The Displaced in Focus

The Horizon  By   Kayode Komolafe, Email: kayode.komolafe@thisdaylive.com        

It is highly instructive that the visit of the United Nations Secretary General Mr. Ban Ki-Moon has again brought into a sharp focuses the humanitarian consequences of terrorism in Nigeria. Ki-Moon has spoken about the multi-dimensional rehabilitation of the 1.5 million internally displaced persons in Northeast. He has also drawn attention to the plight of the Chibok girls. Chillingly, it will be 500 days tomorrow that the poor girls were kidnapped from their school; but the Nigerian state is yet to rescue them. Significantly, the UN Secretary-General asked President Muhammadu Buhari to address the material roots of insurgency by expanding “educational and employment opportunities for young people.” It is also important that Ki-Moon stressed the place of human rights in the course of the anti-terror war.

Ki-Moon has not said anything new in coming to terms with dehumanising  impact  of the crisis, you may probably say. Yet the ringing reminder from the United Nations is a timely one. The significance of this global attention on the Nigerian problem is doubtless immense.  Not a few individuals and organisations have advocated such attention given the magnitude of the problem at hand. For too long the enormous human cost of the crisis has been subsumed in politics. Sadly, this politics is sometimes played in a manner that smacks of sheer inhumanity. In a way, the response to the humanitarian issues arising from the terrorist and counter-insurgency activities could be taken as a measure of our collective humanity.

For instance, weeks after the abduction of the Chibok girls last year, some persons within and outside government were still asking cynically: “ are you sure any girl was kidnapped?”  Some government officials were openly hostile to the gentlemen and ladies of the Bring-Back-Our- Girls campaign. Inexplicably, the campaigners who should have been officially saluted for asserting our common humanity became objects of harassment and abuse by those in power at that time. Some other persons elected to trivialise the national tragedy. Others merely saw the abduction as a factor in electoral calculations. A lot of callousness was put on display. However, it is irrefutable that the fate of the girls remains a central humanitarian issue in the crisis.

Similarly, the condition of internally displaced persons  in the Northeast deserves a more structured response. Yes, the abbreviation IDP (for an internally displaced person) is commonplace in many discussions of the crisis.

It is not enough to talk about IDPs; it is more urgent to bring succour to the IDPs.  Humaneness demands that the condition of the vulnerable persons in emergencies should be squarely addressed in any crisis. Apart from the estimated 1.5 million suffering social dislocation in camps located in some states of Nigeria, about 167, 000 have reportedly fled to neighbouring countries of Cameroon, Chad and Niger. Among the displaced are orphans and widows. There have been reports of births in the poor conditions of the camps. The education and health needs of the children are so obvious in many of the camps that they do not need any further advocacy. In an environment in which a majority of those who are lucky not be displaced are wriggling in shackles of poverty, the fate of those living in poorly equipped camps could be imagined.

It is in order for Nigeria to call for help from outside; but the greater challenge is how to arouse a sense of common humanity within Nigeria itself to the plight of the internally displaced persons and other victims of terrorist violence. Buhari made a lot of this call for help very well when he visited the United States recently. The World Bank is reportedly in favour of low-interest loans of $2.1 billion to affected states through International Development Agencies. Indeed, Ki-Moon’s visit would give a boost to responses from other international organisations and philanthropic bodies.

Nevertheless, there should be no illusion about the issue: without well coordinated responses from the federal and state governments as well as philanthropic organisations the burgeoning humanitarian crisis would not be definitively solved. About a year ago, former President Goodluck Jonathan inaugurated a Victims Support Fund with the respected General T.Y. Danjuma as chairman. The other day, Danjuma told Buhari that N33.54 billion is still outstanding out of the N55.92 billion pledged by donors at a highly choreographed dinner in Abuja. 

In fact, it was Buhari who recently ordered the release of the N5 billion promised by the federal government itself last year to the Fund. It speaks volumes of how much humanity is left in our midst that N33.54 billion   pledged to the Fund is still outstanding!  Some donors were probably playing politics with their pledges. If the motivation was genuinely humanitarian the redemption of the pledges would not be in abeyance a year after they were made with fanfare.

It is a matter of honour that those who have made pledges to the Victims Support Fund should make good their promise. Besides, more individuals and organisations should donate to the Fund to bolster its capacity to deliver on its mandate. The fact that the Fund would be insulated from political interference should spur more individuals and organisations to donate to it. The Fund, in turn, should scrupulously target the most vulnerable in the disbursement of the limited resources at its disposal. Its operations should be carefully structured in coordination with other interventions on the problem. 

It is more practical to imagine that ultimately the governments of the affected states would be responsible for the care of the victims given their proximity to the situation. In many respects, the rehabilitation and resettlement of the displaced would be the task of the state governments. In the circumstance, the efforts of the charity organisations should be synchronised with those of the state governments. 

An example is the IDPs camp in Uhogua in Edo State. About 1, 400 displaced persons from various parts of Northeast are taken care of at the International Christian Centre in the community. The Edo state government is making provisions for the centre and putting in place structures for education of school children among the displaced. It is soul-lifting for the displaced that they could find some refuge at the centre until it was safe for them to return home. 

We can only hope for the end of insurgency soon so that those who are displaced could return home. The rebuilding of the Northeast has grave moral and material components. It may take some time to accomplish.
Meanwhile, the internally displaced victims of the crisis should be accorded the most humane treatment as expected in a civilised society.