It said in the three North-East states
(Borno, Yobe and Adamawa) affected by the activities of the Boko Haram
insurgency, the Internally Displaced Persons were concentrated in 25
towns.
The UNOCHA stated this in the September, 2017 edition of its publication, ‘North-East Nigeria Humanitarian Overview’.
In a write-up titled, ‘Challenges and
the Way Forward’, the UN agency stated, “Outside of Maiduguri, the state
capital, civil administration and state services are limited. Most
recently, humanitarian partners have noted with concern an increase in
attacks in and outside the IDP (Internally Displaced Persons) locations.
“In many areas, there is little
indication of a return to normalcy in the near future. Trips a few
kilometres outside the LGA (local government area) headquarters to farm,
to fetch firewood or collect water – most of the time with mandatory
military escorts — carry the risk of attacks or abduction by Boko Haram.
“Market and trade activities have
drastically reduced as security measures and border and market closures
limit food. Most populations in rural areas will not be able to resume
full economic or agricultural activities in the coming months or even
years and will likely depend on aid delivery.”
The UN agency stated that despite the
significant “scale-up of humanitarian operations since October 2016, the
ability of humanitarian agencies to reach conflict-affected people with
timely humanitarian assistance, remains severely constrained outside
large towns.”
It added that at the beginning of 2017, about 700,000 people were estimated to be inaccessible by humanitarian workers.
The agency said although thousands of
civilians continued to leave highly insecure areas for main towns, there
were thousands of people outside the reach of humanitarian responders.
It added that armed conflict between the
Nigerian Armed Forces and Boko Haram insurgents was still going on in
the North-East, especially in Borno State.
“The civilian population of vast swathes
of Borno State has abandoned the rural areas and 1.7 million internally
displaced persons in the three states (over half in host communities)
are concentrated in 25 towns.”
The UN group, however, noted that there was gradual improvement of Nigeria’s 2017 Humanitarian Response Plan funding status.
It stated that as of September 1, 2017, Nigeria’s HRP was 48 per cent funded – up from 22 per cent in April.
The group noted that the trend should be sustained to enable humanitarian partners to meet the growing needs.
“The humanitarian community in Nigeria
acknowledges the need to step away from business as usual, and continue
to make concerted efforts to strengthen coordination, increase
effectiveness and bridge humanitarian development divides where
possible,” it added.
B’Haram attacking only soft targets, says Buratai
But the Chief of the Army Staff, Lt.
Gen. Tukur Buratai, said the activities of Boko Haram terrorists had
been curtailed by the Nigerian Army and other security agencies to
“desperate attacks on soft targets.”
The army chief said this in Abuja on
Wednesday at the Directorate of Army Public Relations conference, noting
that the Boko Haram terrorists would be completely wiped out within a
short time.
Buratai said, “Training is a key
requirement for our professionalism. The army, in conjunction with other
security agencies, have reached a very important stage in the war
against the Boko Haram terrorism. This is after having contained the
operations of the Boko Haram and reduced them to desperate suicide
attacks and attacks on soft targets with futile attempts to portray
themselves as a coherent force.
“We will continue to engage and degrade
them until they are completely wiped out. We are determined to achieve
this within the shortest possible time.
“This workshop will update the knowledge
of the officers and soldiers in the directorate in information
management. The misunderstandings and misconceptions by various human
rights organisations and journalists, alleging human rights abuses, will
also take a better dimension.
“The deliberations should focus on
fashioning out a better means of media cooperation to assist the army
operations. This should offer means of also improving civil-military
relations and ways to avoid human rights abuses.”
No comments: