Accept Your Blame for Palliative Hoarding, FG Tells Tambuwal
The federal ministry of humanitarian affairs, disaster management and social development has on Tuesday reacted to claims by Sokoto State governor, Aminu Waziri Tambuwal, that directives from the ministry was responsible for the state’s delayed the distribution of COVID-19 palliatives to its citizens.
The governor had earlier on Tuesday said he did not distribute the relief items because the minister of humanitarian affairs, disaster management and social development, Sadiya Umar-Farouq, gave directives that the state delayed the distribution so that she would be around when it is done, and that the state received the items only two weeks ago.
Tambuwal spoke to his Sokoto citizens on his effort to check riots in the state, saying the state had no hoarded relief materials meant for distribution. He said the state had only received two categories of palliatives since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Accordinf to the governor, the first relief materials received from the Coalition Against COVID-19 (CACOVID) was a bit delayed because the donors wanted the materials to be pooled together before distribution, adding that as soon as this was done, the distribution was done.
He explained that the delay in the sharing of the second category, received on October 17 from the federal government, was on the request of Sadiya Umar Farouk, minister of humanitarian affairs, who wanted to be around when the distribution starts.
In its response to the governor however, the ministry noted that the governor was economical with the truth, saying the relief items were given in the early day of the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in the country, asking those who failed in their responsibilities not to shift blame to the government.
Vanguard newspaper quoted a source at the ministry to have said neither the minister nor the federal government dictates to the states how they should run their affairs.
“It is ridiculous for anybody to try to shift blame for his failure to the minister or the federal government. This is because neither the federal government nor the Honourable Minister of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development dictate to states how to run the affairs.
“As far as we are concerned as a ministry, we did our best by ensuring the distribution of relief materials to all the states in good time for onward distributions to their citizens. “If for any reason, the states failed to distribute the items to where necessary, the ministry should not be blamed for that,” the source told Vanguard.
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