Disaster Mgt: NEMA assures of active collaboration with Media

0
473

By; ABDULL-AZEEZ AHMED KADIR, Kaduna.
National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) has emphasized the need for continues support from critical stakeholders, assuring of continues collaboration with the media for active disaster mitigation and management.
The North West Zonal Coordinator of the agency, Alhaji Musa Ilalah gave this assurance Thursday in Kaduna during a courtesy call on him by the officials of Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ), Kaduna Council led by the Chairman, Comrade Garba Muhammed.
Ilalah said no any organisation worth its name can operate and succeeds in a vacuum without utilising the media, hence NEMA would always partner the media to ensure its aims and objectives are achieved seamlessly.
According to him, promoting disaster management and mitigation is a task that requires all critical stakeholders and the media is a veritable one in that aspect.
He asserted that NEMA North West Zone with him as Coordinator has enjoyed a tremendous support and partnership with the media in Kaduna.
He said the agency’s stakeholder network is large such that even a peasant farmer in a remote village can be utilised to achieve the agency’s objectives.
“The media and practioners in Kaduna has always aided NEMA with useful advice, and the heeding of the advise by the agency has gone a long way in making success of saving of life and property” he stressed.
Ilalah said one of the greatest challenges of the agency is funding, but they are working within available means to make best use of the limited resources.
“Our goal is to ensure free disaster environment through proactive measures in collaboration with other agencies through mass sensitisation and street campaigns to avert and mitigate disaster.
“As a team we can make better impact and achieve more result” he asserted.
In his remarks, Comrade Garba Muhammad stressed the importance of taking the media along in the agency’s activities.
He applauded the prompt response of the agency to calls and cries for assistance, especially the recent visit to internally displaced persons (IDPs) Camps within Kaduna to evaluate their conditions and needs.
Muhammad said one of the challenges of the Council is the issue of quacks, but since assuming the leadership of the Council, they are doing the best they can to ensure practicing journalists in Kaduna have the minimum qualification, hence the repositioning of International Institute of Journalism (IIJ), Kaduna Study Centre.
He also revealed that the Council is poised to empower its members through skills acquisition which necessitated partnership with Small and Medium Enterprise Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN) to train then on various skills and enterprise.
The Chairman also assured the agency of the continuous support of the council while advising the management to utilise the effectiveness of new media in sensitization for real time effect and wider outreach.

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here