It was indeed a memorable and historic ground breaking ceremony when the Minister of the Interior, Gen. Abdulrahman Dambazzau, received relief food items consisting of 2,300 bags of rice, 20 litres of groundnut oil, 200 cartons of macaroni, 200 cartons of spaghetti etc from the Deputy Managing Director of Huawei Technologies Company Mr. Martin Zhong on behalf of the Federal Government for onward delivery to the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) adversely affected by the Boko Haram terrorist insurgency.The handing over ceremony which took place at Huawei Technologies Office located at No. 21 Mahatma Gandhi Street Area 11, Abuja last Friday was attended by top officials of the Ministry of Interior including the minister, the acting permanent secretary of MOl, Alhaji Muhammed Maccido as well as the deputy managing director of Huawei, the Chinese Ambassador to Nigeria, Mr. Zhou Ding Jian, other senior officials of HTC, and representatives of civil society and the mass media.The deputy managing director of Huawei, Mr. Martin Zhong while handing over the relief materials explained that the gesture was meant to signify the relationship of love, trust and cooperation existing between the Nigerian and Chinese people: It is a great pleasure to welcome you to this occasion which is meant to bring together the two countries, China and Nigeria, united by love and friendship. We at Huawei wish to extend a hand of friendship to Nigerians in their time of need. We are aware of the IDPs in the northeast, suffering from starvation, hunger, disease and deprivation and we will like to extend our deep commitment to Nigeria by presenting these food items to the IDPs who are refugees in Abuja. What we are doing today cannot assuage all the suffering of the IDPs but we hope that it will at least alleviate their plight, so we are partnering with the Ministry of Interior to help these people and we hope others will follow suit.A visibly appreciative General Dambazzau thanked Huawei and the Chinese government and people for their display of generosity, fraternity and cooperation with the Nigerian people in this dire period of need, stressing that the humanitarian intervention will further complement the ongoing efforts of the federal government aimed at ameliorating the plight of the vulnerable IDPs who are mostly women and children. The minister also restated the Nigeria governments resolve at quelling the Boko Haram insurgency, ensuring the return of peace and normalcy to the affected areas as well as the resettlement of the IDPs in their original homes of residence before the advent of terrorist activities. According to the minister: I want to express my profound gratitude for this donation of relief materials through the Ministry of Interior to vulnerable Nigerians in the IDP camps. Beyond the business for profit, this is a humanitarian gesture to vulnerable persons who were forcefully displaced as a result of the Boko Haram insurgency. We are very grateful to Huawei Technologies Company which has been in business for the past 70 years and this donation of relief materials will go a long way in assisting those in the IDP camps.We are very much concerned about their living conditions and we are happy that the vast majority of people now realize that the effort to handle the situation cannot be tackled by the government alone, so this assistance will assist in re-enforcing the efforts of the government. We have two categories of those adversely affected by the Boko Haram insurgency: the IDPS who are more than 2 million and the refugees in our neighbouring countries like Chad, Cameroon and Niger Republic.In a few days time we shall be travelling to Cameroon to sign a tripartite agreement between Nigeria, Cameroon and the United Arab Emirates to protect the refugees in the camps. We have about 65,000 refugees, so the agreement will protect them internationally. These are the kind of moves the government has been making and we therefore call on other governments, establishments, individuals and corporate bodies to assist in making the IDPs comfortable not only in the aspect of feeding but also in providing education and health care services to make their lives more comfortable in the camps. Also the federal government is making effort to ensure that the IDPs and the refugees are relocated to their homes safely and as soon as possible. the minister concluded.The permanent secretary, Ministry of Interior Alhaji Muhammad Maccido also appreciated the gesture by Huawei, stating that the handing over of the relief materials to the IDPs was made possible because of the strong bilateral relations between Nigeria and China.The Chinese ambassador to Nigeria, Mr. Zhou Ding Jian also extolled the fraternal relations between his country and Nigeria while also praising Huawei for its humanitarian intervention on behalf of the IDPs: It is a great honour to be here, Huawei is doing great things, a friend in need is a friend in deed, the Nigerian government is doing a good job to stabilise their country and help their people and as a great friend of Nigeria, we are trying to help both at the political and at the business level by encouraging Chinese companies to help Nigeria by integrating their businesses in a way that will benefit the Nigerian people.On this happy note, the handing over ceremony was concluded with a strong message and resolve by the Nigerian and Chinese governments, to work together at the political economic, business and cultural arenas for the greater good and development of their people at all levels. Asadu wrote from Garki, Abuja
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