Cisa News Africa

RUMBEK January 27, 2012 (CISA) -The Superior of the Sudan delegation of the Eastern Africa Province of the Salesians of Don Bosco, Fr Ferrington Rayen, has said that the presence of the relic of St Don Bosco in South Sudan means that Don Bosco is part of the new beginning of the new nation, South Sudan.

Fr Rayen said this on Wednesday January 25 during the Eucharistic celebration with the relic of St Don Bosco in Tonj Mission of the Catholic Diocese of Rumbek.

He described the presence of the relic of St Don Bosco as a pilgrimage of faith and a very historic event.

Fr Rayen encouraged South Sudanese to build their country in Christ and with Christ, explaining that St Don Bosco was in South Sudan to give hope to the people journeying towards a great future.

Fr. Rayen recalled the three values St Don Bosco embraced in his ministry among the youth, that is, work, bread, and heaven, challenging the youth to shun idleness and laziness and to work hard for their livelihood.

He described Don Bosco as an attractive saint leading people to Christ and called on the faithful to have Christ and the mother Mary at the centre of all plans towards nation building.

Meanwhile, the Parish Priest of Tonj Mission, Fr James Pulickal, prayed that the visit of St Don Bosco will bring blessings upon the leaders, the youth and all families in South Sudan.

The Diocesan Administrator of Rumbek, Fr. Fernando Colombo, expressed his solidarity with the religious and faithful of Tonj Mission, praying that the visit of St Don Bosco bring to South Sudan and to Rumbek Diocese renewal in faith, hope and good deeds especially among the youth.

ABUJA January 27, 2012 (CISA) -As many as 35,000 people have fled their homes in northern Nigeria after continuing attacks from the Islamic extremist group Boko Haram. Their numbers include a large number of Catholics who report that churches have been destroyed.

“There is panic. Many just leave everything behind, and run for safety, because they do not know when violence might flare up again,” a source told Aid to the Church in Need on January 24.

On January 20, Boko Haram killed at least 185 people in attacks that rocked Kano city, located in the state of Borno. The coordinated attacks used cars with heavy explosives and suicide bombers who targeted police stations. Men in security uniforms gunned down government officials.

Churches have also been destroyed in Maidiguri in Borno and the city of Bauchi, in Bauchi state.

“It is the stated goal of Boko Haram to make the whole of the north free of Christians,” one source told Aid to the Church in Need.

At the beginning of January, Boko Haram spokesman Abu Qaqa gave Christians a three-day ultimatum to leave the area.

Refugees are headed to where they believe it is safe, especially the city of Jos.

Boko Haram’s name means “western education is sinful” in Nigeria’s Hausa language. The group has killed at least 935 people since its 2009 uprising, and more than 250 since the beginning of 2012, Human Rights Watch reports.

The Catholic bishops of Nigeria have decried the actions of the group.

Analysts believe the group intends to make the administration of President Goodluck Jonathan, a Christian, appear unable to control the country.

NAIROBI January 27, 2012 (CISA) -Simona Atzori an Italian motivational speaker is back in the country following an invitation by St Martins-CSA a religious organization based in Nyahururu. This is Simona’s second visit to Kenya after being in the country last year.

Born without harms, Simona learnt to use her feet when she was young. At the age of 4 she started painting using her feet and by the age of 6, she was already able to dance on her own. Despite some initial opposition from teachers who felt that it was not appropriate, her own determination and the strong support of her mother enabled her to succeed in a discipline normally associated with the fully able-bodied.

Her ability to do everything that an able person can do makes her unique and for this reason she has become a sought-after motivational speaker.

Simona will be meeting street children and disabled persons in Nyahururu, Laikipia county starting January 27 through February 4. She will demonstrate how she uses her feet in place of hands.

She is categorical that doing everything for the disabled discourages them from trying out their ability. She believes that she was able to fully utilize her legs because her parents encouraged her.

“Every person has a kind of disability and it is up to the individual to set a difference in his or her life,” she said.

DAVOS, January 27, 2012 (CISA) -The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) honoured Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and activist Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu for his efforts in the battle against hunger and his advocacy on behalf of the world’s most vulnerable people.

“I can think of no more worthy individual as a recipient of this honour, than a man who has confronted tyranny and defended the weak and the hungry, armed with nothing but the strength of his faith and the unwavering belief in upholding the rights of the oppressed,” said WFP Executive Director Josette Sheeran.

The Archbishop Emeritus has been a “staunch advocate” for universal human rights, including the right to food, as well as the rights to clean water, shelter, hygiene, sanitation and health care, the agency noted in a news release.

“There are some problems so big and so entrenched it is easy to believe they will never be solved. Hunger is one of these problems,” Archbishop Emeritus Tutu said last year. “Yet a lifetime of experience has taught me that there is no problem so great it cannot be solved, no injustice so deeply entrenched it cannot be overcome. And that includes hunger.”

He is the fourth recipient of the Global Champion Against Hunger award, whose past recipients include former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, and Peter Bakker, former CEO of global logistics company TNT and WFP Ambassador Against Hunger.

WFP also launched its commemoration of 50 years as the UN’s frontline agency in the fight against hunger.

In a related development, the UN expert on the right to food, Olivier De Schutter, today urged ministers gathered in Davos to acknowledge the relationship between globalization and human rights, saying that “globalization should serve human rights and sustainable development, rather than being a process blind to its impacts on the individuals affected.”

KINSHASA, January 27, 2012  (CISA) –Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) is alarmed by the situation of HIV/AIDS patients in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), the lack of priority given by the Congolese authorities and the withdrawal of donors, all occurring as the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Malaria and Tuberculosis prepares to celebrate its tenth anniversary on 28 January.

The conditions surrounding access to care for people living with HIV/AIDS in DRC are horrific. At the Centre Hospitalier de Kabinda (CHK) in Kinshasa, MSF has observed an excessively high number of patients arriving with serious complications resulting from lack of treatment. Their advanced illness creates unacceptable suffering.

“I have worked with HIV-positive patients in many countries in central and southern Africa, but what I’m seeing in DRC has not existed elsewhere for years,” says Anja De Weggheleire, MSF’s medical coordinator in DRC. “The situation here reminds me of the time before any antiretroviral (ARV) treatment was available. Our doctors face serious complications every day that could be prevented if patients received early ARV treatment.”

The number of HIV-positive people in DRC is currently estimated at more than one million, 350,000 of whom could benefit from ARV treatment. However, only 44,000 are receiving treatment at this time. This represents a 15 percent ARV coverage rate, one of the lowest in the world (of all African countries, only Somalia and Sudan have similar rates).

DRC is also one of the two lowest-ranked countries in western and central Africa in terms of the prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV (PMTCT). Only one percent of pregnant women estimated to be HIV-positive have access to PMTCT treatment. Without treatment, approximately one-third of the babies who are exposed to the virus will be born with HIV.

Despite these disastrous indicators, donors have not given DRC the priority it deserves. What is worse, some donors – such as the Global Fund – are withdrawing or sharply reducing their funding. While the Global Fund is the leading supplier of ARV drugs in the DRC, the countries that finance the Fund have not kept their promises. As a result, the Global Fund is having to lower its sights.

This pull-back by donors is directly threatening the lives of thousands of people in DRC.

“It is crucial that Congolese authorities meet their commitment to provide free prevention services and free treatment for people living with HIV/AIDS. It is also critical that donors immediately mobilise the necessary resources to ensure that patients waiting for ARV treatment are not condemned to die,” said De Weggheleire

KHARTOUM January 27, 2012 (CISA) -IOM on January 26 began a series of 12 flights to help 165 very vulnerable people stranded in Khartoum, together with 226 family members and escorts, to return home to South Sudan.

The airlift, which is scheduled to continue for a week, will include 11 charter flights and one commercial flight to Wau, Aweil and Juba, and will be completed by the end of the month. It will be funded by the Common Humanitarian Fund (CHF) and UNHCR.

The returnees are part of a bigger group of South Sudanese who have been stranded at locations in and around Khartoum known as ‘departure points’ since late 2010, when the government of newly-independent South Sudan called upon its people to return home.

They include elderly and disabled people, pregnant women and people with serious medical conditions. Nine unaccompanied minors, identified by UNICEF, will also travel with the group to be reunited with their families in South Sudan.

IOM is supporting the governments of Sudan and South Sudan by facilitating the voluntary return home of South Sudanese citizens.  In 2011, it helped some 23,000 South Sudanese to return by barge, train and air.

Conflict in border areas between the two countries and few commercial transport links mean that it is now difficult for people to return to South Sudan without help from the two governments or the international community.

In December, IOM organized an airlift of 65 vulnerable people who were stranded at the Kosti Way Station. The returnees were transported from Kosti by road to Khartoum, where they boarded a flight to Juba, the capital of South Sudan.

Since South Sudan declared independence in July 2010, over 350,000 South Sudanese living in the north have returned with help from the governments and the international community.

An estimated that 700,000 South Sudanese remain in the north.  The Sudanese government has earmarked April as the final date for all South Sudanese wishing to return home. People staying in the north will subsequently have to regularize their stay.

NAIROBI, January 27, 2012 (CISA) -United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has announced that it is in the process of instituting new ways to ensure its assistance and services at Kenya’s Dadab refugee Camp continue uninterrupted.

In a statement it issued on January  27, the UNHCR said this was in line with its efforts to maintain operations despite prevailing insecurity and reduced humanitarian access at the Camp, situated in northern Kenya and  which rates as one of the largest refugee Camps in the world.

“The new measures include stronger and deeper involvement of the refugee communities in the day-to-day running of the camps, by reaching out to different groups within the refugee population, such as elders, the business community and youth,” says the UNHCR statement.

Complementing this, UNHCR is organizing additional training, mentoring and capacity building for refugee workers and volunteers, the UN body for refugees has further said.

“Refugees have always had a role in making camps work. However at Dadaab that role is being expanded. Hospitals, for example, have remained open throughout this difficult period, staffed by refugees, nationals, and a limited number of international staff,” the UNHCR statement has emphasized.

“Together with our partners we are working to control outbreaks of measles and cholera. Monitoring is conducted on a weekly basis and the number of reported cases is now on the decline in all camps – from some 150 suspected cases at the end of 2011 to about 50 suspected cases in the first weeks of this year,” adds the UNHCR.

In the area of water and sanitation, refugees are building new latrines on sandy and rocky ground and are collecting and transporting solid waste by donkey carts to allocated waste disposal sites. The water and sanitation committees, a network of volunteers that control the water delivery and sanitation services on household level, have also received additional resources and responsibilities for overall coordination and monitoring of these activities, running like a help desk in the camps, UNHCR has pointed out.

And despite insecurity, says the UNHCR the Kenyan National Exams took place in the camps at the end of last year and the results were an improvement in the average score in comparison to the previous year. The exams were made possible because the community patrolled the schools and guarded the gates.

Dadaab refugee complex presently shelters more than 460,000 refugees. A third of this refugee population arrived in 2011 alone, fleeing the conflict, drought, famine and human rights abuses in Somalia. The camps in Dadaab opened two decades ago and were originally designed to host some 90,000 refugees.