The Director General of the Plateau State Peace Building Agency, Joseph Lengman, has expressed satisfaction with what the Agency has been able to achieve over the years, in terms of restoration of peace and engaging peace initiatives in troubled parts of the State.

Speaking during a review of its operations in the immediate past year, Lengman acknowledged that the challenges have been many, but the Agency remained focused and consistent on delivering on its mandate, by coordinating and directing all stakeholders and their initiatives towards the ideal of entrenching enduring peace in different parts of the State.

The process of building peace and restoring confidence among the various communities and tribes, he said, has been daunting, noting that sometimes the Agency had to spend time and resources to repeat certain activities and peace engagements, in order to achieve the desired results.

The most cherished achievement in this regard during the period under review is the establishment of the Community Peace Architecture Forum, which has provided a platform for regular stakeholders’ interface, as well as keeping community leaders on the routine of building and discussing the analysis of early warning signals.

According to Lengman, a major pillar of the Community Peace Architecture Forum is the emergence of the Peace Corps, whose primary objective is to strengthen the capacitíes and structures of the Plateau Peace Building Agency, PPBA.

Lengman noted that the Agency has had a major challenge of managing the numerous and oftentimes duplicitous non-governmental organisations, NGOs, that emerged on the scene as part of the post-crisis management initiatives.

Some of the NGOs, he said, were better merged, one to synchronise their functions, and two to reduce their number to a more manageable scale.

However, he said, this effort is being frustrated by the conveners of such NGOs, who have come to embrace peace practising as a form of Enterprise.

Promising that the PPBA will strive to achieve more in the new year, the director general said accountability and transparency regulate all the engagements and operations of the Agency, as it must justify all its expenses with projects executed and results achieved.