“We estimate that there will be almost a quarter of a million children under five suffering from severe acute malnutrition in Borno this year. Unless we reach these children with treatment, one in five of them will die. We cannot allow that to happen.” – Jean Gough, UNICEF Nigeria Representative (unicef.org/July 1, 2016)
If you can form a mental picture of the acute social dislocation and psychological trauma that millions of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) are suffering in the various refugee camps across the nation, especially in the North East, after the ravages of Boko Haram, you will immediately understand how grievous it is for anyone to steal from those poor fellows who are at the margins of life, struggling to stay alive. Reading the national newspapers on Sunday July 10, 2016 brought that stark reality to my consciousness. The Guardian Newspaper of July 10, 2016 reported on page 3 that 71 trailer loads or rice and other grains meant to ameliorate the hardships of IDPs in Adamawa State “actually arrived the state only for the items to develop wings two days after the Deputy Governor, Mr Martins Babale, flagged off the ceremony marking the distribution of the consignment, without getting to the IDPs camps.”
The Executive Secretary of the Adamawa State office of NEMA, the federal agency responsible for distribution of relief items in times of humanitarian emergencies, reported that “his agency, which is in charge of managing IDPs in the state was not involved in the distribution of grains from the Federal Government to the state.” In his words, “I cannot tell exactly what went wrong with the distribution… But we were not involved in the recent exercise.” This raises a very serious question: Who are those morally bankrupt persons stealing what is meant for IDPs?
In the same Guardian Newspaper, another news report titled “Double Trouble for Displaced Persons” on page 7 stated that, “In camps for displaced persons in Taraba State, there are allegations of diversion of relief materials… Food items donated by various non-governmental organisations (NGOs) hardly reach the intended recipients.” A displaced person in one of the camps told a reporter of Premium Times the stark reality: “We have lost count of people that have died so far in this camp. It is really a messy situation when you have to pick corpses of malnourished persons everyday; sometimes some of the dead ones may not even be discovered on time. The theft is not restricted to food items alone; drugs, toiletries, beddings and wrappers have been diverted to the market and sold by greedy officials.”
Let us move to Benue State. In the aftermath of the farmers/herdsmen crisis in Agatu, the destruction of sources of livelihood and the displacement of many people, 300 bundles of sheets of zinc donated by TY Danjuma Foundation to the community to assist in rebuilding destroyed homes has created new trouble. Daily Trust Newspaper of July 10, 2016 reported on page 19 that “the immediate past chairman of Agatu Caretaker Committee, Joseph Mgbede, is accused of cornering 100 bundles to himself. Mgbede denied the allegation.” Whatever the truth is, stealing from the poor and vulnerable is a grave sin. It is the height of moral and spiritual corruption. The Christian Bible vehemently frowns at this and is replete with curses of doom for those who exploit and oppress the poor. Add all of these national humanitarian disasters to the unfolding security emergency occasioned by acute food shortage and malnutrition in IDPs camps in the North East and you produce a cocktail of ticking time bombs.
Already reports by international aid agencies have revealed that three million people in the North East are in dire need of food, healthcare and other humanitarian aids. The level of malnutrition and starvation is said to have reached an all time high. A rapid screening of children under five performed by Action Against Hunger in Borno, Adamawa and Yobe states – the three states most affected by the Boko Haram insurgency in the North East – indicated that “some areas could be at above crises levels, with nearly 30 per cent of 4,445 children screened suffering from Global Acute Malnutrition. As a result of the ongoing conflict, people who were already chronically food insecure could remain vulnerable to emergency levels of food insecurity for many months to come” (actionagainsthunger.org).
A May 2016 report of the UN World Food Programme (WFP) titled “Nigeria in Crisis” stated that “Nearly half a million people – refugees, returnees, IDPs, as well as local communities – face an acute food security and livelihood crisis. As the lean season peaks, their numbers are likely to rise. The capacity of health centres is already stretched and the coming rainy season will further aggravate an already precarious health and nutrition situation” (wfp.org). The United Nations has also warned that some 50,000 children could starve to death this year in the North East state of Borno alone, unless urgent steps are taken to avert this humanitarian calamity. Daily Mail, a British newspaper reported that according to Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), an international medical charity organisation, “at least 188 people died in the camp of Bama between May 23 and June 22, mainly from diarrhoea and malnutrition, while more than 1,200 graves, many of them for children, have been dug near the camp in the last year.” MSF has called the situation in the North East “a catastrophic humanitarian emergency.”
Although Nigeria has the largest economy in Africa, it also has one of the highest numbers of severely malnourished children in the world: approximately 24% of children under five years old – more than a million children – suffer from malnutrition. Underneath the statistics lies the pain of human tragedy that is unfolding before our very eyes. The Federal Government must devise a new strategy to address this unfolding humanitarian disaster, which can give way to unprecedented social explosion. We certainly have a long way to go in terms of pursuing the programmes of Reconstruction, Rehabilitation and Reconciliation (3Rs) of the entire North East. Nothing less than a revolutionary Marshall Plan is needed to bring that region back to life from the brink of catastrophe.
