DHI, Lagoon School walk for IDPs

In the spirit of Christmas, the Doctors Health Initiative (DHI) with the Lagoon School environmental committee organised a walk to create awareness and raise funds for a health outreach for the women and children among the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs).

The initiative which has been working with the IDP camps in Yola, Benin City and Lagos for the past three years, held the walk that started out from the Lagoon School in Lekki Phase 1 to the Lekki-Ikoyi link bridge and back to the school.

According to the president of DHI, Dr. Nkechi Asogwa, the walk is aimed at giving a voice to victims especially women and children of the Boko Haram insurgency, giving them access to healthcare services that has become necessity for their survival. “The Boko Haram insurgents have decimated whole families and communities in North-East Nigeria. As in all conflicts, it is the women and children of these communities that are most affected, suffering unimaginable physical and psychological degradation.

“In addition to the trauma of being violently torn from their homes and loved ones, these women and children have suffered the loss of their lands and thus their livelihoods from agriculture. It is not within your power or mine to stop the violence done to these women and children by Boko Haram insurgency. However, we can heal our land by showing love to those so unjustly treated,” she added.

Founder, Center for Values in Leadership (CVL), Prof. Pat Utomi at the opening ceremony congratulated the students and their parents for coming out in spite of the rains that morning to show solidarity with the IDPs. He said they are future leaders who are sensitive to the needs of their environments. Utomi commended their commitment, courage, cooperation and hard work.

This is the first of its kind as the idea came from teenagers of the Lagoon School Environmental Committee made up of 13 to 17 year-old-teenagers who feel called to make a change in the lives of the victims of Boko Haram insurgency.