The European Union (EU) has commenced the distribution of basic food items to vulnerable households in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) in furtherance of its wider support to Nigeria’s COVID-19 response.
A statement issued on Thursday by the Press Officer of the European Union Delegation to Nigeria and the ECOWAS, Modestus Chukwulaka, said a total of 2,157 households whose livelihoods have been most impacted by the crisis are targeted in the exercise. It was carried out in collaboration with local authorities of the benefitting communities, and aims at mitigating the adverse economic effects of the crisis on the most vulnerable persons.
According to the statement, the benefiting communities were selected after a thorough needs assessment conducted by the EU and its partners. The choice of the beneficiaries and distribution of the items are being done in concert with the local leaderships of the selected communities, it said.
“A quarter (25 per cent) of the items will go to People with Disabilities (PWD); the rest will go to female heads of households and widows as well as other vulnerable households in pre-selected Abuja suburbs. Each household will receive assorted food items, including rice, beans, detergents, noodles sardines, salt, vegetable oil, tomatoes, seasonings, beverages and condiments,” the statement said.
Also included in the over N40 million intervention is the installation of public sanitation facilities in the communities and provision of information booklets on COVID-19 to enhance public awareness on the virus.
The Head of the EU Delegation to Nigeria and ECOWAS, Ambassador Ketil Karlsen, who led a team for the exercise, called for solidarity to defeat COVID-19. “We are focusing on the immediate needs of the most vulnerable because they always pay the highest price when the economies are struggling,” he said.
Among them, he added, are people with disabilities, women and children – with intensified risks of violence – and poor people depending on the informal sector to get food on the table every day.
The EU has been working with the Nigerians authorities and other partners to provide a swift, effective and holistic response to the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic in the country.
Meanwhile the Nigerian Minister of Interior Rauf Aregbesola has assured that the security agencies are working hard to ensure that the borders of Nigeria at the eastern flank with Cameroun are thoroughly guarded to prevent suspected Covis-19 patients from making unwarranted incursions into the country.
The Minister said this while fielding questions during the daily briefing of the Presidential Task Force on containment of Covis-19 in Abuja on Thursday.
“There is a combined task force of the security comprising the Army, the Police, Navy Civil Defence, and Immigration patrolling in all the formations. They jointly patrol the borders, legal and illegal on all the land borders of Nigeria, particularly at the Eastern flank of the nation and they are doing a wonderful job.
“We are supported by the sub -national governments at the Eastern flank and we must commend the governments of Borno, of Adamawa, of Taraba, of Benue of Akwa Ibom, and Cross River for their support in ensuring that we have a water-tight situation at the border, so there is no fear at all,” he said.
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