..As More Nigerians Were Displaced This Year
About 11 million Nigerians need humanitarian assistance on account of the crisis in Nigeria,outgoing representative of the United Nations Secretary General in Nigeria, Edward Kallon, has said.
He disclosed this during a farewell visit on the Governor at the Benue Peoples House, Makurdi,where he also said that the 2020 Global Terrorism Index ranked Nigeria 3rd behind Afghanistan and Iraq as countries in global terrorism.
According to him, activities of herders-farmers crisis in the North Central, Boko Haram in the North East and North West, Niger Delta Avengers and Indigenous People of Biafra, (IPOB), have led to large scale migration and mass stay in Internally Displaced Persons, (IDP), camps across the country.
He said that Nigeria is currently at sea with multiple challenges which have implications on peace, development and stability in West Africa, Africa and beyond, stressing that cohesion, justice and the rule of law must be entrenched for the benefit of the country.
He emphasized the need to ensure women and youth participation in politics and productive economic activities to reduce youth unemployment and underemployment.
Receiving Mr. Kallon and his entourage, Governor Samuel Ortom, renewed his call for the convocation of a National Security Summit to discuss growing security challenges confronting the country.
Ortom who appreciated the UN Representative for his presentation expressed worries that no place in Nigeria is safe at the moment.
Meanwhile,the Federal Commissioner for National Commission for Refugees, Migrants and Internally Displaced Persons, Imaan Sulaiman-Ibrahim, ,has said Nigeria recorded One Million additional internally displaced persons (IDPs) in the year 2021.
He said the develoe has increased the number of IDPS in the country to three million, adding that it was due to the current unprecedented humanitarian crisis in Nigeria and the alarming growth rate of displacement.
According to her, over 500, 000 Nigerians are awaiting repatriation from Chad, Cameroon, Nigeria, Cameroon, Libya and other countries.
Nigeria,she said, is currently host to about 73, 000 refugees from 23 countries. Suleiman, who stated this during a budget defence session with the House of Representatives Committee on IDPs and Refugees, adding that the proposed aggregate expenditure for 2022 is N5, 740, 063, 922 comprised of N1, 182, 728, 095 as recurrent cost and N4, 457, 335, 827 as the capital component.
She explained that this was due to the increase in the number of persons of concern across the six geopolitical zones and the need for the commission’s presence nationwide, just as she called for increase in their overhead to adequately deliver on the mandate of the commission.
But the Hon. Mohammed Jega-led committee queried the commission over recurring issue of the resettlement of the people of Bakassi, of which N200 million was proposed for in 2022 budget, and urged that something be done about it permanently.
“I don’t know how long we would be resettling Bakassi IDPs. I don’t know for how long. That has been around for over 10 years. We keep resettling them. We resettle until we resettle the fourth generation. Do we have statistics? Jega said .
Another member of the committee, Hon. Awaji Inombek Dagomie Abiante said: “As as today how many have been resettled in terms of figures and percentage. So we know what is left. Let it not look as if we are pouring water into a basket. It would be unending. Every year resettlement Bakassi. How many people have been resettled. What is the percentage of the outstanding IDPs that need to be resettled?” .
