NEMA partners NGOs on disaster management in Niger

The National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), has sought collaboration with Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs), providing humanitarian relief support to victims of various disasters in management of disasters in Niger State.

Head of Operations, NEMA, Minna Operations Office, Hajiya Zainab Sai’du made the call during a stakeholder meeting with the theme: “NGOs as Stakeholders in Disaster Management” on Tuesday in Minna

She said the objectives of the meeting were to bring various NGOs who were providing humanitarian assistance to victims of disasters in the state under one umbrella to help the agency with the rightful data of victims of disaster for relief assistance.

Sai’du explained that disaster management was multi-sectoral, multi-disciplinary and everybody’s business, adding that all hands must be involved to save lives and property.

She added that it was expedient for players in humanitarian service to work in synergy in order to avoid unnecessary replication of responsibilities and waste of hard resources.

“We are bringing faith-based and community-based organisations that deal with humanitarian activities together under one umbrella so that we can help each other out.

“Whenever we want to give humanitarian assistance, we will incorporate these organisations since they are based in communities and they know the rightful victims so that the relief items will get to the right people,” she said.

She noted that the agency was empowered by law to regulate and coordinate all organizations providing humanitarian support, adding that the meeting was to come up with a way-forward to make humanitarian service better in Niger state.

According to her, NEMA was the only agency of the Federal government that manage all disasters and collate data from all spheres of disaster management.

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She urged the NGOs to take information sharing with the agency as a national service, adding that the agency was currently buildings a database for disaster management across the country.

“This makes it very important for us to build a viable working synergy between us for the sake of the distressed and humanity,” she added.

In their separate remarks, the Director-General of Niger State Emergency Management Agency,( NSEMA) Malam Ahmed Ibrahim Inga, and the District Head of Maikunkele, Alhaji Suleiman Dada, pledged to continue to give support to NEMA for the smooth running of its activities.

Similarly, stakeholders such as Nigeria Police, Nigeria Air Force, Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps,( NSCDC), and Nigeria Red Cross, promised to support the leading disaster management agency in providing security and aid to the agency.

Responding, the NGOs lauded the agency for the initiative of bringing them under one umbrella to properly coordinate their activities and ensure that relief items get to the actual victims of disasters in the state.