By Chuks Oyema-Aziken
The Victims Support Fund (VSF) Task Force on COVID-19 has disclosed plans to distribute food items and medical consumables to Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) and the vulnerable in Northeast.
Recall that the Chairman, VSF, Lt.-Gen. T. Y. Danjuma (Rtd.) recently inaugurated the Task Force.
The 6 member Task Force is mandated to provide palliative measures to Internally Displaced Persons and other vulnerable groups around the country, as part of its contribution to national efforts to fight COVID-19.
The IDPs were sacked to take refuge in camps during the decade Boko Haram insurgency in Borno, Adamawa, Taraba and Yobe states.
Head of task force, Mrs. Toyosi Akerele-Ogunsiji, in Maiduguri on Tuesday disclosed that critical stakeholders and partners in insurgency affected states are to be provided with medical consumables to prevent coronavirus spreading into IDP camps.
“We’ll distribute a unit each of 10 kg bags of rice, beans, maize, four litres of cooking oil and two kg of salt to the IDPs in camps and host communities,” she said.
She said the task force will embark on sensitization to IDP camps and host communities of Maiduguri, Dalori, Dikwa, Pulka, Monguno and Gwoza, a border community with Cameroon.
The sensitization campaigns were to inform and educate the IDPs on the need to observe hygiene and sanitation guidelines to prevent further spread of the deadly virus.
She said VSF is committed to sustaining efforts in the global fight against the devastating COVID-19 pandemic.
“We’ll continue to work to provide succor to victims of insurgency and armed conflict in Nigeria especially in the areas of livelihood and recovery,” she said.
According to her, intervention support, included education and protection, infrastructural development as well as research and peace building.
