By Olukayode Idowu
Borno State Governor Babagana Zulum, on Monday, gave out about N172 million cash and food items to 30, 436 residents of Damboa.
According to a statement by the spokesman of the governor, Mallam Isa Gusau, Zulum personally coordinated the distribution of cash and food items to the people of the town, including victims of destructions caused by flood.
Gusau said a total of 436 persons were identified as victims who lost shelters and food items to floods caused by a recent downpour which led to destruction of many houses and left some families displaced.
After he was told by the chairman of Damboa Local Government Area, Professor Adamu Alloma of the destruction caused by the flood, Zulum directed that each of the 436 victims be given N50,000 cash, a bag of maize grill, clothing materials and a mat.
He empathized with the affected persons, but urged residents to desist from building houses along waterways to forestall future occurrences.
The governor aside the gifts to the 436 flood victims, also supervised the distribution of N5,000 each and fabrics to 30,000 residents majority of whom are widows, vulnerable women and men from different communities.
The governor during his visit to the area, also toured communities in Hausari, Old Damboa Market and Kachallaburari since arriving Damboa on Sunday afternoon before passing night in the town.
Meanwhile, the governor while in Damboa, directed the allocation of tractors, through a loan model, to farmers.
He said the tractors would accelerate the farming activities of residents.
On education, Zulum inspected an integrated mega Islamic school being built to combine Islamic and western education.
The visit was to accelerate completion in order to enable young people that attended traditional Islamic schools to qualify for tertiary education to acquire an equivalent of diploma certificates.
The governor has since approved construction of similar schools in Monguno in line with plans to have the schools in all 27 local government areas of Borno State.
Given its over 1,000 years’ history of Islamic scholarship, Borno has thousands of citizens with mainly Islamic education.
The higher Islamic schools provide such citizens, who meet certain criteria, the opportunities to qualify for admissions into integrated schools where they acquire equivalent of diplomas with which they could seek further western education to become graduates and go further.
