ZAMFARA STATE’S RESPONSE TO MY ARTICLE IS AN ADMISSION OF WOEFUL FAILURE AND IS EMBARRASSING

My article dwelt on the hundreds of thousands of IDPs, mostly women and children, who are currently living hungry and cold and how the state government has done ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to help them; the state has refused to set up IDP camps and didn’t provide IDPs with medical care. Here are the points I noted from the rather clumsy rejoinders:

1. The state did not dispute that there are hundreds of thousands of IDPs in all the LGAs Zamfara;
2. The state did not deny that there is not a SINGLE IDP camp established by the state;
3. The state government didn’t dispute that IDPs, including children, are sleeping on the roadside, abandoned buildings, etc;
4. Instead of addressing the current acute need and what they are doing now, the state government went a voyage of listing the laughable interventions last year. More people are displaced every single day. How can the little intervention claimed to have been made last year help them?
5. The Zamfara Governor claimed to have distributed just N6m this year and a couple of hundreds of bags of rice to less than 400 people. Assuming this is true, what will it do in the face of the huge need across the state? We are talking hundreds of thousands of human beings.
6. Even the State Government didn’t claim to have made any medical interventions. So, sick IDPs should go and die?
7. The government claimed that BBC Hausa didn’t balance its story. But BBC Hausa said in their story that they contacted the commissioner in charge, but she didn’t respond. Assuming the BBC didn’t balance the story, does that falsify the crying voices and the ill children we all heard in the report?
8. The Zamfara Government didn’t tell us what they did to help the IDPs that were visited interviewed by BBC Hausa. Why? Because they didn’t do anything.
9. Even the Zamfara Government didn’t claim to have provided ANYONE with shelter. So IDPs should continue to sleep in the open because Matawalle is busy with more important things? What could be more important than human lives? His personal luxury?
10. Even the Zamfara Government didn’t claim to have clothed anyone. So little children should continue to suffer in this biting winter with no approach clothes. Is this how Matawalle’s children are living?

My message is simple: Governor Matawalle should stop cruising the world and help his people who are in dire need. He should set up IDP camps, feed the hungry, cloth the naked and care for the sick. That’s what they should focus on, not empty rejoinders aimed at damage control. I have nothing personal against Matawalle or any politician for that matter. All we want is for him to do his job!

• Barr. Audi Bulama Bukarti