Nigeria’s North-eastern States Get $2.3m to Strengthen Health Services
Peace Dasouza The government of Japan has given the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) $2.3 million as grant to commence a programme that will strengthen its fight to reduce maternal mortality, as well as morbidity from sexual and reproductive health issues in conflict-ridden communities in Nigeria’s north-east region.
The programme, which is targeted at Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) from the ongoing war against terrorism in the region, will seek to upgrade access to sexual, reproductive health, maternal and new-born health services in the three violence-prone Northern States of Borno, Adamawa and Gombe.
It will also ensure that management of sexual violence survivors are smartly responded to through prevention of and response to sexual and gender-based violence in the affected States.
A statement from the UNFPA in Abuja containing this development, noted that the situation in the North-eastern states continues to deteriorate due to incessant insurgency and counter insurgency operations.
UNFPA stated that a multi-agency assessment in 2014 under the leadership of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) revealed that 15,562,083 people have been directly affected by the humanitarian crisis in the region while 646,693 have been internally displaced from their homes in region.
Recalling that the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) had in January 2015 disclosed that the 981,416 figure of IDPs from the conflict would likely escalate as hostilities continues in the region, UNFPA explained that access to sexual and reproductive health services will usually become limited in such situations, the imperative to recommend measures that provide significant support and care to the highly vulnerable groups, such as children and women.
It noted that with the grant from the Japanese government, accelerated growth will be achieved through UNEPA’s ongoing response to the humanitarian situation in the North-east which targets a total caseload of about 7.1 million people including 42,400 pregnant women and 8,100 skilled birth attendants.
“The grant provided by the government of Japan will scale up UNFPA’s ongoing response to the humanitarian situation in the North-east which targets a total caseload of about 7.1 million people including 42,400 pregnant women and 8,100 skilled births attendants,” the statement explained.
UNFPA also stated that the Nigerian Hu- manitarian Strategic Response Plan (SRP) was grossly underfunded at just 14 per cent, adding that it considers the Japanese’ supplementary budgets as the most relevant and reliable source of funding to maintain and scale up the life-saving operation.
“This project will contribute to reduction of moralities and morbidities of women and young girls who are the most vulnerable. It will also reduce significantly sexual gender based violence in the Boko Haram conflict affected States of Borno, Adamawa, and Gombe.
“The government of Japan and UNFPA renew their commitment to cooperate with the people and government of Nigeria to deliver a world where every pregnancy wanted, every child-birth is safe, and every young person’s potential is fulfilled,” the statement added.