BENUE State Governor, Samuel Ortom, has decried rising Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) and influx of refugees from Cameroon to Benue, saying the state is endangered.
He noted that it was not easy to manage the refugees and IDPs.
The governor urged the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development to intervene.
Ortom spoke when he received an Inter-Agency Technical Committee from the ministry at Benue Peoples House in Makurdi.
He said: “We remain an endangered state as far as refugees and IDPs are concerned…” stressing since 2017, “the state continued to witness influx of IDPs in official and unofficial camps.”
Ortom noted: “we have over two million IDPs in Benue State that have been profiled,” saying the state hosts over 10,000 Cameroonian refugees in Benue’’.
“We have taken it as a responsibility to provide minimum comfort for the Cameroonian refugees”.
He said the government continued to prevail on the host communities to allow the refugees to settle down.
The governor noted that over 134,000 persons had been displaced as a result of the flood, saying due to early sensitisation, there were less casualties.
Appreciating the ministry’s support, Ortom urged the committee to carry out their assessment of the humanitarian situation with diligence.
He said the committee should report the situation on ground, so help could be provided to the state, adding the government would do its best in handling the challenges.
Leader of the team, Mr Murdakai Titus, of National Commission for Refugees, Migrants and IDPs (NCFRMI), appreciated the governor’s commitment in providing enabling environment for the wellbeing and protection of IDPs and refugees.
“The Federal Government of Nigeria is mindful of challenges and tensions always associated with hosting asylum seekers and refugees globally especially in the immediate host communities and Nigeria’s experience is not different particularly in Benue state.
“It is to this end that this multi-sectoral team is on this mission to your state to carry out needs assessment of the possibile humanitarian situations caused by the influx of refugees from Cameroon into Nigeria through the national border corridors, including Benue State,” he said.
He explained that, the team comprise representatives of, Federal Ministries of Humanitarian Affairs, Health, Office of the National Security Adviser, National Commission for Refugees, Migrants and Internally Displaced Persons IDPs and United Nations Partners, United Nation High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), stating that the relevant MDAs in the state will also join the team.
According to him, the exercise was to enable the Federal Government and its Humanitarian partners in collaboration with the State Government to obtain first-hand information on the humanitarian situation created by the influx of asylum seekers from Cameroon with a possible solution through a burden-sharing mechanism.