A non-governmental organization, AID Foundation, has announced plans to plant one million trees in 34 communities in the Kaduna metropolis in order to promote peacebuilding in the state.
The organization’s Executive Director, Mr. Emmanuel Bonet, revealed the project, code-named Green Peace, during an update meeting with traditional rulers in Kaduna. The initiative aims to engage 100,000 people across the two major religions in Kaduna to foster unity among them while promoting climate change mitigation, sanitation, and hygiene, and discouraging open defecation.
According to Bonet, Kaduna State residents have been divided along religious lines, which has hindered interaction and integration among them. The project will therefore encourage residents to interact with people from different religious backgrounds through planting and nurturing trees in various communities. Youths from predominantly Muslim communities will go and plant trees in predominantly Christian communities, and vice versa, while cleaning up the environment of the host communities.
Bonet explained that the tree planting would begin once the rains started and that traditional and religious leaders would sensitize their communities on the importance of the project. Celebrities from the Hausa movie industry, Kannywood, as well as the media, would be engaged in sensitizing and mobilizing youths for the Green Peace project.
The project will last for five years, and the foundation has received support from all governorship candidates in the state. Mr. Kashim Usman, head of the planning unit at Kaduna Facility Management Agency (KADFAMA), said that traditional leaders would be in charge of ensuring the implementation of the project, as they are opinion leaders and closer to the people.
The traditional rulers present at the meeting declared their support for the initiative and promised their unwavering support toward its success. Alhaji Bala Muhammad-Tijjani, the district head of Doka, said planting trees would improve the eco-balance in semi-urban and urban areas, and that it would be easy to mobilize people for the tree-planting exercise.
The Green Peace project was supposed to be implemented in 2020 but was halted due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The AID Foundation is partnering with the KADFAMA to achieve the project’s objectives.
