About 13, 000 persons displaced by Boko Haram insurgency have benefited from a livelihood support programme initiated by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
UNHCR’s Livelihood Programme Officer, Theresa Dekassan, made the disclosure while inspecting some of the skill acquisition centres supported by the commission on Sunday in Maiduguri.
Dekassan said more than 11, 000 Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) and returnees received skills training and livelihood support between 2016 and 2017; in Adamawa, Borno, Gombe and Yobe.
She explained that the beneficiaries were exposed to tailoring, knitting, pillow, bed-sheet, beads and jewellery making as well as bag, shoe and leather craft.
Dekassan listed other trades to include computer literacy, carpentry, iron bending, steel fabrication, welding, tie, dye and cap making.
According to her, about 50 per cent of graduates of the programme are provided with resettlement packages to enable them set their businesses.
The UN official said the agency planned to train about 1, 500 displaced persons under the programme in 2018, and attributed the drop in the number of beneficiaries to paucity of funds.
Dekassan explained that the skills acquisition programme was being implemented in partnership with the American University of Nigeria (AUN) and Future Prowess Islamic Foundation.
According to her, the livelihood programme is designed to empower vulnerable displaced persons and returnees to develop their capacities for self-reliance and empower them with start-up kits for small entrepreneurship.
According to her, the organisation in collaboration with Future Prowess Islamic Foundation is also providing education support to hundreds of orphans in Maiduguri.
Also, Mr Zanna Bukar, the Proprietor of the Future Prowess School, said the foundation trained women widowed by the insurgency on various trades with the support from UNHCR.
Bukar explained that the organisation was also providing skills acquisition training to over 500 orphans enrolled in its school.
“We enrolled the children into schools to enable them access quality basic education and provide skills training for their mothers,” he said.
Some of the beneficiaries, who spoke to news men lauded the gesture because it had improved their social and economic status.
Mrs Amina Hassan, a 40-year- old widow, said she was trained on shoe making and was making good saving from the trade.
Hassan, a mother of 10 children, added that she was now able to feed and take care of her children from the sales of shoes.
“My husband was killed when the insurgents sacked our village in Gwoza. I have been going through terrible life experience in the past years due to the insurgency.
“I am making between N2, 500 and N4, 000 in a week from the trade, it assists me to provide for my family needs.
“Two of my children have enrolled in the school and my living condition has improved significantly,” she said.
Another displaced person, Fatima Muhammad, 20, said she was trained on tailoring and she was making good living from the trade.
Muhammad explained that she was taking shelter in Maiduguri with her relatives after the insurgents had killed her parents in Gwoza.
A UNHCR’s fact sheet showed that over two million dollars had been expended on the implementation of the programme in the past two years.
“During the period under review UNHCR, with support of key donors, invested more than 2.5 million dollars in the programme.
“These include rehabilitation of the Women Development Centre, Maiduguri, and Livelihood Centre, Damasak.
“In 2018; UNHCR plans to invest another 2 million dollars to support livelihood activities as part of its protection driven intervention throughout the country.
“The northeast will be given priority because of the weightiness of the protection issues faced by crisis affected populations.” (NAN)
