NAN-H-70
Awareness
By Sumaila Ogbaje
Abuja, Oct. 13, 2016 (NAN) The National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) has urged the media to champion the creation of awareness among the people living in the disaster-prone areas.
The NEMA Director-General, Alhaji Muhammad Sani-Sidi, made the call at a news conference on Thursday on the 2016 International Day for Disaster Risk Reduction in Abuja.
He said there was the need to create awareness on a sustainable basis around the communities faced with the risk of disaster in order to build resilience to mitigate it.
According to him, no one can stop natural disaster from happening, adding that it could only be mitigated by reducing the impact.
“I want the media to take the lead in creating awareness among the communities on what to do when disasters happen.
“The celebration today is aimed at raising awareness for actions that we all need to take collectively to reduce mortality rate around the globe.
“You are aware that there are increasing numbers of mortality as a result of disaster, because disaster can happen anywhere and at anytime.
“But the issue is how do we save lives when disasters happen, who lives to tell the story? We don’t want people to die as a result of disaster.
“We want people to live after disaster, not to die with the disaster.”
In his remark, Mr Taiye Olaniyi, the Chairman, Nigerian Red Cross Society, FCT Branch, said that the event was to further expand the educational capacity of parties involved in disaster management.
Olaniyi added that efforts should be geared towards disaster prevention through effective collaboration of all relevant agencies and organisations, adding that preventive measures were better than curative.
While commending NEMA’s efforts, he also called for improvement in disaster management in Nigeria.
“Disaster management in the country had not been too good, but thank God that we have NEMA that is a little better equipped to handle disasters in the country.
“There should be adequate training of personnel that are directly involved in managing disasters as well as the resources to handle them,’’ he said. (NAN)
OYS/KOLE/NKO
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Edited by Remi Koleoso/Nkechi Okoronkwo
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