Pastor Solomon Folorunsho, General Overseer of the International Christian Centre, Uhogua in Ovia North East Local Government Area of Edo State, is a man who has given much to the development of humanity but whose efforts seem not to get the kind of recognition it deserves.
Pastor Folorunsho started his missionary journey via the International Christian Centre For Missions(ICCFM) in Ogida Quarters, a suburb of Benin City in 1991.
A year later he established the Home For The Needy in order to help the needy in the society like orphans, street children, children from broken homes or poor families, widows and internally displaced persons.
As you’re reading this the home cares for more than 5,000 needy people. Most of them are children and widows from the North East of Nigeria, who have lost their parents and their homes through the Boko Haram insurgency.
By the year 2010, the premises of the church, International Christian Centre (ICC) which has now relocated to a more spacious environment in Uhogua, started accommodating victims of the much dreaded Boko Haram insurgency who sought for refuge from the death penalty which the insurgents have inadvertently passed on the people of the North East region of Nigeria.
On getting to the facility now christened Internally Displaced Persons(IDPs) camp the escapees are now much secured, entitled to decent accommodation, feeding, education for the kids and opportunities to access health facilities when they are sick at no extra cost.
Support from those with means has been negligible but Pastor Folorunsho, his team of dedicated missionaries and caregivers have been managing as much as they could to keep the facility in operation not minding that what goes into achieving that feat is enormous most especially in the area of finance.
All efforts to get the attention of the different federal government agencies and indeed state governments like Borno State has not yielded anything tangible. Even when it became public knowledge that the kids under the care of the home for the needy are always top of their class in tertiary institutions that they attend response to their plight of not been able to pay up their school fees which is about two hundred million naira(N200,000,000) has been largely ignored not even minding that they achieve this laudable fit mostly with empty stomach.
A mark of their academic prowress can be seen in Ishaku Amos, one of the products of the facility, who is presently doing his PhD in one of the reputable universities in America as a result of the scholarship he was offered by an international organization on the strength of his commendable performance in the Edo State University, Iyamho where he earlier graduated with a First Class honours in his first degree course.
Popular News gathered that just recently a horde of the kids who are top flyers in their different departments in the institutions they attend scattered around the country were being fished out of classrooms as they sit in readiness for their school examinations because they are yet to pay their fees.
Insiders said that the poor students may be suffering from getting recognition of their state governor, Babagana Zulum, because they are Christians considering that Borno State is mostly populated by Moslems while the Edo State Government considers them as “strangers” and would not want to “waste” the state resources on them.
The only time the IDPs in Uhogua were given some measure of recognition was during the era of Comrade Adams Oshiomhole as governor of the state who ensured that throughout the year there’s always some kind of skill acquisition programmes been organized for them as even food, clothing and equipment for the different skills they acquired were made available for them.
Another issue that is of huge concern is that in recent time the camp facility has been facing security challenge as it has been invaded on many nights by guntotting criminal elements who vandalise some of the equipment therein. The issue of these nocturnal unwelcomed visitors has jolted the management of the camp as the inhabitants face a lot of trauma trying to differentiate their earlier nerve wrecking experience with insurgents and this visit to their home by hardened gun wielding criminals.
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