Hundreds of facebook users have attacked President Goodluck Jonathan’s facebook web page asking him the reason he broke his pledge to release funds to cleanse up poisonous Lead in Zamfara State.
On Thursday, two civil liberties teams, Human Rights Watch and the Nigerian Youth Climate Action Network, NYCAN, called on the masses to prevail on Mr. Jonathan to release the claimed funds.
“Unless the promised funds are released immediately, cleanup of the contaminated areas won’t be able to start until after next year’s rainy season, leaving thousands more children at risk of death and permanent disability,” said Babatunde Olugboji of Human Rights Watch.
Over 400 kids have actually died from the lead poisoning, according to Mr. Olugboji, and thousands more are in need of medical attention.
The civil liberties teams claimed that government’s failure to launch the guaranteed funds has left lots of youngsters handicapped for life in the worst major poisoning in the Nation’s history.
After the groups’ request on Thursday, hundreds of remarks telling Mr. Jonathan that” Children are perishing and your federal government’s failing to act is placing a lot more youngsters at danger” emerged on his webpage.
In his last facebook post, Mr. Jonathan’s had actually begged with Nigerians to be patient over his “improvement agenda.”.
“Last year, you entrusted me with your mandate by voting for me to emerge as president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. I continue to hold that mandate in trust for you and future generations of Nigeria.
“Over the past year, this administration has been working on fulfilling the promises I made to you during the campaigns. Many of those promises will take time to come to fruition…,” Mr. Jonathan wrote on his November 1 post.
The comments on the Zamfara lead poisoning were put under Mr. Jonathan’s last post.
“I know you’ve got a lot of difficult tasks to tackle in the next year, but the Zamfara cleanup is one that has a proven solution and you have the funds to solve it. Respect your citizens by cleaning up toxins,” read one comment on his post by Elyse Leonard.
Another post by M Ahmet Nermin read “#Lead poisoning in Zamfara State, Nigeria, killed 400+ children and left thousands more with permanent life-long disability. In May, President Goodluck Jonathan pledged $4,000,000 to clean up the lead contamination. Today, that money is nowhere to be found, and thousands of children remain at risk of death and disability. #childrights.”