Edu Inspects FG’s Completed Prototype Houses at Idu

*To build 1m homes for IDPs, refugees across Nigeria

The Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation, Dr. Betta Edu, has announced federal government’s readiness to build renewed hope low-cost shelters for the poor, Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) and refugees across Nigeria.

This special project, according to the minister, was in line with President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s commitment to providing dignified shelters for the poor, internally displaced persons and refugees in the country.

She said this was one of the ways of addressing multidimensional poverty in the country.

The Minister made this known during an inspection of prototype shelters of two sample houses (one bedroom & two bedrooms) at Idu village.

She opined that both samples were built by the local people in that community for themselves, using local materials in ten days and very cost effective, adding that this will be applicable across Nigeria.

She said the government wanted to achieve the project in a record time because many IDPs were in different parts of Nigeria, and they needed befitting shelters they can call their homes.

She noted that recently, an IDP camp was burnt down in Borno state, while Benue had millions without shelter due to the farmers-Herders clash.

Edu said “what is also interesting about the project is the fact that we want to introduce the solar energy to it so that the shelters are not dependent on the National Grid, but they can use the solar energy to provide at least the basics such as bulb light, electricity for charging their phones and do their basic things with in the locality”.

The Minister further stated that the President directed that the shelters be built by the local community to provide them with skills and economic empowerment, as well as the dignity of owning their houses which they build by themselves under strict supervision by professionals

“The project is not a contract or to be built by a contractor.The local community will be given the dignity of building the house they will live in. They will see it as their project, they will own it, and they will not vandalise or destroy it.

“To ensure quality control, the construction of the houses will be supervised by professional architects, engineers and support from the Federal Ministry of Works”

Edu said that the shelters will be built in Benue, Borno, Zamfara, Yobe, Cross River, Ebonyi Lagos, Adamawa, Bayelsa, and other states that had large numbers of IDPs, refugees and extremely poor Nigerians.

According to her, the groundbreaking ceremony of the houses was done in Benue State, where the building of forty shelters was flagged off.

She also disclosed that ground clearing had been concluded in the 10 hectares of land in Benue while blocks mounding and preliminary work like digging is ongoing.