The Benue State Emergency Management Agency (BSEMA) performed Oliver Twist over the weekend as Fidelity Bank provided food to Makurdi’s Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs).
Team Lead, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), Victoria Abuka said the food distribution was an endeavor to personally reach out to the most disadvantaged in society while speaking to reporters at the Federal Housing Estate IDP camp in North Bank.
The effort known as “Fidelity Food Bank” is a monthly nationwide endeavor, according to Abuka, who noted that as a responsible business organization, Fidelity Bank “sees it fit” to give back to the community. It started in April 2023.
Speaking to the IDPs at the event, Terwase Swande, Branch Leader of Fidelity Bank in Benue State, stated that the bank was working with the Hyacinth Alia Foundation and BSEMA to directly alleviate hunger in communities that were in great need, such as the IDPs. He claimed that the bank will keep doing it.
James Iorpuu, executive secretary of SEMA, explained to the team earlier while showing them around the tents used by the displaced people as their sleeping quarters that some of the IDPs were widows whose breadwinners had died and orphans who had lost both parents to terrorist attacks and were being cared for by other displaced people at the camp.
James Iorpuu said the state government was planning a resettlement program for displaced persons in the state.
Iorpuu said: “We cannot continue keeping these people in the sun and in the rain. We want to resettle them back in their homes. As you have provided food for us, we appeal to you to assist us in the resettlement plan too.”