US releases $13m for Boko Haram victims in North East

The United Nations humanitarian agency, has released $13 million from the Central Emergency Response Fund, CERF, to provide life-saving assistance to 250,000 persons in North-east of Nigeria that have just become accessible.

This brought the total CERF support to more than $70 million.

$27 million was allocated in March 2015 to assist more than 1.6 million Internally Displaced Persons, IDPs, refugees, returnees, and host communities in Cameroon, Chad, Niger and Nigeria.

An additional $31 million was provided in early 2016 to help 700,000 people in the Lake Chad Basin.

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The destruction of crops and looting of livestock have left many unable to support their families.

It has been gathered that more than 50,000 persons are in need of seeds and tools for the upcoming planting season and CERF funding will help them to rebuild their livelihoods by providing food, including the all important child nutritional supplements.

In a statement yesterday, Stephen O’Brien, on behalf of the UN agency, the international community must take advantage of the better access to vulnerable people to reach them with essential services and build on the CERF allocation to scale up the response.

“The humanitarian crisis in North-East Nigeria is massive and alarming: 15 million people are affected by the violence instigated by Boko Haram including seven million people who need urgent humanitarian assistance,” said Munir Safieldin, the acting Humanitarian Coordinator.