Sultan to northern govs: Fish out IDPs billions
By AbdulRaheem Aodu
Kaduna
Chairman, Northern Traditional Council and Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Sa’ad Abubakar, has asked governors of the northern states to fish out the billions of naira collected for the Internally Displaced Person (IDPs) in the region.
The Sultan spoke yesterday at the 2nd General Assembly of the Northern Traditional Rulers’ Council in Kaduna.
He said: “Whenever we meet with our political leaders, we always tell them that we are only here to advise them and that is what we are doing here and we will continue to advise them as long as it is necessary. We will continue to advise them for the good of our people, especially in the Northern part of the country.
“We believe that once problems of the North are taken up from the trouble spots or the map of trouble areas in the world, we believe Nigeria will be a better place. So, we intend to discuss on issues affecting the North and also the country in general.”
Continuing, he said: “When we go into closed session, we will discuss that thorny issue of displaced persons in the IDP camps mostly in the North-East. It is a very sad situation, people are suffering, billions and billions of naira have been collected or put aside for their welfare, but what we hear every day and what we see on the pages of newspapers is very bad, it is important that this money be disbursed immediately via the state governors.
“The billions of naira collected must be utilised now because when somebody dies, he does not need anything again except prayers. So, since they are still alive, let’s feel for these IDPs, they are our brothers and sisters, we must feel for them, we cannot live in luxury when our brothers and sisters are suffering, we do not sleep very well, when we see things like that.
“Please, we want the governors to take the issue much more seriously, take it up with Mr. President and ensure the release of these funds because I was part of the team that attended to this issue when money was collected for IDPs during the last government. They should find out where that money is and disburse it immediately.”
The Sultan also expressed concern over the agitation for Biafra in the South-Eastern part of the country, saying: “We are very much concerned about this issue because we know we have millions of millions of Igbos residing with us in our homes, in our towns, in our state, very peacefully, very industrious, helping our communities and helping our economy to grow. And so, many of them as we know, keep telling us that they have nowhere else to live than where they are presently living.
“Since we have this coordination with millions and millions of them, what is happening now is a thing of concern to us and we believe we should look at this issue and most likely set up a small committee of senior traditional rulers to go down to South-east and engage our brothers there (traditional rulers) so that we will know how we can come in to help to stop this agitation.”
He commended some of the Igbo leaders and governors who condemned it, adding that it must be condemned totally.
“We believe in dialogue, whatever the problem is with anybody, we believe we should sit down and discuss and a solution will be found.”
The Sultan condoled with Nigerians over the loss of Nigerian pilgrims during the last 2015 Hajj operations in Saudi Arabia, the people of Kogi and Benue states over the death of their former governor, Abubakar Audu, and the passing away of the Tor-Tiv, Dr Alfred Akawe Torkula, respectively.
In his own remark, Governor Jibrila Bindow of Adamawa state, charged traditional rulers to help check the influx of fake Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) from neighbouring countries into Nigeria.
The governor decried what he described as a strange influx of IDPs from neighbouring countries of Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad and Niger Republic, while charging the traditional council
assembly to look into the matter and proffer immediate solution to it.
According to the governor, who was represented by his deputy, Mr. Martins Babale, only Adamawa state receives between 1,000 to 3,000 IDPs every week.
He said: “I want to report that we have a very serious problem, particularly affecting the Northern states, and by extension, the North East. I raised the alarm several times, the influx of IDPs, every week, we receive between 1, 000 to 3, 000 so-called IDPs from these counties who are taking advantage of making our country a dumping ground. Any unwanted elements from their country, they push them along with the IDPs and that is what we discovered.
“We have three camps in Adamawa state; if you go there, you will see strange faces. These are not real Nigerians, how do we screen these people coming in and that is why I am reporting the issue to this assembly.
“The second thing that affects the northern states is the issue of porosity of the borders. When I was in the House of Representatives, I sponsored a bill on Border Development Commission, unfortunately, it was reduced to Border Development Agency and it is operational now to
operate under the National Boundary Commission.”