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STORY: TRT: 2.54
SOURCE: UNICEF
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGES: HAUSA / ENGLISH / NATS
DATELINE: 31 MAY - 5TH JUNE 2012, NIGERIA
1. Various shots, farmer’s silhouette
2. Close shot, farmer’s feet
3. Close shot, muddy well
4. Wide shot, gathering water from well
5. Wide shot, father and son
6. Various shots, loading onto cart
7. Wide shot, cart driving away
8. Wide shot, farmer
9. Close up, farmer’s feet
10. Wide shot, farmer
11. Close shot, sewing machine wheel
12. Various shots, farmer tailoring
13. SOUNDBITE (Hausa) Jibrin Garba, farmer:
“Farming earns me money but I need to complement it with tailoring because I have enormous family responsibilities”
14. Wide shot, Zoom out of three girls
15. Close shot, porridge
16. Close shot, girl eating
17. Wide shot, three girls
18. Wide shot, interior hospital with mothers holding emaciated children
19. Wide shot, child patient being treated
20. Close shot, baby
21. Tilt up, from baby to nurse
22. Close shot, baby
23. Wide shot, three mothers and children
24. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Yahaye Mohammed:
“They have immuno-suppression and these infections can affect the brain, affect the legs it can affect the respiratory system and it can also affect other systems. But the most common one is diarrheal diseases which is infection of the gastro intestinal system.”
25. Wide shot, sick children and mothers
26. Wide shot, little girl in red and a goat
27. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Bamidele Davis Omotola, Nutrition Specialist UNICEF:
“If you look globally, you may be tempted to believe that Nigeria does not have the same problem as those in Niger, Mali – those are all Sahelian States. But if you now look deeper, you will find households that, we have children who are as worse, or as bad as you find in these other countries. So it’s a silent crisis because these children come from homes where their parents are already facing severe deprivation.”
28. Wide shot, market and cattle
29. Various shots, market scene
30. Wide shot, man praying.
31. SOUNDBITE (English) Abdullahi Magaji, Police Commissioner:
“We put a lot of patrols and we have people in plain clothes both in the churches and the mosques and evening in your houses without you knowing it. We get a lot of information from the people and the people are co-operating because they are all conscious of the security within themselves”
32. Various shots, teacher and girls in school
Across the Sahel region nearly quarter of a million children have received treatment in the first four months of this year but Unicef needs another 146 million dollars to sustain this work for the rest of the year to treat the 1.1 million youngsters estimated to need urgent help because of an area-wide drought.
These stark images of Nigeria may not have attracted headlines in the way other countries of the Sahel have, but the crisis is no less pressing.
Parched by the sun, it’s a punishing existence in the desert heat.
Water, hard to come by in northern Nigeria. Clean water, even harder.
For millions this is the daily routine.
A two hour round trip to retrieve water from a muddy well.
Nigeria is one of 8 states that form the Sahel region and because of its vast size the impact of drought, malnutrition and disease is threatening devastating consequences.
Farming is the main livelihood, millet guinea corn and beans, what they grow here.
But this is the hungry season. And they’ll have to wait until October before the harvest comes.
Farmer Jibrin Garba has three wives and a family of 18 to feed so he needs other work to survive
At home, he turns his hand to tailoring to boost his meager income
SOUNDBITE (Hausa), Jibrin Garba, Farmer:
“Farming earns me money but I need to complement it with tailoring because I have enormous family responsibilities”
Tuwo, a porridge made from millet is what Jibrin’s family survives on. It may be rich in carbohydrate but it’s hardly a balanced meal.
So at Katsina General Hospital they’re seeing the effects of poor diet and malnutrition.
13 month old Maria Aliyu was brought in this morning with diarrhea and vomiting; she’s quickly given treatment and will survive. But the cases keep coming.
In the ward next door we find the sickest patients, children always the most vulnerable.
Malnutrition, causing infections and other medical complications.
SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Yahaye Mohammed:
“They have immuno-suppression and these infections can affect the brain, affect the legs it can affect the respiratory system and it can also affect other systems. But the most common one is diarrheal diseases which is infection of the gastro intestinal system.”
SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Bamidele Davis Omotola, Nutrition Specialist UNICEF:
“If you look globally, you may be tempted to believe that Nigeria does not have the same problem as those in Niger, Mali – those are all Sahelian States. But if you now look deeper, you will find households that, we have children who are as worse, or as bad as you find in these other countries. So it’s a silent crisis because these children come from homes where their parents are already facing severe deprivation.”
Markets on the border bring farmers from miles around. Cattle transported here from neighboring Niger, exchanged for Nigerian crops.
It’s a highly mobile population, used to hard times, but there’s now a new challenge. Growing concerns about security following high profile sectarian attacks means life in Nigeria is getting harder.
SOUNDBITE (English) Abdullahi Magaji, Police Commissioner:
“We put a lot of patrols and we have people in plain clothes both in the churches and the mosques and evening in your houses without you knowing it. We get a lot of information from the people and the people are co-operating because they are all conscious of the security within themselves”
These pictures of Africa’s most populous nation may mask the problems. Away from urban wealth lurks a silent crisis. One in seven children in Nigeria will die before they reach school age - malnutrition one of the biggest causes. A world apart from the image this country often portrays.
