This is an urgent call for help
On Friday the government in Nigeria demolished a large part of the New Kuchingoro IDP (Internally Displaced People, aka refugees) Camp in Abuja with just a few days notice, and with no provision for the survival of the residents.
The bulk of those re-displaced by this are women and children. Many widows and orphans. The adults lost everything and barely escaped with their lives from the Gwoza Massacre in 2014. Most of the children whose homes were demolished on Friday were born in that camp. They are not vagrants, they are victims.
These people have nothing, and have been fighting daily for survival since fleeing Boko Haram, with virtually no outside assistance. What little they did have was just destroyed so a developer could build on this land.
Included in this group are a grandmother who last November showed my wife the bullet wound scars she received trying to protect her grandchildren from the terrorists. Also, Ms. Hanatu, who barely escaped the bloody slaughter with her three daughters. She is a former Gwoza school principal who has dedicated her life since then to educating the children in this camp, while living there herself. I have been in her home there as recently as May of this year. Like the others, she built it from scrap with her own hands. It is now gone.
We have run a school in this camp since 2020 for some 350 students.
Today, as many as we can accommodate have sought temporary shelter in our school.
Jeff Gibbs and I are departing tomorrow morning to go straight there and help as much as we can.
This is a horrible, unexpected development. We have sufficient funds for our trip, but very little to help with the urgent needs of these people, for their immediate survival.
Please help. A little bit can go a long way there. A lot can go even further. Everything we collect from this will go straight to their direct relief.
Thank you,
Mike Arnold
Africa Arise
This is fastest and easiest in the US:
https://www.letusriseafrica.org/give
In Nigeria, this is best:
*Account name: Africa Arise International*
*Account number:0023728261*
*Bank name :NPF*
