‘We Don’t Want To Do The Abuja Business’ – Humanitarian Affairs Minister, Edu Rolls Out Work Plan

The Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation, Dr Betta Edu, has said it won’t be business as usual with her ministry as she hits the road to roll out her work plan.

Edu said she will not be involved in any Abuja or state business because she is going straight to the grassroots, where poverty bites harder.

The minister said with the task ahead, she would usually not be found in her office in Abuja because it would be a field operation all through for her.

During a two-day visit to Maiduguri, Borno State, on Friday, Edu said high-level poverty was not in Abuja but at the bottom of the ladder in local government areas in the country, Naja News learned.

She said, “So, it’s going to be a field operation all through for me. I will basically not be found in my office because every day, I will be on the field, reaching out to the poorest of the poor. We don’t want to do the Abuja business.

“We don’t want to do the state business; we want to drop it down all the way to local government so that individuals that are poor can be easily identified and easily supported.”

Speaking further, the minister said humanitarian hubs would be set up in all the 774 local government areas in Nigeria to relieve the pains of Nigerians through various projects.

She submitted that “We’ll begin an expanded upscale social safety net programme which will be reaching out to at least 15 million households in Nigeria.

“We are putting conditions to it; these are funds to start up businesses, these are funds that put you back on track, so it is not government giveaways as usual.”

She also warned that “any money given by the government to anybody, there must be criteria attached to it, and you will be held accountable for what you use government money to do.”

“Presently, we have 15.7 million households on the social register, and we have about 62 million individuals on the social register. But, this is completely inadequate compared to the number of persons that require intervention by the Ministry of humanitarian affairs and poverty alleviation.

“Because it’s not a permanent register but a dynamic one. There are people coming and people going out, so whoever left should leave the register. And, if you are coming in, we should truly know that you deserve to be part of the register by the criteria,” she explained.

Edu revealed that the goal of the President Bola Tinubu administration was to resettle internally displaced persons and refugees coming in from Cameroon, Chad, Niger, and other persons of concern.

“So, it’s not just about resettling them, or offering them humanitarian services or responding when we have a humanitarian crisis.

“The issue is, how can we prevent these humanitarian crises from happening? How can we work with the security agencies? How can we work with the communities to prevent this crisis from happening?

“Beyond this, we want to be able to provide a more resilient system that is reliable, and the interventions are sustainable, so it is not about going to offer a cup or bag of rice, no,” she added.

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