By Joshua Egbodo
Abuja
House of Representatives yesterday approved the creation of a new standing committee on Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) and Refugees, matters for which were, hitherto, handled by the Committee on Human Rights.
Blueprint reported on Tuesday that the said committee may be underway as disclosed by Speaker Yakubu Dogara while recently playing host to head of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNCH), Ms Angel Dekonge Atangara.
The decision of the House followed the adoption of a proposal by Chairman of the ad-hoc committee on Rules and Business, Hon. Emmanuel Oker-Jev, who noted that the Boko Haram insurgency which started around 2007 had constituted the single most devastating incident in Nigeria’s history since the end of the Civil War in 1970.
He said the murderous activities of the Boko Haram sect in the North-east, especially has led to the death over 200,000 people, displacement of over five million others, destruction of property worth millions of naira and dislocation of the way of life of people of the region.
“We are concerned about the large scale of devastation of the Northeast zone by the sect and the compelling need to adopt extra military measures towards rebuilding the zone which had been akin to a theatre of war.
“We are also cognisant of the level of rehabilitation, reconstruction, re-orientation and re-integration of the traumatised and displaced people of the North-east zone requires the creation of a Standing Committee devoted exclusively to handle the tasks ahead.”
The Committee is expected to oversight Ministries, Agencies and Department (MDAs) of government responsible for IDPs, refugees, migrants and Stateless persons save those assigned to other Committees.
The Committee would, in addition, “have oversight roles and legislative responsibility over the National Commission for Refugees or any successor agency, as well as the responsibility of the Committee to relate and coordinate with multi-national and supra-national agencies and bodies with respect to the rehabilitation, reconstruction, recovery, resettlement amd development of the North-east zone, comprising Adamawa, Bauchi, Borno, Taraba and Yobe states ravaged by terrorism.”
