The Victims Support Fund (VSF) and Borno state government have supported 61 deceased families with income generating materials and N12.2 million. During the 12-year Boko Haram insurgency, 76 District, ward and village heads were killed in Borno state.
While distributing livelihood support machines and materials Thursday at the Maiduguri Shehu’s palace, the Executive Director of VSF, Prof. Nana Tanko disclosed: “These livelihoods support are to provide succour to the families of district and ward heads killed by terrorists. According to her, the assessments of livelihood support to the families were made from each beneficiary before distributing the materials to them. “A rapid needs assessment was conducted to ascertain the precise situation,” adding that coping strategies to underscore the vulnerabilities of families in the absence of their bread winners were made.
She said that 61 families from 14 Councils are beneficiaries of the VSF livelihood support project. She said the project covers the education and training of out of school children in vocational skills and support with starter kits. Their employability, according to her, is to secure beneficiaries’ means of livelihoods and support them in income generation activities. According to her, the distributed farm inputs include fertilizers and improved seeds of vegetables comprising lettuce and onions.
She added that the beneficiaries are also being engaged in poultry and fish farming. In a breakdown of livelihood support, Tanko said: “We provided 600 school age children in primary one to senior secondary school 3 with school bags, sandals, exercise and drawing books.” Other educational learning materials distributed yesterday comprise Mathematics, English, Basic Science and Social Studies for primary schools. She warned the beneficiaries not sell the distributed livelihood support materials and machines.
