" ITREALMS: UNICEF says 800,000 Nigerian children forced to flee violence

Monday, April 13, 2015

UNICEF says 800,000 Nigerian children forced to flee violence

 
 
 
United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has estimated that over 800,000 children have fled their homes in Nigeria, reports ITRealms.

According to UNICEF Regional Director for West Africa, Manuel Fontaine, “The abduction of more than 200 girls in the region, scores of girls and boys have gone missing in Nigeria – abducted, recruited by armed groups, attacked, used as weapons, or forced to flee violence. They have the right to get their childhoods back.”

He also told  ITRealms that a year on from the abduction of more than 200 schoolgirls in Chibok village in Borno, UNICEF focuses attention on devastating impact of conflict on children, saying that around 800,000 children have been forced to flee from their homes due to the conflict in the Northeast between Boko Haram, military forces and civilian self-defence groups.

The figures come as UNICEF draws attention to the devastating impact of the conflict on children across the region using the hashtag #bringbackourchildhood.

Investigation carried out by ITRealms discovered that as part of this drive, UNICEF is using Snapchat – a social platform where messages disappear – to highlight the plight of the hundreds of thousands of children who are missing out on their childhoods as a result of the conflict. 

Details of the information gathered by ITRealms further disclosed that to tell the stories of the children who have fled the violence, UNICEF and leading Snapchat artists will share images based on drawings from children in Nigeria, Chad, Niger and Cameroon.

The artwork,   ITRealms  reports reflects what children missed from home and the emotional wounds and suffering they have endured, including seeing their parents and siblings killed, tortured or abducted. 

Cyriacus Nnaji /GEE

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