Cameroon returnees birth 7 babies at IDP camp

Seven women have put to bed at the Mubi transit camp for Nigerians deported from Cameroon over the last two weeks, the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) has confirmed.

The agency also said 5,762 returnees had been transported to the Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camps in Yola, Adamawa state.

Cameroon initially deported 2,000 Nigerians on July 31, saying they were living in the country without permit. This was followed, on August 5, by deportation of another batch of 3,000 Nigerians.

Confirming the births, Dauda Yakubu, a  health worker at the Mubi transit camp, said the seven women were safely delivered of four girls and three boys, with the mothers and babies all in stable condition.

Charles Otegbade, an air commodore and director of NEMA’s search and rescue, who is coordinating the evacuation, stated that 4,641 returnees were transported at the weekend in addition to the earlier 1, 121, of whom 650 had been transported from the camps in Yola to Borno state.

“We have moved the returnees from the Mubi reception centre and all of them at the Nigerian/Cameroun border post in Sahuda, after clearance by the Nigerian Immigration Service and other security agencies to the Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camps in Yola,” he said.

“More returnees are still being expected at the border post, while those transported to Yola have been taken to the IDP camps in Damare NYSC camp and Malkohi and a new location in Fufore for proper supports and care by NEMA.”

He assured the public that all returnees arriving at the border would be fully supported and taken to the IDP camps for proper care.

Muhammad Sani Sidi, director-general of NEMA, had earlier visited Mubi to officially receive the returnees and assure them of the federal government’s support in reintegrating them into the society.

He was accompanied by Zanna Umar Mustapha, Borno state deputy governor, as most of the returnees who had been displaced by insurgency before fleeing to Cameroon are natives of Borno.

As the returnees arrived the IDP camps, NEMA officials provided them with food to, bedding, clothing and other basic support.

Also, at the transit camp in Mubi, NEMA provided them with food, while health officials of the Adamawa state government and members of the Nigerian Red Cross Society were on hand to render other forms of support to the returnees.