Yobe donates food to private workers

The Yobe State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) has begun distribution of food items to private school workers in Yobe State.

In an interview with Kanem Trust in his office in Damaturu, the SEMA Executive Secretary, Dr. Mohammed Goje, said the intervention was deliberately meant to support private school teachers who had not been receiving salary in the last three months due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Dr. Goje said even though the pandemic affected almost every profession, worst hit were the private school workers whose employers could not afford to pay them their monthly entitlements.

He maintained that the state was concerned about the plight of the teachers, hence the decision of Gov. Mai Mala Buni to immediately approve distribution of food items to them across the state.

He further said the agency captured only 200 beneficiaries in few schools in the first batch of the exercise; with a view to reach others in the next few days within the available resources, and revealed that apart from the private school workers, 150 mobile phone repairers and sellers had also benefitted.

Babagana Modu, a cleaner in one of the schools, said the gesture was timely considering how they found it difficult to put food on their tables during the closure of schools.

While urging government to extend the gesture to many others, Modu disclosed that most of his colleagues, especially the aged, relied on neighbours for their daily meals.