To cushion the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on vulnerable people in Nigeria, a non-governmental organisation, Otunba Adejare Adegbenro Foundation, has donated food items to 1,573 displaced person’s in the Federal Capital Territory.

Speaking during the handover of the relief items, at the Internally Displaced Persons, IDP, camp in Kuchingoro in Abuja, a representative of the foundation, Alhaji Umar Bida said the intervention was aimed at alleviating the suffering of Nigerians during the period of lockdown.

The items donated were: over 50 cartons of noodles, three cartons of fish and three bags of rice.

He added that the relief items were distributed to identify with the needy and assist government in combating the spread of the pandemic.

Bida said: “We came here to identify with the displaced persons notwithstanding the situation the country is facing at the moment.

“These people came from Adamawa and Borno states and they need our support. The state of the camp is indeed pathetic. But we can make a difference in our own little way because the government cannot do it alone.

“This should not be a one man idea. I am using this opportunity to call on individual persons to do the little they can do from their meagre resources to assist the IDPs camps.

“Our intervention is going to spread all over the country where we will identity other IDPs camps and do the little we can for them.

Bida called on the government to intensify awareness on the dangers of COVID-19 and preventions in IDPs camps all over the country.

Receiving the donated items, Chairman of the IDP camp, Mr Philemon Emmanuel, expressed gratitude for the donation and expressed appreciation to the foundation for remembering the needy.

He explained that the displaced persons had been living on the support of charity organisations since the lockdown begun.

He regretted that the IDPs do not take COVID-19 guidelines and preventive measures seriously, but are more concerned about what to eat.

He noted: “Before the lockdown, we usually go out to look for job so we could fend for ourselves but since the lockdown, there have been no jobs anywhere.

“We used to educate our on the need to apply the prevention directives like social distancing, hand washing and the use of face mask but our people are more concerned with what to eat. They don’t really care about the existence of the virus”