About 50,000 persons displaced by the Boko Haram insurgency are living under extreme difficult conditions, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), has said in a report it released yesterday.
The charity organisation, according to its Head of Delegation in Nigeria, Karl Mattli, has distributed food and household items to displaced persons who are taking refuge in Maiduguri, Borno State.
“Not only did people have to flee their homes in Kodunga, Kaga, Gwoza and Damboa, they also lost all their belongings and their means of earning a living. They didn’t have enough food and they lacked important basic items,” said Mr. Mattli.
“The additional strain placed on communities by hosting the displaced reached the point where it was more than they could bear.”
According to ICRC report, the organisation and over a hundred volunteers from the Nigerian Red Cross launched an emergency operation to meet the needs of the displaced persons after carrying out an assessment, leading to the distribution of 960 metric tonnes of food and other relief items to 51,000 displaced persons.
The report said most of the displaced persons were accommodated in government buildings and schools while some stayed with relatives or host families, with whom they shared scant resources.
It report notes that regardless of the kind of accommodation the displaced persons are putting up with, they cannot afford to buy their own food, therefore, have had to depend on aid provided by the state or on the generosity of others to survive.
“In the short term, the aid we have just distributed will improve significantly the well-being of the displaced,” said Janet Angelei, an ICRC economic-security specialist working in Nigeria.
“The kitchen sets, blankets, soap, mats, hygiene items and tarpaulins we have provided will meet some of their immediate needs and reduce the burden on the hosting families.”
The ICRC also distributed about a month’s supply of rice, beans, oil and salt.
One of the displaced persons from Konduga, Abdullahi Abuya was quoted by the report to have said: “Since fleeing our homes, we had not received any significant help. “Some of us had barely had anything to eat for weeks, but now things are better.”
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