MAKURDI – The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Nigeria has provided Benue State with agricultural materials to support the estimated 10,000 Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) residing there. The provisions include basic items to allow the IDPs to resume their agricultural livelihoods, including herbicide, high-yielding maize and rice seeds, aluminum pots, aluminum zinc and mosquito nets.
While handing over of the agricultural provisions to the Benue State Government for distribution, the senior liaison officer of UNHCR Nigeria, Mr. Wahid Ben Amor, on behalf of the UNHCR Representative to Nigeria and ECOWAS, Ms. Angele Dikongue-Atangana, conveyed the importance of this aid, stating that IDPs would be able to return to their agrarian lifestyle to again earn an income.
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Amor thanked the Benue State Government for their continued efforts to alleviate the plight of IDPs and affirmed UNHCR Nigeria’s commitment to continue to provide assistance and protection to the IDPs.
In his remarks the Benue State Governor, Mr. Gabriel Suswam, represented by the Attorney General of the Benue State, assured UNHCR that both local and state governments would continue to work with partners like UNHCR to find a lasting solution to the IDPs crisis.
UNHCR Nigeria has a longstanding partnership with Benue State, including through BENGONET, a consortium of Benue State NGOs. At the beginning of the year, UNHCR and its partners repatriated over 400 Cameroonian refugees to Cameroon, which Benue State had been hosting since 2008.