Presidential Committee Distributes Relief Items To Borno IDPs

The Presidential Committee on the North East Initiative has flagged off distribution of relief items to Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) living in the host community in Maiduguri, the Borno state Capital.

Available statistics indicate that out of over two million people displaced by insurgency in Nigeria’s northeast, only 350 from Borno live in conventional makeshift camps.

The state government said others live within the host community either with relatives or alternative arrangements.

The PCNI sub Committee led by the Director General of the National Orientation Agency, Dr. Garbai Abari, observed that these group of survivors required humanitarian support.

“The very fact that they are not in their respective communities, the very fact that they are not in their homes these are internally displaced persons that have been housed by the state government led by respective households.

“What we are addressing here are people who are living with families. There are others that we are going to address that are in IDP camps, this one is not a conventional IDP camp but it is actually an IDP camp only that they are living with their families,” he said.

The first beneficiaries are residents of the Yerwa Peace Estate, built by the Borno State government for residents who lost their homes to insurgency in Ngarnam area of Maiduguri.

Community leader, Lawan Gana-Abba, explained that the Peace Estate now houses more IDPs than the original occupants of the estate.

“Everyone here is accommodating relatives. When the villages were spoilt, everyone came to stay with family members until this place got filled up – there are a lot of them here.

“Today they have brought relief items for them and we thank our governor and president,” he told reporters.

According to a resident, “all 432 houses of the estate accommodate IDPs, with some living with their relatives while others got allocations.

A beneficiary, Modu Umar, explained that “since the government built these houses, nobody has ever come here with help for us so we are really grateful that this committee considers us and has made food available to every household here”.

The IDPs forced out of their original homes are made to live in the capital city of Borno, until their homes, mostly destroyed by insurgents, are liberated and rebuilt for civilian habitation.