Two Senior UN officials to visit on Nigeria, Chad to back humanitarian, development efforts
United Nations Development Programme(UNDP) administrator, Achim Steiner, and United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, Mark Lowcock will arrive Nigeria and Chad in a few days time, Lucky Musonda, Communications Specialist, UNDP, disclosed in a statement.
According to the statement, Mr. Lowcock and Mr. Steiner will make a joint trip to the two countries from October 5 to October 7 on a mission to underscore and back joint humanitarian development efforts in two countries. They will visit Nigeria from October 5-6 and Chad, October 6-7.
In Nigeria, the two UN officials will meet with senior government officials and representatives of the humanitarian, development and donor communities. On October 6, they will travel to Borno State and visit a site for internally displaced persons, a transition centre and a rebuilt community.
In Chad, the two UN principals are expected to meet President Idris Déby, senior government officials as well as humanitarian and development partners. On 7 October, they will visit a nutrition centre in N’Djamena where international NGOs and UN agencies are treating children with malnutrition amid one of the worst nutrition crises the country has ever experienced. A third of Chad’s population – more than 4.9 million people – urgently need humanitarian assistance due to food insecurity, malnutrition, and health emergencies. The joint mission will provide a unique opportunity to assess UN coordination on the ground, to mobilize resources to address longer-term needs, and seek further commitments from Government and partners.
The joint mission is coming a month after the High-Level Conference on the Lake Chad Region held in Berlin. Mr. Lowcock and Mr. Steiner will discuss with partners and governments on ways to translate commitments made during the conference into practical action on the ground.
The humanitarian crisis in northeast Nigeria has spread across the Lake Chad region and remains severe with 7.7 million people in urgent need of assistance. The UN has stepped up coordination to improve resilience and self-reliance of local communities through the restoration of basic services such as water and electricity, the rehabilitation of schools and hospitals and emergency jobs programmes.
Humanitarian and development partners are linking up efforts to respond to the devastating consequences of the ongoing violence in north-eastern Nigeria while seeking to promote durable solutions for affected communities.
