Salisu Sa’adu, chairman of the Internally Displaced Persons camp in President Muhammadu Buhari’s home state of Katsina, says IDPs are suffering from hunger and starvation.

In an interview on Tuesday in Jibia, where the camp is situated, Mr Sa’adu said the foods provided to the refugees are not enough, hence, they are suffering from starvation, hunger and death.

“In fact, let me tell you, in view of the hardship we are passing through, 15 of us died, while 35 women gave birth under forced labour,” he said.

Mr Sa’adu said the IDPs camped in Government Girls Secondary School (GGSS) Jibia were mainly from Kwari, Zango, shimfida, Tsauni, far faru, Tsambe, and Gurbin magarya villages of Jibia Local Government Area of the state.

He stressed that only two policemen were guarding the camp.

“Most of us (IDPs) are sleeping without mosquito nets and blankets, but we thank a non-governmental organisation, Medicines San Frontier, Doctors without borders that supplied drugs to us always at the camp,” he said.

Mr Salisu appealed to the state government to take steps to relocate them to their villages, to enable them to farm and get what to feed their families before the end of the rainy season.

“We are now almost three months here, and we can’t continue like this; we really want to go back to our villages and look for what to eat with our families.

“So we are appealing to the government to take cogent measures and relocate us to our places,” he said

When contacted, the chairman of Jibia Local Government Area, Bashir Mai-tan, said that the government was trying its best to feed the refugees in the camp.

Mr Mai-tan said apart from that, the local government released N200,000 daily for some of their needs.

He said that currently, over 1,500 of his people were still in bandits hostage, advising that the government alone could not fight banditry.

The News Agency of Nigeria observed during a visit to the camp that some of the IDPs looked worried, hungry and in tears. 

(NAN)