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The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) says that it has registered no fewer than 46,000 Cameroon refugees in Cross River, Benue and Taraba states with the majority of them in Cross River.
        Mr Antonio Canhandular, UNHCR Country Representative to Nigeria, disclosed this at a news briefing on Wednesday in Abuja, saying that they were refugees from Anglophone Cameroon. As at today we have registered together with the National Commission for Refugees, Migrants and Internally Displaced Persons (NCFRMI), 46,000 Cameroon refugees. This number is not the total number of refugees in Nigeria but the ones we have registered. The majority are in cross river, we have about 5,600 in Taraba, 6,400 in Benue state and so many thousands in Cross River state. We have also Nigerian populations that have been displaced out of Nigeria; Nigerian refugees in Cameroon are 94,000; in Chad 12,000 while Nigerian refugees in Niger are 112,000. I Am talking about North-East crisis because there is another crisis in the North-West which are Sokoto and Zamfara, which has created also an internal displacement population. We don’t have the figures but it has created the outflows of refugees,’’ Canhandular said.
        In a related development the UNHCR country representative said that in Adamawa 900,000 IDPs had returned to their various areas of origin although their settlements were still in poor state. Because the infrastructure still need to be rebuilt after all these years of crisis. Other state where we have also a lot of return of IDPs is Yobe State, most of them have returned. We are talking about 1.2 million Internally Displaced Persons that we have access to; the ones that have access to assistance. Canhandular also said that the total of the IDPs population that were accessible are different from the total IDPs population that receives assistance, saying that the total accessible is 1.8 and the total assisted IDPs is 1.2. Speaking on return of migrants, Mr Dahiru Bagiwa, Director Refugees of NCFRMI Said that the commission had so many cases recently, adding that some came from Libya, Europe and there is a very good arrangement for their return. Bagiwa said that in collaboration with NGOs, UNHCR, EU and Nigeria government the commission was making a very good provision at the reception centres such as the airports in Port Harcourt, Lagos and all the centres. There is a transit camp for them because most of them when they come they don’t know where to go, we have a transit place for them especially in Lagos. There is a training programme for them as well, the national commission is concerned about durable solutions, we give starter packs and most of them absorb into the society easily."