The President of the ECOWAS Commission, H.E. Omar Alieu Touray, in consultations with the Chairperson of the African Union Commission, H.E. Moussa Faki, and the Special Representative of the Secretary-General and Head of the United Nations Office for West Africa and the Sahel (UNOWAS), H.E. Leonardo Santos Simão, has deployed a Joint ECOWAS-AU-UNOWAS Assessment Mission to the Republic of Sierra Leone, as a follow up to the  Agreement for National Unity signed between the Government of Sierra Leone and the All Peoples Congress (APC) party on 18 October 2023.

The Mission is co-led by H.E. Leonardo Santos Simão, Special Representative of the Secretary-General and Head of the United Nations Office for West Africa and the Sahel (UNOWAS), and H.E. Fatoumata Jallow-Tambajang, former Vice President of the Republic of The Gambia.

The Mission will meet with senior Government officials and the leadership of the All Peoples Congress (APC) Party, other political parties, as well as all relevant actors and stakeholders in the country, including the hierarchy of the Security Agencies and the Tripartite Committee in the course of the assessment of progress made in the implementation of the Agreement for National Unity. The Mission will also pay a courtesy call on the President of the Republic, H.E. Maada Bio.

As Moral Guarantors of the Agreement, the Joint ECOWAS-AU-UNOWAS Mission would wish to urge all political actors and the citizens to remain calm and to prioritize the peace, unity, and stability of the country above every other partisan interest.

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS).

The celebration took place on 16 June in Monrovia, Liberia. The day was celebrated under the international theme: “Education for all children in Africa: The time is now”, encompassing a holistic approach to education for all, despite race, color, creed and religion, among others.

The programme, held at the ECOWAS regional radio station, brought together government representatives, a leading member of Liberia’s civil society organisation and children from a variety of educational backgrounds, including pupils from the School for the Blind. The event, which took place in two phases, included discussions on the rule of law sector, child labor, drug abuse and sexual violence in schools. The Inspector General of the Liberia National Police (LNP), Colonel Gregory Coleman, took part in one of the discussions.

Colonel Coleman, deliberating on rule of law, specified that all citizens have equal rights under the law, irrespective of their statuses in society, emphasizing, that ignorance to the law excuses no one. He further mentioned the relevance of creating awareness on provisions of the law, in order to ensure full adherence, while at the same time disclosing, that the Liberia National Police is collaborating with the Liberia Drug enforcement Agency, in the fight against drug abuse. He cautioned the children of Liberia and those in the region, to avoid becoming accomplices to the drug trade which leads to addiction, adding, “as you celebrate the day of the African child, you must prioritize your education above peer pressure, as a strong recipe to becoming good leaders in the region”.

Inspector Coleman promised to work assiduously with the leadership of the Liberian Children’s Parliament and other regional youth parliaments, in further enhancing their capacities through education on national and international instruments that promote their rights to education as a fundamental human right.

The Executive Director of NAYMOTE Partners for Democratic Development, Mr. Eddie Jarwolo, representing Civil Society, challenged the children to aspire towards the principles of good leadership, which require transparency and Accountability. He noted that accountability guarantees respectable leadership which easily helps to address issues of corruption.

Madam Victoria Zaway, Directress for Children and Social Protection, speaking on behalf of the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection, said her ministry’s ultimate goal is to engage major stakeholders-in both the private and public sectors, in efforts to promote the rights of children to education in Liberia.

The Day of the African Child (DAC) was climaxed by a live stage performance of the Lion King Movie, with casts from the Josephine Clarke Academy, depicting key moral lessons of Responsibility and Leadership, Courage and Perseverance, Friendship and Loyalty, alongside Redemption and Forgiveness.

The Day of the African Child was instituted in 1991 by the Assembly of Heads of State and Government of the OAU, now AU in memory of the 16th of June 1976 student uprising in Soweto, South Africa. About 20,000 children took to the streets, protesting the poor quality of their education and demanded their right to be taught in their own language. The DAC also raises awareness of the continuing need for improvement of the education provided to African children.

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS).

Following the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between the African Development Bank (www.AfDB.org) and the International Committee of the Red Cross (https://apo-opa.co/4cuqbYu) in December 2023, representatives of both institutions met in Abidjan to take stock of progress and to further strengthen the strategic partnership. The ICRC team led by Regional Director for Africa, Patrick Youssef visited the Bank’s headquarters on 21 May 2024.

“We welcome the ICRC delegation’s visit to the Bank’s headquarters. Together, within the framework of the Bank’s new Ten-Year Strategy (https://apo-opa.co/4c5GpXT) and through our MoU, we are committed to leverage our collective strengths. This includes jointly expanding impactful programs that foster resilience and make a tangible difference in the lives of the most vulnerable affected by fragility, food insecurity and climate change in Africa,” noted Marie-Laure Akin-Olugbade, African Development Bank Vice President for Regional Development, Integration and Business Delivery.

Youssef said: “In times of increasing conflicts, displacements and humanitarian needs in several parts of the African continent, our partnership to find durable solutions in new and protracted crises becomes ever more pertinent. At the ICRC we not only reiterate the criticality of International Humanitarian Law (IHL), but we are also committed to Sustainable Humanitarian Impact”.

He also appreciated the African Development Bank’s strong focus on conflict prevention, addressing the complex and multifaceted drivers of fragility and staying engaged during conflicts to bolster resilience pathways in Africa.

Yero Baldeh, Director, Transition States Coordination Office at the African Development Bank said in alignment with the Bank’s Fragility and Resilience agenda (https://apo-opa.co/3RxWfT7), it shares with ICRC the urgency of advancing   innovative,  bolder, context-specific and conflict-sensitive interventions with scalable solutions.

“It’s a partnership that we value not only in terms of the neutrality and capacities of ICRC, but also in terms of the presence, access and essential protection – of people and investments – in active conflict situations,” Baldeh said.

Other participants such as Dr. Martha Phiri, Director of the Human Capital, Youth and Skills Development Department, and Acting Director of the Gender, Women and Civil Society Department at the African Development Bank, highlighted the value of applying a gender lens across Bank operations and jointly with partners such as ICRC.

She said the Bank’s Gender Strategy made sure that women are not just beneficiaries of small programs, but  are active players in terms of building economic resilience. “Women need investments, and the successful partnership between the bank and ICRC is evidenced through the economic empowerment of vulnerable women project in the Sahel region  (Niger, Mali, and Chad) that enhanced the resilience of 11.000 people.”

ICRC is one of the Bank’s critical partners and work is ongoing to develop an operational framework agreement to streamline collaboration procedures for co-creation and strengthened operations.

The exchange highlighted the importance of strategic partnerships to reduce humanitarian funding gaps in the medium to long-term by pursuing a shared preventive and resilience building approach. It also stressed the critical role of advanced technologies in improving the efficiency and quality of the Bank’s programming through remote appraisal, supervision, monitoring and evaluation via the use of satellite imagery.

Both organizations also reiterated their efforts to expand collaboration in knowledge/analytics, policy dialogues, increased capacity development and shared learning opportunities, and to boost resource mobilization and concrete co-financing opportunities.

Speaking on the long standing and instrumental partnership between the two organizations, Millicent Omukaga, representing the office of African Development Bank president Dr. Akinwumi A. Adesina, expressed appreciation for the excellent collaboration that has evolved significantly over the past years and continues to expand.

The ICRC Delegation visiting the Bank included the Head of the Regional Delegation in Abidjan, Loukas Petridis; Principal Advisor for Institutional Partnerships at ICRC, Jean-Francois Yao. Other ICRC staff joined the meeting online. From the African Development Bank, Frederik Teufel, Jerome Berndt and Aissatou Dosso, facilitated the exchanges,  with several other Bank staff from other departments joining in.

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of African Development Bank Group (AfDB).

The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has welcomed a contribution of US$37 million from the United States Government to provide critical food and nutrition assistance to refugees in Kenya. This contribution will enable WFP to increase rations for vulnerable refugees and resume cash transfers in Dadaab and Kakuma until December 2024.

WFP in collaboration with the Government and the UN Agency for Refugees has also started shifting from providing refugees with homogeneous support to a ‘needs-based’ approach. In this approach, WFP will provide food assistance based on the food security and socio-economic status of each family. Currently, 650,000 refugees supported by WFP receive the same level of food assistance.

“Providing assistance according to levels of need ensures that the most vulnerable are prioritised based on available resources, while weaning the least vulnerable off humanitarian assistance and supporting them to become self-reliant instead,” says Lauren Landis, WFP’s Country Director in Kenya.

The new funding from the United States Government comes at a time when chronic funding shortfalls have forced a reduction in food rations over time, reaching an unprecedented low of 40 percent and a temporary stoppage of cash transfers to 580,000 refugees living in Dadaab and Kakuma camps since May 2024. In recent months, refugees in Kenya have also fallen victim to the climate crisis, with droughts and floods destroying the little they have. Kenya has experienced a 60 percent increase in the population of refugees and asylum seekers since 2019.

“Refugee families have had a very difficult past two months – surviving on less than half of the minimum food required for a healthy life,” says Landis. With support from the United States Government, WFP will increase this amount to 60 percent of the minimum ration and resume Bamba Chakula cash transfers in Dadaab and Kakuma. This will avail more food to the families, uplift the local markets, and increase availability and accessibility of diverse diets.” 

WFP’s shift to ‘needs-based’ assistance strongly promotes self-reliance of the refugees. It is part of the broader refugee operations transition agenda, and complements the Government’s policy to transform refugee camps into integrated settlements. The shift recognizes that refugees are important actors in Kenya’s socio-economic development, who when supported, can participate in and contribute to the country’s economic growth.

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of World Food Programme (WFP).