The Presidential Initiative for the North East (PINE) has concluded arrangement with LAFARGE Company, maker of Ashaka Cement PLC, based in Gombe State to invest about 100 million dollars in order to create jobs and alleviate poverty created by activities of Boko Haram sect in the region.
This was disclosed yesterday by the Secretary of PINE, Mallam Umar Gulani, who was in Maiduguri, the Borno state capital with his team to distribute relief materials to victims of insurgency in the state.
In Jere local government alone, more than 5,500 bags of rice, sanitary materials, rain jackets among others, were freely distributed to over 30,000 households, including the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) at various camps.
Gulani said he was in the troubled state to personally monitor the distribution of 79,000 assorted bags of 10 kg packaged rice and other relief materials to the people of the state, in line with the federal government’s determination to cushion the hardship faced by victims of Boko Haram, especially the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) taking refuge at various camps in the state.
He noted that, PINE on Monday, had already distributed relief items to people living in Nganzai, Magumeri, Biu and Damboa council areas, while Maiduguri metropolis and Jere, which constituted the largest population received their own shares on Tuesday.
Gulani, who took his time and visited some IDP camps and distribution centres at Farm Centre, Gomari Airport primary School, Old Gomari primary school and Mairi primary school, expressed happiness with the orderly conduct exhibited by victims who queued in to receive the items.
He promised that PINE was working assiduously with other agencies to ensure that victims of insurgency were not only taken care of in terms of provision of food and non-food items, but to economically integrate them into the society by rebuilding their destroyed houses, places of business, schools and hospitals.
He said, to achieve this goals, PINE had set up short, medium and large term plans for the traumatized people, through improvement and engaging in modern agriculture and other occupations to create jobs for the teaming unemployed youths in the region.
The short and medium term plan according to him, was the ongoing distribution of relief materials as palliative measures, provision of mobile clinical facilities to areas recently liberated by the military, rebuilding their destroyed places of worship, houses and business centres, while the long term plan will involve partnership with national and international investors to create jobs and generate revenue to the poverty stricken region, especially Borno state which is the epicenter of Boko Haram.
Comments