Governments of the United Kingdom and the United States of America on Friday announced additional humanitarian funding of 80million pounds and 41million dollars respectively to support those affected by the menace of Boko Haram and natural phenomenon in the Lake Chad region.
Fifty million pounds out of the amount pledged by the UK will go to meet the needs of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPS) and affected communities in the North Eastern part of Nigeria ravaged by the terror group while the thirty million pounds will support those in Cameroun Chad and Niger who have also been affected by the spread of Boko Haram.
The funding commitments were made at a high-level side event on the humanitarian crisis in the Lake Chad Basin,held at the United Nations General Assembly and attended by Presidents from the Lake Chad area which is being ravaged by famine following the drying up of the Lake.
UK, had in April this year announced a donation of £32m to Nigeria to help deliver basic life-saving assistance and protection to some of those in the affected region. The US had last month announced
additional $37million for humanitarian aid in the North East part of the country.
The World Bank estimates that US$6.7 billion is needed to rebuild the North East. Recent figures showed Nigeria has 2.4million Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) with 1.9 million of them spread across Adamawa, Borno, Gombe, and Yobe states where about 4.4 million people are in urgent need of food assistance, with malnourishment affecting about 2.5 million children under 5 years old as well as pregnant and lactating women. A United Nations survey said 134 children will die daily of
severe malnutrition from this region except they are treated.
UK Minister for Africa, Tobias Ellwood said who made the announcement for the additional funding of his country said “ The UK has just pledged a further 80 million pounds of humanitarian funding, 50
million will go towards meeting the needs of work in the affected communities in Nigeria including food assistance and access to essential household items and services and 30 million to support those
affected by the spread of Boko Haram into Cameroun Chad and Niger”.
He called on international partners to increase its funding efforts, adding that it was imperative that the international community and governments of the affected region redouble their efforts.
United States Ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power who also announced the additional funding from her country noted that the Lake Chad region was in desperate need of support and the citizens and governments of the affected region could not do it alone.
“We need to dramatically increase the international assistance we are dedicating to this. United States has provided more than $380million in humanitarian aid in the region since 2015 and we would continue to do our part and we recognise that we have to do more.
“Today I am pleased to announce an additional $41million in humanitarian assistance for the region and we call on every government here to find ways to step up the support,” she said.
She quoted the UN as saying about $542 million funding is still needed to meet the unilateral needs of the people in the region between September and December of 2016 and that is more than three times what countries have given so far this year.
Earlier, Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari appealed to the international community to not delay or downplay humanitarian intervention in Nigeria’s North-East and the Lake Chad Basin stating
that “it is time for collective global action to invest in the people of Nigeria’s North-East and the Lake Chad Basin region”.
At the high-level event jointly sponsored by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the African Union, the European Union and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, Buhari expressed delight that displaced persons have begun to return to their communities in Konduga, Mafa, Benisheck and Ngala in the North-East.
On the Lake Chad, President Buhari said the shrinking of the Lake has also like Boko Haram, adversely affected the communities around the Basin by increasing their hardship.
Given the enormous challenge posed by the dwindling waters, the President noted that no single State in the region can independently meet the needs of the victims of the depressing occurrence.
“Nigeria thus, reiterates its call for stronger international action and support for the implementation of the Lake Chad Development Resilience Action Plan,” he said, even as he urged “increased global attention and active engagement than it is currently receiving.”
