By CHIJIOKE OKORONKWO

A National Centre for the Coordination of Early Warning and Response Mechanism has been established, with the signing of Executive Order 12 by President Muhammadu Buhari.

Laolu Akande, Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Office of the Vice President, disclosed this in a statement on Friday in Abuja.

The order, signed on June 10, establishes the National Early Warning Centre, pursuant to Article 58 of the ECOWAS Treaty and Article 16 of the Protocol on the Mechanism related to Conflict Prevention, Management, Resolution, Peacekeeping and Security.

Under the ECOWAS instruments, including the 1993 Revised ECOWAS Treaty, each member state is to establish a national early warning centre to address issues relating to threats to human security, as part of the regional body’s peace and security architecture.

The national centre is domiciled in the Office of the Vice President.

With the support of relevant national and transnational institutions, it will provide research, analysis and advisory on trends in the human security sector, cutting across the environment, public health and governance.

Other areas the centre will focus on include: human rights, food security and crime, among others, as well as support government’s responses to emerging situations in these domains.

The president had earlier approved the appointment of Mr Chris Ngwodo as Director-General of the centre.

Before his last appointment as Senior Special Assistant to the President on Policy Research in the Office of the Vice President, Ngwodo had served as Technical Assistant to the President on Justice, Conflict and Security in the office of the vice-president.

A lawyer by profession, Ngwodo had worked on conflict, human security, policy and development issues for over a decade.

A member of the presidential committee on the North-East Initiative, Ngwodo had also served in various capacities on numerous human security-related assignments. (NAN)

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