……as Community draws Government attention says urgent medical care needed
Upata Kingdom in Ahoada Local Government Area of Rivers State has raised alarm over an outbreak of water borne and life-threatening diseases at the camp of the Internally Displaced Persons at “Camp Upata Zone” Edeoha Town, .
The Chairman of the Flood Committee in Upata Kingdom Prince Ike Egeh raised the alarm when members of the Rotary club of Port Harcourt Eco led by Nancy Iheduru, visited the camp with some food stuff, blankets and toiletries to commiserate with families who have been displaced by ravaging floods in that area..
Prince Ike Egeh, while commending the Rotary Club of Port Harcourt Eco for their timely intervention, said the camp which is housing about seventeen communities and about four thousand flood victims, is in need of urgent medical care.
“We thank You Rotary Club of Port Harcourt Eco for the intervention. People in this camp need urgent medical intervention. Last time, through our Royal Majesty Dr Felix Tuarikpo, the Rivers State Police medical team came to the camp on a medical outreach, all the tests carried out revealed that ninety percent of men, pregnant women and children here are positive of Malaria and typhoid. We even have HIV patient here. People are dying of cold because they sleep on bare floors. The flood committee promised to come with foams. Uptill now, we haven’t seen them. We heard the governor donated one billion naira for relief materials to the flood victims. We are yet to see anything out of it. People that are not even from these areas were inaugurated as members of the flood committee, how will they know what’s going on in these places. We are calling on the governor to call on the committee to be proactive and do the needful, people are dying in this camp”, he said.
Some of the residents in the camp told our correspondent that are dying slowly with different illness and diseases and need urgent help.
Meanwhile the Team lead of the Rotary Club of Port Harcourt Eco Nancy Iheduru said the club is delighted to respond to some of the urgent needs of the Flood victims in the area.
She said the club is also making plans to reach out with more relief materials to flood displaced families in other local government areas..
In a related development,a non Governmental Organization known as Follow The Money is calling on the Governor Nyesom Wike to ensure that the one billion naira fund donated to cater to the needs of Internally Displaced Persons at various camps in the local government areas is adequately utilised.
Country Representative of the group “Follow The Money”, Evelyn Williams said the group is shocked that relief materials are yet to get to some IDP camps.
“From the lamentations of the IDP in this camp, it shows they are yet to feel the presence of both the state and federal government. It means the money funded for this purpose is not been utilized. We are watching closely and won’t keep quite over this anomaly. We will call them out if this is not corrected. The government should ensure this is properly done and the money utilized.”
Williams, called on governor Nyesome Wike to include the civil society, Medical and Environmental experts in the flood committee not leaving out community stakeholders from the committee.
