UN humanitarian coordination agency will base international staff in Mogadishu for first time ever next week
NAIROBI (AlertNet) - The United Nations is sending more international staff to Somalia and negotiating access to increasing numbers of people in need, despite high levels of violence, its new director of humanitarian operations said this week.
U.N. agencies are still unable to provide food aid to most of the 2.4 million people hit by conflict and drought in south and central Somalia because those parts of the country are controlled by Al Shabaab militia, allied to Al Qaeda.
Almost 50 humanitarian workers were killed in Somalia and 35 abducted during 2008 and 2009, reducing the international presence to an all-time low. But with many having left, only one humanitarian worker - not from the United Nations - was killed in Somalia last year.
But, while violence is still rife, improvements in security are starting to allow the U.N. and other agencies to start sending in more international staff.
Next week, the U.N. humanitarian coordination agency, OCHA, will for the first time ever send international staff to live and work in Mogadishu. There are now over 15 international and over 60 national U.N. workers in the country’s capital.
“The security situation in Mogadishu is particularly acute and difficult and it’s not going to be easy,” said John Ging, who was appointed OCHA’s director of operations in January.
“But we are going to match that difficulty with resolve and commitment to do it because we are convinced of the need to be physically there with international staff.”
“By being more present on the ground, you can see the opportunities as they emerge and they may be fleeting opportunities, which, if not seized upon immediately, are lost,” Ging told AlertNet in an interview on Tuesday, following his first visit to the country.
The Horn of Africa nation has been mired in conflict since the 1991 ouster of dictator Mohamed Siad Barre.
The Afgoye Corridor, 30 km outside Mogadishu, is home to the largest concentration of displaced people in the world. Many of these 410,000 people are not receiving aid because the area is controlled by Al Shabaab.
NEW UN OFFICE
The United Nations is also opening up an office in the Galgaduud region of central Somalia, which will enable it to provide humanitarian relief to 180,000 people displaced by conflict and drought.
The area is dominated by Ahlu Sunnah, a militia allied to Somalia’s fragile transitional federal government which controls about half of the Somali capital.
“In the last couple of days, we have gained access to areas that we did not have access to, and as far as I am concerned that’s exactly what we should be doing,” said Ging.
“If it’s mile by mile, then let it be mile by mile. But I would like it to be much bigger than that.”
A former officer with the Irish Army and previously head of the U.N. Relief and Works Agency in the Gaza Strip, Ging is taking a hands-on approach to his new job, making almost a dozen field trips in his first four months.
He admitted the international community is failing the Somali people, with only 36 percent of the $529 million in funding needed this year covered so far.
“The last 20 years of failure (is) a very good and compelling reason to despair, but our obligation to the people is to actually make a bigger effort and to try new things,” he said.
Ging adopted a frank approach with Somalis he met during his visit, saying they need to tackle corruption and insecurity to improve the country’s “bad image”.
“It must be clearly demonstrated that respect for international aid workers and the integrity of the aid effort is a core value of Somali society in action, not just in words, and sadly to date that is not evident,” he said.
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