SEMA Asks Federal Govt To Protect Benue Farmers To Harvest Crops

Benue State government has called on the federal government to deploy adequate security to unsafe communities to protect the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) across camps and for farmers to harvest their crops now that the dry season is here.

The executive secretary, State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) Dr Emmanuel Shior who made the call while briefing journalists during the monthly distribution of relief materials to IDPs camps lamented that lack of security in communities and camps has made farmers and IDPs more vulnerable to attacks.

The SEMA boss informed that the recent flooding, Gbeji attacks and the military invasion in Konshisha local government area has increased the number of IDPs to over two million.

Shior explained that even though the first protector of the IDPs is God, the federal government is expected to do the needful, by sending adequate security to all camps because currently there are few conventional securities in some camps. He added that the Community Volunteer Guards are also on ground just to gather intelligence and report back to the conventional security for onward action hence they do not carry arms.

He intimated that 134,000 persons in 44 communities in 11 LGAs of Benue State were  displaced by the recent flood while 24 persons died during the flood.

Shior also disclosed that 27, 000 persons were displaced in Konshisha LGA following the military invasion in Bonta and some neighbouring communities in the area, while 200 persons were also displaced in the recent attack on Gbeji, Mchia and Mou communities in Logo LGA where over 50 persons lost their lives as the result of herdsmen invasion.

While commending journalists in the state for telling the world the plight of Benue people, Dr Shior also urged them to do more to draw the attention of the federal government and international community just as it has done in the case of Borno where over 200 humanitarian partners are working there whereas in Benue State the partners are less than 10.

He also said that he has been directed by the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) to work closely with the council chairmen of the affected LGAs to ascertain the number of farmers, farmlands and crops affected by flood to enable them benefit from the federal government’s Emergency Agriculture Intervention Programme.