The Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation, Dr. Betta Edu, has unveiled plans to include families of soldiers who were injured during military operations, including slain one’s, on the national social register and its poverty alleviation programmes.
Dr Edu gave the hint in Abuja on Monday, during a working visit to the Chief of Defence Staff, Major General Christopher Musa.
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The Minister said there was a need for cooperative efforts between the Military and the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation to protect humanitarian aid workers and other staff of the ministry, as well as to reach out to those in need of humanitarian aid.
While speaking, Edu noted that:
“We want to expand our social register, social database to accommodate military persons that have either been affected by war or injured and some that were even killed and left their families behind and we need this data from the Military so that we can have them captured under the social register so that the poverty alleviation programmes can be far-reaching touch lives.”
“The Chief of Defence Staff has promised to collaborate with the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation to see that Nigerians truly are brought out of the humanitarian crisis and out of poverty.
“Our target is people who are below the poverty line. The people we are targeting to elevate from poverty, some of them are relatives or live in the Barracks, they’re actually linked to the Military, or actually families that were left behind by soldiers that were lost during Military operations.
“We want to see how we can have all of these persons on the social register to benefit from President Tinubu’s renewed hope initiative
“The President is very passionate about eradicating poverty from Nigeria and passionate about reducing the number of persons who are affected by humanitarian crises and for us to effectively do our job in the North-East and other areas of Nigeria.
“We need that strong collaboration with the Military to reach out to people who are affected, and also protect our staff that will be on the field working,” she added.
Speaking on the essence of the collaboration, Dr. Edu said:
“There is a humanitarian crisis across the nation and the need to collaborate with the military to be able to prevent more persons coming under the humanitarian brackets is key.”
She further expressed the ministry’s duty to prevent the humanitarian crisis from going beyond what it is and spreading to other persons.
“We should be able to mitigate and reduce the number of persons that are coming within that bracket. We should also be able to effectively reach out to those who are affected by humanitarian crisis wherever they are.
“We need our health workers and humanitarian workers to be able to reach them where they are with the support of the Military,” she stressed.
In his remarks, the Chief of Defence Staff, Major General Musa, who pledged support in attaining the goals of the Ministry, applauded the Minister’s ingenuity on the proposed inclusion of Military personnels and soldiers on the Social Register.
“It is important that we look at the humanitarian aspects of the entire operation. For us in the Military, while we conduct the kinetic and non-kinetic operations, the humanitarian aspect of it is also critical.
“There is always a linkage between poverty and acts of criminality and we believe once the Ministry succeeds, it makes our job a lot better,” he assured.
“We are also happy that other communities will also be considered, which is critical. The troop’s morale will be high, knowing that they are also being considered in the aspect of humanitarian assistance, so we will work together, and we assure you that we will achieve success.”