The National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) has said plans have been concluded to repatriate 56,000 Borno Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) from Diffa, in Niger Republic.

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NEMA North East Zonal Coordinator Bashir Garga disclosed this during a Humanitarian and Development Coordination Forum organised by the agency in Maiduguri, yesterday.

Garga said the IDPs were those who escaped Boko Haram onslaught in the last seven years in Mobbar and Abadam local government areas of the state.

He said all arrangements had been concluded with the government of Niger to ensure that they are brought back to Nigeria.

“There were serious concerns on insecurity in some of the liberated local government areas. NEMA is working with the security agencies toward ensuring that the liberated LGAs are safe and habitable to the returnees.

“But much still needs to be done. So we are urging the humanitarian organisations to give attention to developing the liberated communities.

“This is because some of the IDPs, after going back home, return to where they were because their homes are not habitable.

“We need to encourage them and reassure them of their safety all the time,” he said.

In his remarks, Ahmed Bello, Assistant Commissioner of Police, Borno Command, who gave update on the security situation, said proactive measures had been adopted to protect the IDPs.

Bello said the Force has deployed no fewer than 50 mobile police units in communities liberated from Boko Haram to enhance law and order as well as trained some personnel on conflict resolution techniques; to curb issues of land-grabbing, cattle-rustling and other menace which may arise in the liberated communities.

He explained that the Command is working with traditional leaders, civilian Joint Task Force and other partners in the state to check crime.