The Christian Rural and Urban Development Association of Nigeria recently held a two-day capacity training on humanitarian intervention and disaster management for some Non-governmental organisations and churches in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital.
The CRUDAN Programme Officer in the South West, Mr Anthony Fasehun, said the training was designed to make NGOs and churches proactive in disaster management, be it man-made or natural.
According to him, the training programme entitled, ‘Disaster management and capacity strengthening,’ was facilitated considering the spate of insecurity in the country.
Fasehun said, “If we look at our society especially what is happening in Nigeria today in terms of insecurity and other forms of challenges, be it flood, inferno and all that, we see this as a need.
“In all these, the church is supposed to be proactive because it is part of the gospel though we may not call it evangelisation.
“In CRUDAN, we talk about demonstration of the gospel and this is an aspect of social work of the gospel as Christians.
“We see that throughout the country, there are so many cases of insecurity, violence and disaster and so what can we do as a church seeing we are located within the society and we cannot leave everything to government alone?
“That is why we are building the capacity of churches and organisations on how to respond to disaster within our locality.
“Moreso, the programme is to build this capacity and equip them with necessary skills, so that they can come up with feasible activities that will alleviate the suffering and problem of people during the time of disaster.
“This should be done in such a way that people become better after experiencing any form of violence. At CRUDAN, humanitarian intervention is one of our core thematic areas.”
Fasehun urged victims of disaster to speak out. He called on relevant stakeholders to come to their rescue, saying, “they should not wait and say people know our problem, they should come and help us.
“Disaster is an unpleasant situation but not the end of the world. They should make themselves available for necessary humanitarian assistance and see it as a privilege.”
Some of the participants said the training had prepared them on salient points of note as they relate with victims of disaster and violence within their communities.
The training drew participants from Oyo, Osun, Lagos, Ogun and Ondo states.
