Benue state governor, Rev Fr. Hyacinth Alia, on Tuesday, said the current humanitarian situations in the State occasioned by insecurity truly deserved global attention and urgent intervention.
Governor Alia who disclosed this, when he received the team of officials from the United States Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance (USBHA), said over 1.
5 million people in the state are currently without homes and have no access to potable water and other means of livelihood.
He stated that the government and people of Benue state have been threatened by insecurity due to herdsmen attacks, kidnapping and armed banditry activities.
He informed the officials that his administration, on assumption of office, encountered an enormous humanitarian crisis occasioned by various forms of crises and natural disasters, which has left the state with one Million, five hundred thousand (1.5m) IDPs across the state.
“Benue state has continued to experience intense conflicts and tensions as a result of herder/farmers clashes, kidnapping, armed banditry which have continued to disrupt the agrarian lives of our people”.
“Insecurity is yielding a growing concern in our state. However, our administration is committed to finding lasting solutions to these disputes and fostering peaceful coexistence among all residents in the State. Towards this end, we decided to adopt the “three Rs” – Reconciliation, Rehabilitation and Rebuilding in the affected areas of the State.
“My administration is working assiduously to resettle the Internally Displaced Persons, (IDPs), back to their ancestral homes,” Alia stated.
The governor while thanking the United States Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance(USBHA) and the International Organization for Migrant (lOM) for coming to the aid of Benue State, called on other development partners working in state to support his administration and develop a comprehensive template would bring a lasting solutions to the humanitarian crisis in the State.
In his remark, the leader of the team officials and Senior Humanitarian Advisor to USBHA, Patrick Robinson, said they were in the state to assess the humanitarian situation in Benue so as to see which area they could assist in resolving the crisis.
He maintained that USBHA have been intervening in the humanitarian crisis in Nigeria since 2016, where they have rendered tremendous assistance to the government of Borno State and currently intervening in humanitarian activities in the Northwest.
He thanked governor Alia for the warm reception accorded the delegation and assured USBHA would do its best to address the challenges confronting the State in the area of humanity.
Earlier, the Executive Secretary, Benue State Emergency Management Agency, (SEMA), said his office had put up a resettlement data plan that will also be submitted to the government for immediate actions.
