W/Africans constitute 31.5m global refugees – ECOWAS Parliament
Tunde Opalana, Abuja
Over two million displaced Nigerians and nationals of some other West African countries presently constitute 40 percent of about 70 million refugees in the world.
Secretary General of the Economic Community of West Africa (ECOWAS) Parliament, John Azumah, who made this disclosure in Abuja, said humanitarian crises in sub -Sahara African are caused by communal strife, insurgent activities and banditry.
Azumah, who spoke at the National Assembly during the official inauguration of the West African Parliamentary Press Corps and Senate Press Corps Day, said it is regrettable that despite the efforts being made in West Africa, the region is plagued with multiple crises.
In a keynote address delivered on his behalf by the Director of Parliamentary Affairs and Research of the ECOWAS Parliament, Bertin Some, Azumah said in Nigeria alone, 2.1 million people have been displaced by the Boko Haram insurgency
He said that “for instance, Nigeria’s North -East , North – West and North – Central are ravaged by Boko Haram terrorism and farmer-herder clashes which has resulted in the killing of over 20, 000 people and with about 2.1 million people displaced .
“This carnage has caused huge humanitarian crisis, such that there appear to be lethargy of addressing the crises with funds by the international agencies.
In Mali, insurgency has run down the country and displaced many. These crises are replicated in many parts of the region.
“According to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), West Africa is one of the regions of the world with the highest number of refugees and internally displaced persons estimated to constitute about 40 per cent of the 70 million refugees and displaced persons in the world.”
Azumah blamed the sorry state of the region on bad governance which according to him has rendered many affected countries financially impotent to the point of depending on funds from donor agencies to implement their yearly budget.
“The political crises that trigger these humanitarian situations in the region are products of bad and unimaginative governance which has plunged a great number of our citizens into poverty and untold hardship.
“The poverty level is so high in the region such that many member states largely depend on donor agencies and international humanitarian agencies to fund their activities and programmes because their streams of revenues can no longer fund the national budgets,” he lamented.
