According to the Federal Government, one million shelters for Internally Displaced People (IDPs) nationwide will be built using three trillion naira allocated to this purpose in the 2024 budget.Dr. Betta Edu, the Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation, said this while on an inspection tour of the recently finished and sampled homes at the Idu IDPs camp in Abuja.
The government plans to construct a million shelters for the impoverished, internally displaced people, and refugees throughout Nigeria, she said. This will inevitably result in the provision of shelter for roughly 5 million Nigerians.
"Each of these shelters was allocated $3 million to be finished, and naturally, this is partially reflected in our budget for 2024. Additionally, as you may remember, the federal government recently approved the humanitarian trust fund, which is composed of 70% donations from the private sector, development partners, and philanthropic individuals, and 30% government funding."
She stated that in order to demonstrate how the project will appear when finished, the samples were rapidly built using the entire ten million naira in less than ten days, using laborers from the IDP community.
"We need to start building a sample of what these shelters will look like right away. We have two of them; one has one bedroom and the other has two bedrooms, but they are both samples that the community's locals built for themselves. They are also very cost-effective; the building was constructed in ten days for less than three million naira.
"What's really intriguing about it is that we want to install a solar system so that this refuge for the economically disadvantaged, refugees, and internally displaced people won't have to rely on the national grid to meet their basic electrical needs, like lighting and phone charging.
We have come to examine and formally assume control of the one- and two-bedroom homes that were constructed as prototypes for the shelter initiative run by the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation.
"Keep in mind that there are several aspects of poverty that we must address, one of which is the lack of adequate housing for the people.
"When we traveled to Benue, we observed that millions of people had been displaced and were living in cramped shelters. It is completely unacceptable for a family of six or five to live in that small, leaky house where the rain falls on them and the sun shuns the little children. For this reason, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has stated that we should support these communities and help them construct respectable, self-built homes.
"This will not be constructed by a contractor; rather, the community will build them themselves, empowering them in the process. We are teaching the youth how to build so they can participate in the project, and we also give them the dignity of building the home they will call home. This will give the community a sense of ownership over the project, and they won't damage or vandalize it as a result," the speaker continues.
Dr. Edu also disclosed that the project's foundation work was completed in the state of Benue.
As of right now, the roughly 10 hectares of cleared land needed to build the 40 dwellings have been completed.
"After setting and installing the building's foundation, work is still being done on the bore hole that will deliver water to the structure.