Minister asks embassies to assist IDPs     

Minister of state for foreign affairs, Khadija Bukar-Ibrahim, has urged foreign embassies in Nigeria to come to the aid of the internally displaced persons (IDPs) scattered across the country.

Bukar-Ibrahim made the call when the Egyptian Embassy donated relief materials, which include medical and food items to the displaced persons at the IDP camp in Durumi, Abuja.

The embassy had also facilitated the visit of some medical doctors from Egypt to offer medical support to the displaced persons suffering from various ailments.

The minister commended the embassy for the initiative and identifying with the need of the displaced people at the crucial moment of their lives.

“It is important that we play our parts, and the gesture should be emulated by other countries,” the minister said.

In her words: “Having seen what the Egyptian Government has done today; they have supplied medicals, they have supplied medicines, and they have supplied items of food, they have also supplied so many things here today and doctors have flown in from Egypt to attend to the IDPs, so seeing that, I think others will emulate.”

According to her, the gesture will go a long way to alleviate the suffering of the people displaced by the insurgency in the northeast who sought refuge outside their home state.

The minister said that Nigeria was indeed touched by the humanitarian gesture and the fulfilment of a promise made during the Egypt Grand Imam’s visit to Nigeria in May.

“This is a show of fraternity in a time of need which we will not forget,” she added.

She advocated for the need to train the IDPs in some skills so as to have something to fallback to after life in the camp.

The ambassador of Egypt to Nigeria, Ashraf Salama, said the gesture was at the instance of the Grand Imam of Egypt, Ahmed El-Tayeb, who was in Nigeria recently.

The envoy, who pointed out that the gesture would also be replicated in other IDP camps in the FCT, said the exercise would take four days.

The chairman of Durumi IDP Camp, Ibrahim Amodu, on behalf of the IDPs, thanked the Nigerian and Egyptian governments for the support.