Cross Riverian Accuse NEMA Of Politicking With Relief Materials

By Efa Sunday

A young Cross Riverian, identified as Mr. Olyma Bill Ogbeche has accused the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) of politicking with the disbursement of relief materials to displaced persons across the country and Cross River State in particular.

Ogbeche made this accusation via his twitter handle @Olymzo, while commenting on a statement of sympathy issued on Friday by the President of Nigeria, Muhammadu Buhari.

President Buhari had twitted, “My heartfelt sympathy goes to the families of all who lost their lives in recent flooding incidents, as well as those who lost property. I have directed @nemanigeria to immediately provide relief assistance to all affected communities and persons across the country.”

On his part, the Ogoja born commented, “@nemanigeria is politicking with the disbursement of relief materials. For example @CrossRiverState with so much displaced persons is not given priority. Pls look into this.”

The conversation however, generated divergent views amongst Nigerians, as some clamored for pro-active measures from Government and NEMA, such as “cleaning and emptying the drainages, to allow for free water flow during raining season.”

Statistics by Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC) and published by Sun Newspaper on the 5th of July, 2019, it states that “about four hundred displacements were recorded within 3rd of July to 5th of July, 2019, due to a two- day heavy rain downpour in Calabar metropolis alone.”

Also according to the report of IDMC tracked by Displaced Tracking Matrix (DTM), out of a total population of about two hundred million people in Nigeria, about one million nine hundred and eighty thousand, and thirty-six people (1,980,036) have been displaced from January to May, 2019.

See twit below;