By Ndahi Marama

MAIDUGURI—Borno State government has said that over $20 million was needed to re-build about 22 local government areas destroyed by Boko Haram insurgents in the last one year.

Governor Kashim Shettima made this known yesterday at the Government House in Maiduguri when members of Red Cross Society led by its President, Mr. Peter Maurer paid him a courtesy call.

An assessment team- led by the Director, Search and Rescue of the National Emergency Management Agency, NEMA, Air Commodore Charles Otegbade, sent by the Federal Government to the state on Monday was still assessing the level of destruction by the insurgents as at the time of this report.

However, Shettima who was represented by his deputy, Alhaji Zannah Umar Mustapha, said that since the displacement of many communities by the insurgents, the state government had been shouldering the responsibility of feeding the IDPs through the State Emergency Management Agency, SEMA, even as he commended the effort of the Red Cross for its humanitarian assistance to the victims of the insurgency.