Lions Club to assist rescued victims of insurgency

Mr Samuel Ekpuk, the Chairman, Council of Governors, Lions Club International, Nigeria, on Saturday said the club would assist the girls and women recently rescued by the Nigerian military from the Sambisa forest.

Ekpuk, who disclosed this at the club’s 2015 convention holding in Ibadan, said such assistance was part of the club’s commitment to mankind.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that more than 293 victims had been rescued by the army in the last one week.

Some of the rescued girls and women had been reported to be in poor health due to their experience in the Boko Haram camps.

Ekpuk said that the club had assisted victims of the Nepal earthquake by providing shelter and food.

“We will assist the rescued persons if they agree to move to the southern part of the country.

“We sympathise with the girls, women and children that have suffered inhuman experience in the Sambisa forest.

“ Before now, we had assisted displaced persons in 11 states of Nigeria,” he said.

Ekpuk said that the club during its 50th anniversary last year came up with notable projects through the support of its international body.

“ We discovered that a generation of children has been denied formal education and quality healthcare because of the crisis in the north.

“We are ready to assist the rescued girls and women in the area of education if they are willing to come to the south for rehabilitation.

“We are actively involved in children support programmes and skills acquisition for less privileged youths,” he said.

NAN reports that the club’s convention would end on Sunday.