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Hargeysa MAY 27, 2009 – Mark
Bowden, the United Nations Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator made a
3 days trip to Somaliland to visit various UN projects in Hargeysa and
Berbera.
Mark Bowden announced Cabdiqadir Nur Hussein as the winner of the UN
Media Awards 2008 for Somaliland. Mr. Hussein won the prize for best
feature, in the print category. The winning article was printed in the
Geeska Afrika Newspaper in Hargeysa, Somaliland.
The UN media awards recognize the work of Somali journalists across
Somalia and cover print media, broadcast media and online media. The
initiative seeks to encourage the production of features on development
and humanitarian issues and recognizes the contribution of Somali
journalists in putting those issues on the public agenda. It also aims
to improve the overall standard of journalism on these issues, in a
country where there is limited access to formal journalist training.
Mr Bowden then visited the Jamalaaye settlement of internally displaced
people, in Berbera where UNICEF has three projects; a mother and child
health centre, a primary school for the IDPS mostly and a piped water
facility. The projects are centered around the community, their needs
and requirements in terms of development. UNICEF support to the
community includes the provision of a primary school, piped water and a
maternal and health clinic.
The Hassan Ali Henry School, which is supported by UNICEF, is another
project that Mr Bowden visited in Berbera. Before the construction of
this school most children in the Jamalaaye area of Berbera could not get
an education or had to walk a minimum of two kilometers in 40 degree
weather to the nearest school. Only over a third of the children aged
6-13 years in Somaliland (i.e. approximately 150,000) are estimated to
be in school. The school is named after Hassan Ali Henry, a Somali
philanthropist who used to assist Berbera children in 1930s.
While in the Jamalaaye district of Berbera, Mark Bowden also saw the
Jamalaaye Maternal and Child Health Clinic (MCH) which serves a very
poor community with limited access to other health facilities. The MCH
provides much needed immunization, an under five clinic, growth
monitoring, outpatient feeding, and antenatal services. UNICEF provides
the MCH with drug kits, vaccines and vaccines supplies. The MCH also
distributes ‘Plumpy doz’, a ready to use food supplement to reduce the
incidence of acute malnutrition to 9,500 children under three for eight
months and will treat 6,000 severely malnourished children this year
alone.
Mr Bowden also visited the Berbera port to see the operation being
carried out by the World Food Programme (WFP) which has generated over
300 additional jobs. He also visited two other WFP warehouses storage
facilities which have created additional 60 jobs.
The last stop of the trip involved a visit to the Local Economic
Development and Appropriate Technology (LEDAT) Resource Centre in
Hargeysa. LEDAT was established in 2004 to support economic development
in Somaliland by providing local entrepreneurs and those involved in
poverty alleviation with access to quality information, research and
training materials. It is run by the International Labor Organization (ILO)
with support from Italian government and UNDP.
For more information, please contact Kaltun Hassan, Media Relations
Specialist, Tel: +2522 4166242 or
+254 726891851. Email:
kaltun.hassan@undp.org
Source: UN Office of the
United Nations Resident & Humanitarian Coordinator for Somalia
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