The Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation, Dr. Betta Edu, has announced that the federal government has given permission for the deployment of officers from the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons to various ports in Nigeria.
According to The Punch, a statement made by her Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Rasheed Zubair, stated that Edu revealed this during a visit to the Federal Ministry of Interior’s Abuja headquarters on Wednesday.
The minister cited migration, human trafficking, and internal security problems as some of the causes of instability, humanitarian crises, and poverty nationwide.
Edu explained to Interior Minister Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo that cooperation between the two departments would help her obtain the intelligence required to manage humanitarian responses in Nigeria.
“I have come here to speak with you because your ministry is one of the ministries that will make my job easier,” she remarked. The President is dedicated to making sure that fewer people are exposed to or susceptible to humanitarian crises.
“I am saying this because how successfully you perform your duties at the Ministry of Interior will affect a lot of our work. We require all facets of your assistance. The leaders of the security services here at this conference will cooperate with our team to collect information on how people are entering and leaving our nation.
“We recently received authorization for NAPTIP officers to be present at the various ports. We want you to understand how crucial it is for us to work with you on the border. In Nigeria, we need to develop strategies to improve our intelligence. There are just too many unofficial borders.
Edu said that the Nigeria Correctional Services’ inmates would gain from the skill-acquisition program’s inclusion of widows of paramilitary officers who passed away while serving, and that the social registry will be expanded to include them.
Edu also said that the Nigeria Correctional Services detainees will gain from her ministry’s skill-acquisition program and that the social registry would be enlarged to include widows of paramilitary personnel who died while on duty.
In his response, Tunji-Ojo stated that the inter-ministerial committee, which is chaired by the two permanent secretaries in the two ministries, would develop strategies to sharpen the agenda’s focus.
