By Tom Garba, Yola
As tens of trucks are being moved into Adamawa state on a weekly basis in order to relieve thousands of people who are internally displaced as a results of Boko insurgency attacks in Northern part of the state, other people are making serious gains by either diverting or cornering hundreds of bags into the city of Yola, selling them at cheaper prices .
The IDP food items mostly being sold around the town are bags of Rice with a label boldly written as”ICPR” being the product known to be distributed by International Red Cross organisation.
Barr Caleb Atiman was an eye witness and exposer of this kind of criminality immediately he received a surprise visit by a stranger who asked him whether he would buy a bag of rice from the IDP camp.He became inquisitive ,wanting to know how come the bags were streaming into the town? But stranger only replied that” there are many people selling it all over the place”.
To further satisfy his Inquisition he reply to the affirmative “yes”. Lo and behold the man went and brought a big of rice in a tricycle.
“I was so shocked when a total stranger who walked up to me to buy a bag of rice from the IDP camp which I know should not be .But I tried to find out the truth when ‘my friend’ went way and came bag a big bag of rice with Red Cross inscription on it”,Atiman said.
He blames the trend on corruption by officials charged with managing IDP camps.”It pains me much that I have to take my whole day to let the world know about this.I decided to get the media. It seems our official are now diverting what belongs to this our brothers and sisters who are suffering from the Boko Haram scourge”,he said.
Another eye witness,Gibson Swagidi,a reporter with Gotel TV affirmed that,a tricycle heavily stocked with bags of rice belonging to the IDPs was seen roving around Jimeta town looking for patronage from buyers who are used to the shoddy business.
When contacted , the secretary of Adamawa state emergency agency (ADSEMA), Alhaji Bello Furo said the shady deal is certainly not from his men and he not aware of anything that exists like that .He however pledged to swing into action with other agencies to investigate that.
Before now there had beenn series of serious complaints by the IDPs alleging that most of the food and other relief materials were not getting to them.They accused officials of diverting the items to places outside the camp.
