The United Nations have partnered Nigerian business leaders to launch the UN Nigeria Humanitarian Fund-Private Sector Initiative, (NHF-PSI) to boost humanitarian activities.
The platform is a first global stage that will serve as a blueprint for private sector engagement in humanitarian action around the world through a UN country-based pooled fund.
Jim Ovia, Zenith Bank founder, Wale Tinubu, Oando CEO, and Ibukun Awosika, chairman, First Bank of Nigeria, are among several of Nigeria’s top business leaders who pledged donations to the fund.
This is as the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (COHA) says it has spent $70 million in providing humanitarian assistance in the north-eastern states of Borno, Adamawa and Yobe.
Samantha Newport, head of communications, OCHA, made the disclosure on Thursday in Lagos, while briefing newsmen on UN’s humanitarian efforts in the North East.
Newport said the humanitarian crisis in North-East Nigeria that had spilled into neighbouring Cameroon, Chad and Niger, was one of the most severe in the world today, as “more than seven million people are affected in the three worst-affected states of Borno, Adamawa and Yobe.
“1.8 million people are displaced internally. With other global crises competing for scarce resources, the Nigeria Humanitarian Fund (NHF) – a funding mechanism, was set up in May 2017.
“The NHF is managed by COHA under the leadership of the UN Humanitarian Coordinator in Nigeria, Mr Edward Kallon. The NHF has raised 70 million from 17-donor countries.”
According to Newport, the funds have been allocated to urgent life-saving needs, with emphasis this year in assisting new arrivals with food, shelter and safe water.
She said the NHF had continued to assist internally displaced people in crowded camps and host communities where services were stretched with new arrivals and hunger, malnutrition and sickness were rife.
In a statement by Amina Mohammed, deputy secretary-general of UN at the launch of NHF-PSI, said, “It is personal as someone who grew up in Maiduguri now affected by a crisis that has seen millions displaced and more than 27,000 killed in recent years.
“This creative and generous efforts I about leveraging innovative partnerships between the private and public sector to have real impact on the ground.”
