Who needs help? You or me? Or the internally displaced person's
Think about your life for a moment. You live in a comfortable house with your family, you have a job that caters to your needs (even if you wish you were paid better), your kids attend good schools and you can afford to pay their school fees every term. Now, imagine someone taking all of that away. Your home, your family, your child’s education, everything. And you are forced to live with 65 other families in a crowded school, where clean water is a luxury and your meal for the day is uncertain. That is the case of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Nigeria.
Internally displaced persons are people who have been forced to flee their homes due to disasters, violence or unrest but still remain within the borders of their country. In Nigeria, the Boko Haram insurgency has caused over 2 million people to be internally displaced, making Nigeria the home of Africa’s largest IDPs.
The scenario described above is no exaggeration. These people have lost everything and are now dependent on faith-based organisations, foundations and well-meaning individuals for their daily bread.
Let me start by saying that, Internally Displaced persons also known as IDP's are mostly victims of the inhumanity of man against man. They are victims of various kind of injustices or violence confrontations, perpetrated by either their own government against them or by others, such as, communal clashes, terrorism, riots, religious conflicts, natural disasters and so on.
At the end of 2014, it was estimated there were 38.2 IDPs worldwide, the highest level since 1989, the first year for which global statistics on IDPs are available. The countries with the largest IDP populations were Syria(7.6 million), Colombia (6 million), Iraq (3.6 million), the Democratic Republic of the Congo (2.8 million), Sudan (2.2 million), South Sudan (1.6 million), Pakistan (1.4 million), Nigeria (1.2 million) and Somalia (1.1 million).[
Using Nigeria as an example, it could be said that, the highest contributor to the internally displaced persons in the country are the Nigerian Government, from federal to state governments. It is worth to note that, since the emergence of the democratic government in 1999, the rate of the internally displaced person in Nigeria has grown beyond measure with unfavourable government policies, notably among them is the destructive demolition of houses, streets, villages and even an entire community without providing any alternative to the teeming population.
Before the advent of governments unfavourable policies in recent times, riots in places like Kano and Kaduna have always been a major provider of internally displaced persons, communal clashes in Osun state between Modakeke and Ife, and in kwara state between Offa and Erin Ile have also contributed, but since the demolition exercise which had displaced close to 3 million people in Abuja begun in the federal capital territory under the watch of the then president, Mr Olusegun Obasanjo and Minister of Fct, Mallam Nasir Elrufai, the story has not remain the same.
It was reported that, the then minister of fct, Nasir Elrufai rolled out bulldozer and demolished thousands of houses in Abuja in the name of correcting the Fct master plan. In this exercise, many landlords were reportedly demolished` with their homes even though they had genuine papers from Abuja federal capital authorities. After the demolition, some people slept and never woke up, they died of heart attack. Some were paralysed by shock received from the incident and remained on the wheel chair till date, some were not so lucky, as they died while trying to pick up the pieces of their lives, while many others fled the fct to others places to constitute what we call the internally displaced persons (IDPs). The government is said to have successfully made the city beautiful, while destroying million of its citizens.
Elrufai reportedly demolished over 300,000 houses during his reign as minister, which implies that, if at least 5 for example people were occupying each building demolished, Elrufai had displaced 300,000 x 5,which is 1.5million IDPs between 2003 t0 2007. This figure can even be more since in reality, most places demolished were mostly occupied by the poor where each building contain nothing less than 10 occupant or more.
Furthermore, the present fct minister, Bala Muhammed had also boastfully revealed that, he had demolished 126,000 houses since the beginning of the Jonathan led administration. If each of these building are occupied by at least 5 people, the Jonathan led federal government had also displaced 620,000 people within 2010 to 2012, which the total of displaced persons amount to 2.12million. Reports have it that, many women in the course of walking around without homes became prostitutes.
They need much of help, i wish they can be helped, for they are also human..
Additional source:
Wikipedia.org
wwwPremiumtimes. Com
Nema.gov.ng