Borno Assembly to criminalise diversion of malnourished children’s food

The Borno state House of Assembly has said it will criminalise the diversion and reselling of malnourished children’s food following the disturbing alarm raised by the United Nations Children’s Fund

The House pledged on Friday when UNICEF visited its committee on health to discuss possible collaborations on the Federal government’s N-774 project, which focused on addressing issues of malnutrition in the country

While expressing grievances over the reselling and diversion of malnourished children’s food, the Chairman of the state’s House of Assembly Committee on Health, Maina Mustapha, assured UNICEF of collaboration to deliver its mandate of protecting children’s health through stringent regulations that will deter the selling of healthcare donated items

“We will criminalise the issue of selling out, taking, or theft of nutrition products that is being supplied by donor partners.

We claim we are poor and resort to selling whatever has been given to us by donor partners.

“Instead for us to use it for our children, we choose to use it for our personal gain,” Mustapha frowned.

Speaking on the N-774 initiative, Mustapha appreciated UNICEF’s involvement, while stating that it is ready to carry it along in all the planning and strategies

The UNICEF Chief of Maiduguri Field Office, Joseph Senesie, commended the partnership, saying with the right political will through the N-774 initiative, children in grassroots areas will enjoy access to good nutrition

He said, “N-774 is an initiative, launched by the government of Nigeria, headed by the Vice President, and the N-774 represents all the local governments in Nigeria, meaning it’s for the whole country, where nutrition will go right down to the grassroots level.

“The agenda is to bring down issues relating to malnutrition.

“In Borno state, we are meeting here at the House of Assembly to ensure that the initiative that started at the national level is coming down to the sub-national level.

“This is why we are calling ours the end N-27, since that is the number of LGAs in the state. We want to have committee members and form the committee that will represent all these LGAs so that nutrition is taken down to the grassroots,”

He commended the house for the bold step to criminalise the diversion of products meant for malnourished children, while describing it as the right step in the right direction

had recently reported that UNICEF raised the alarm over the diversion and reselling of RUTF, a product meant for over half a million malnourished children in Borno, Adamawa, and Yobe states.