Limbe I Council disburses 2025 financial assistance to IDPs, persons with disabilities and vulnerable persons

The Limbe I Council, in collaboration with the Ministry of Social Affairs, on Tuesday, September 1, 2026, disbursed financial assistance to Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs), persons living with disabilities and socially vulnerable persons in the municipality.

The ceremony, described as an annual event, was chaired by the Mayor of Limbe I Council alongside the Chief of the Social Centre for Limbe I Subdivision.

Speaking at the event, the Mayor said the assistance is for the 2025 financial year and is meant to help beneficiaries start small income-generating activities.

"We are here today in Limbe I Council with some of the IDPs and underprivileged in our community, under the canopy of the Ministry of Social Affairs. This ceremony we are doing today is a yearly event. Every year, the Chief of Centre for Social Affairs and myself always call the underprivileged, some IDPs, who usually benefit from the Ministry of Social Affairs," she said.

"The financial assistance we are giving them today is for 2025. I just told them that with the government, they grind very slowly but surely. The cash we have given them is to assist them to do small business and so on”,

“It is for the year 2025 and the list for 2026 will come soon before the end of the year. I am so happy that each year the Ministry of Social Affairs thinks of Limbe I Municipality."

The Mayor explained that beneficiaries are selected strictly on the basis of written applications, treated on a first-come, first-served basis.

"If they want any assistance from the Ministry of Social Affairs, they should write their application because when they write these applications, it is from the applications we do our selection”,

“As they write their applications, they include their various businesses they want to do and I sit with the Chief of Centre for Social Affairs, but we don't select. We instead take the applications as they come."

"We believe that everybody has a problem and everybody must benefit. We take the applications the way they come and we don't discriminate. We can't take an application of yesterday benefiting over what someone sent last year, so we take in order."

He warned beneficiaries to use the money wisely, noting that due to the huge number of applications, it may take up to five years before they benefit again.

"I was telling the beneficiaries that they are not the only people benefiting and so whatever we are giving them today, they should know that it can be after five years we can give them something again. We have a pile of applications."

On why cash was given instead of equipment, he said: "We didn't want to buy material things like sewing machines, hairdressing materials and so on, but we decided to give them cash so that they can select themselves the type of business they want to do."

For her part, the Chief of the Social Centre for Limbe I, Mme Ewoh Adeline, said the process is governed by law and verified through field inquiries.

"Today we had the opportunity to hand financial assistance to people living with disabilities and socially vulnerable persons," she said.

"Concerning the selection criteria, there is a whole text. There is the 2010 law that has the criteria on how to do the selection. It is meant for vulnerable persons because you can find persons with disabilities who are not needy."

She said the association of persons living with disabilities helps identify truly needy members, while other vulnerable persons are identified through churches and community leaders.

"The president of the association of persons living with disabilities here in Limbe helps us in that selection when it comes to picking members from the forum. Then in the community we have socially vulnerable persons that are known through the churches, through community leaders. What confirms their eligibility is the social inquiry that we conduct. When we go to the field we see for ourselves."

Mme Ewoh stressed that selection is not arbitrary and cited a case to illustrate due process.

"I quoted the case of one mother who had to drop her application at the central service that was re-channelled back to the subdivision just to tell you that there is a procedure and there is a text that governs the selection criteria”,

“So we don't just select the way we feel. We select following the text, either persons living with disability or socially vulnerable in terms of poverty, financial difficulty, being abandoned, sick, just to name a few."

Applicants, she added, must submit an application plus identification National ID for the socially vulnerable and disability card for persons with disabilities after which they are assessed and shortlisted.

"At the council level it is a whole committee the Council Assistant Grant Committee which is headed by the Mayor who is the chairperson”,

“That's why you find her here present, while Social Affairs is the technical service that coordinates the selection and does the follow-up to see that the beneficiaries received what they are due."

BY BEATRICE MOKAM

Contact KNews management on (+237) 651252410 for New coverage and support

Cross section of beneficiaries pose with Limbe I Mayor, Mbwaye Eposi Florence

and Delegate of Social Affairs, Mme Ewoh Adeline

Limbe I Mayor, Mbwaye Eposi Florence symbolically handing financial assistance