Benue COVID-19 Committee bursts trafficked persons in Makurdi, takes suspects into isolation centres

The Benue State Action Committee on COVID-19 earlier on Monday discovered and busted a camp housing persons believed to have been trafficked into the state from some northern states of the country.

Deputy Governor of the State and Chairman of the Committeee, Engr. Benson Abounu led a taskforce of the Committee to the camp located at Nos. 12 and 13 on Adikpo Street in what is popularly known as the Hausa Quarters area of Makurdi.

Discovered at the camp were large numbers of youths mostly in their early twenties living in tightly clustered conditions in gross violation of social distancing requirements.

When interviewed, “a number of the youths admitted to having been brought into the state from a number of northern states for purpose of seeking work.”

Their host (names withheld) “admitted that he usually receives the youths from all over the north and houses them to enable them ply such artisan trades as tailoring, shoe-making and the likes in the state.”

Interviewed further, he said, “he, however, has not received any new influx of the youths since the COVID-19 lockdown on the state was imposed.’

But residents in the area contended that there has been a daily influx of those youths to the camp even after the imposition of the lockdown.

They said that the youths are usually smuggled in late at night on vehicles transporting goods such as food items and other essential consumer items.

An Emergency Response team of the Benue COVID-19 Committee took the vital signs of the youths after which they were taken into Isolation for further evaluation, in line with established Infection Prevention and Control (IPC) Protocols.

Engr. Abounu also led the Committee to visit other potential camps at the Food Items Loading and Offloading Park on Lagos Close and on Bauchi Street all in the same Hausa Quarters area.

The Deputy Governor further directed that regular security patrols be mounted to police the entirety of the Hausa Quarters area, adding that same measures will be applied to any area where there occur violations of the lockdown.