Boko Haram: Australia supports Nigeria, others with $3m

One of the destroyed villages in the North-East by insurgents

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Adelani Adepegba, Abuja

To address humanitarian crisis in Nigeria, Niger, Cameroon and Chad caused by the Boko Haram insurgency, Australia said it has allocated $3m to help fight hunger in the region.

It also said that it had dedicated  an additional $2.4m to existing projects to combat malnutrition in Niger, adding that its total global contribution to the World Food Programme for 2015-2016 was US $43.3m.

The Australian High Commission in Abuja in a statement on Monday, stated that Australia’s contribution to the WFP is being used in all four countries to assist up to 400,000 of the region’s refugees, Internally Displaced Persons and the communities hosting them to gain access to life-saving food assistance.

“Special attention is being paid to children under five, pregnant women and nursing mothers faced with malnutrition,” it added.

In a related development, a logistics firm, Greater Washington Nigeria Limited has donated foodstuffs to about 600 school children displaced by the Boko Haram insurgency at the  New Kuchingoro Internally Displaced Camp, Abuja.

Items presented to the coordinator of the IDP school, Mr. Sanwo Olatunji-David,  include cartons of noodles, bags of rice and cartons of vegetable cooking oil.

The GWL manager in Abuja, Mrs. Fidelia Dickson who presented the items on behalf of the company the donation of foodstuffs would be a continuous process.

She explained that the donation was meant to show the company’s love to the children who were forced to relocate from their community by the Boko Haram insurgency and take abode in the Federal Capital Territory in order to survive.