UN mobilises $182m COVID-19 lifeline for Nigeria

The United Nations is mobilising $182 million to support millions of Nigerians hit by the coronavirus pandemic, including conflict-torn communities in the North East.

The World Food Programme (WFP) said the funds were needed to sustain life-saving aid for the next six months

The lifeline is to aid three million people in Kano, Abuja and Lagos in addition to the Federal Government’s social protection schemes.

WFP’s senior spokesperson, Elisabeth Byrs, referencing the terrorism in Borno, Adamawa and Yobe, expressed concern that the war-hit communities in the troubled North-East currently face extreme hunger.

In a statement on Wednesday, she recalled that the three states had been plagued by a decade-long insurgency, resulting in the severe humanitarian crisis in the Lake Chad region where over 7.9 million people, mainly women and children, are in need of urgent assistance. (The Guardian)