Mr. Buba Mafindi, the chairman of the Taraba state Planning Commission has disclosed that over 35million Nigerians are facing imminent starvation due to insecurity and desertification.

Mafindi disclosed this in Jalingo at the opening of a one-day Child Friendly Community Initiative meeting of critical stakeholders in the state organized by the United Nations Children Education Fund (UNICEF).

He said that it was imperative for governments to make “deliberate efforts” at reconstruction and rehabilitation of displaced persons as most of the people living in the IDPs camps lack access to basic necessities of life and are not able to continue with their major means of livelihood which is basically farming”.

Mr Bhanu Pathak, Chief, UNICEF officer Bauchi field office who was represented at the meeting disclosed that previous interventions by the UNICEF did not yield a holistic result because different interventions were made to different communities and there was no harmonious result.

Pathak said that “the Child Friendly Community Initiative was aimed at making the communities aware of what they are supposed to do for the children and to make them take charge in enforcing child rights and other child related issues”.

He said that based on statistics on ground, a hundred and twenty nine out of every one thousand children under five years old die before their fifth birthdays while over fifty seven out of every one hundred children in the state are involved in child labour, with four out of every ten girls getting married before their eighteenth birthdays.

Pathak said that the child-friendly community initiative will provide a comprehensive package for children including areas of intervention such as education, WASH, C4D polio vaccination, birth registration and others in one holistic approach with the aim of making the best and most impact on the lives of the children. (Daily Sun)

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