Humanitarian agencies continue to lose more staffers in North Eastern part of Nigeria.
Allianace for International Medical Action (ALIMA) has joined the rank of casualties as Boko Haram/ISWAP ambushed its convoy along Monguno in Borno State killing three men and abducting two female aid workers.
Monguno is about 140 kilometres away from Maiduguri, capital for Borno state.
Recall that Islamist extremists in Nigeria, a faction of Boko Haram killed Hauwa Mohammed Liman, 24, a medical aid worker held hostage since March after expiration of a deadline.
Liman, a Nigerian who worked in a hospital supported by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), was one of three aid workers kidnapped by extremists during a raid on the town of Rann in the restive north-eastern Borno state.
Another aid worker, an ICRC midwife, was killed in September. The surviving hostage worked as a nurse in a centre supported by UNICEF.
In November this year, four aid workers were murdered by the Boko Haram terrorist group in northeast Nigeria.
The aid workers who were abducted by terrorists in July on their way to a remote community in the northeast to provide humanitarian support to victims of Boko Haram violence.
The four men were among the six humanitarian workers, including a driver and a woman, who were kidnapped by the terror group July 26 in Damasak near the Lake Chad region in Borno State.
One of the aid workers was reportedly executed in late September while the woman, identified as Grace Taku, is still held by the terrorists.
Within 18 months, 10 aid workers, all Nigerians have been killed.
The insurgency has led to the displacement of 1.2 million people in some precarious communities in Northeast Nigeria. The population has no access to humanitarian aid as insurgents hold sway in these areas.
Combined efforts of Nigerian partners and the international community scaled up humanitarian assistance in accessible local government areas to 5.6 million people in 2017; 5.5 million people in 2018 and over 4 million as of October 2019. Yet, about 7 million people are in dire need of charitable support. This is as a result of massive infrastructural damage, inability to access farmlands and disruption of basic services and markets.
The emergency grew worse in September 2019 owing to the closure of two aid agencies working in the zone. About 400,000 people were rendered without food during the period of lockdown.
Going by the rate of abduction and killing of aid workers, some aid agencies will be discouraged in sending their staffers to Boko Haram-infested zones for fear of losing more.
