and mitigate against the occurrence of all forms of disaster, be it natural or man-made.

“The need for the framework is to identify, specify and align with responsibilities involved and provide a coherent, transparent and inclusive policy for disaster management appropriate for the country as a whole”, he said.

The Director-General also said that the framework is to create a situation where the sense of belonging and ownership by the people is initiated.

He revealed that the line is subsumed by the fact that relevant players in disaster management must be consulted to make inputs in order to have a holistic and workable framework which in the long run would be managed by them.

There is need for all stakeholders in disaster management to make input into the draft document so that it will be open to all that is why we insist on all, disaster managers making input in the drafting of the national framework.

He also said that the disaster management is an all embracing affair that connects as all with a wide multi-disciplinary, muti-stakeholding, multi re-sources, and multi-jurisdictional imperative issue, bringing together the federal, states, local governments, NGOs, private sectors and the communities with respective roles and responsibilities to play in the matter of disaster and emergencies.

The imperativeness of sustainable coordination and integration of all activities necessary to build, sustain and improve the industry’s capabilities to prepare for, protect against, respond to and recover from natural or man-made disaster is paramount to the agency he disclosed.

Bida maintained that the desire of the agency is to strengthen the capability of the Federal, State, Local Government institutions and communities to mitigate disasters in the country, which is part of government effort in managing disaster in the country.