By Kazeem Waris
The Director-General of the Institute for Peace and Conflict Resolution, IPCR, Dr Joseph Ochogwu, has warned that Nigeria risks paying a far higher price for violence unless it urgently increases investment in peacebuilding and conflict prevention.
Ochogwu said the cost of preventing conflict remained far lower than the economic and human cost of responding to violence and rebuilding communities after conflicts.
He spoke yesterday at the 2026 Peace Awards Ceremony, organised by the IPCR in collaboration with the Ufuk Dialogue Foundation to commemorate the International Day of Peace in Abuja.
Speaking on the theme, “Investing in Peace: A Collective Responsibility for Everyone,” the IPCR boss said Nigeria must move away from a system that reacts to conflicts after they erupt to one that deliberately invests in prevention, early warning, peace education, youth employment, community mediation, justice reform and psychosocial healing.
“In 2024, global military expenditure crossed $2.4 trillion, while peacebuilding spending remained below $60 billion — barely 2.5%. We fund the bullet, not the classroom that could have prevented the trigger,” he said.
Ochogwu said peacebuilding investment must be tailored to the different security and conflict challenges confronting various parts of Nigeria.
He identified extremism in the North-East, banditry in the North-West and North-Central, resource-based conflicts in the Middle Belt and separatist agitation in the South-East as areas requiring targeted peacebuilding interventions.
According to him, the Federal Government’s economic reforms under the Renewed Hope Agenda should also be seen as investments in peace because job creation, poverty reduction, social inclusion and trust-building could strengthen communities against violence.
He identified inadequate funding, fragmented interventions, weak tracking of peacebuilding expenditure and the greater visibility given to security hardware than conflict prevention as major factors responsible for the country’s inadequate investment in peace.
The IPCR DG said the economic consequences of violence were enormous, noting that violence cost the global economy about $19.1 trillion in 2024, while Nigeria had lost billions of dollars to farmer-herder conflicts and infrastructure destruction caused by violence, particularly in the North-East.
To reverse the trend, Ochogwu proposed a five-point Peace Investment Compact involving government, the private sector, faith and traditional leaders, civil society, the media, academia and citizens.
He called on the Federal Government to fast-track the National Peace Policy, establish a National Peace Investment Fund and strengthen the coordination and early-warning mandate of the IPCR.
He also urged the private sector to commit one per cent of its corporate social responsibility, CSR, spending to peacebuilding initiatives.
Faith, traditional and community leaders, he said, should strengthen dialogue and dispute-resolution mechanisms at the grassroots, while civil society organisations, the media and academia should help counter hate speech and disinformation, generate local evidence and support the development of a Peace Investment Tracker to monitor peacebuilding expenditure.
Ochogwu also called on ordinary Nigerians to see peacebuilding as a personal responsibility by conducting themselves peacefully, reporting early warning signs, accommodating others and mentoring young people vulnerable to violence.
Earlier, President of the Ufuk Dialogue Foundation Nigeria, Mr Emrah Ilgen, said the Peace and Dialogue Awards were established to honour individuals and organisations whose contributions had promoted peace, understanding, reconciliation, humanitarian service, education and peaceful coexistence in Nigeria.
Ilgen said Nigeria’s diversity should be treated as an asset rather than a source of division.
“For Ufuk Dialogue Foundation, investing in peace means investing in relationships. It means creating opportunities for people who may not always agree to sit together and dialogue, listen to one another and focus on what they have in common rather than the differences between and among them,” he said.
He thanked the IPCR and other partners for sustaining the awards, saying the initiative was designed to encourage more Nigerians to participate actively in peacebuilding.
The Chairman of the occasion, Inspector-General of Police, IGP Olatunji Rilwan Disu, represented by Assistant Inspector-General of Police, AIG Victor Olaiya, said peace and democracy were mutually reinforcing.
He said lasting peace depended on the rule of law, political participation and respect for human dignity.
Disu said the awards recognised contributions to national unity, good governance, social justice, community peacebuilding and conflict resolution through dialogue.
He urged recipients of the awards to regard the recognition as a renewed responsibility to deepen their contributions to peacebuilding.
The IGP also appealed to Nigerian youths to shun activities capable of distracting them from their goals or damaging the image of their families and country.
The awards recognised contributions across youth development, education, media, sports, arts, culture, humanitarian service, community peacebuilding, interfaith dialogue, gender sensitivity and support for persons with special needs.
Disu urged Nigerians to make peace an everyday responsibility, saying: “Where there is dialogue, there is hope, where there is understanding, there is trust, where there is trust, there is cooperation and where there is peace, there is progress.”
