He said: “When displacements happen; flood, communal clashes, people lose their homes and means of livelihood.
The National Commission for Refugees, Migrants and Internally Displaced Persons says it is building six resettlement cities for use by Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) across the country.
Federal Commissioner Imaan Suleiman made this known on Thursday, at the weekly ministerial briefing organised by the Presidential Communications Team in Abuja.
She listed Borno, Kano, Katsina, Zamfara, Nasarawa and Edo as states where the pilot phase of the scheme would be executed.
He said: “When displacements happen; flood, communal clashes, people lose their homes and means of livelihood.
“We have started the piloting phase of our project resettlement in 2020. The project resettlement city will entail building small cities because Persons of Concern (POCs) have three options of doable solutions.
“They can either locally integrate, resettle or they can go back to their homes but sometimes they are unable to go back home and that is why there is need for building of new communities or strengthening the capacity of their host communities.
“We are in the third phase of our resettlement city project but the pilot phase is in Borno, Kano, Katsina, Zamfara, Nasarawa and Edo States.
“Most of them are now at between 70-90 percent completion but that of Edo State is about to take off. ”
According to her, as part of its doable solutions, the commission intends to address hunger as well as implement empowerment scheme among displaced persons, as they imbibe new forms of livelihood.
“When displacements happen within Nigeria we are not the first responders so we are expected to come in after they are stable to be able to provide them with doable solutions so that they can go back to normalcy.
“So the recent adoption of the National IDP Policy in 2021 by the Federal Executive Council is epic because that gives us the legal framework and clearly highlights everybody’s role including the IDPs and the host communities.
“We have been able to continue to strengthen the psycho-social support system for the commission because people are displaced, they go through all kinds of trauma so, psycho-social support is key.
“We have begun the piloting phase for the transitional learning centers in some locations, Edo, Zamfara, Imo, Bauchi, Federal Capital Territory and Katsina.
“We’ve been able to give persons of concerns access to COVID-19 vaccines and also conduct medical outreaches in collaboration with the National Primary Health care Development Agency.’’
