Monthly Archives: May 2012

David Thomson, Director of Policy and Programmes, blogs from South Sudan. 

Deep-seated poverty and instability just makes children who are already at risk that more vulnerable. Today, when asking why children are being neglected, abandoned, abused and exploited like this in South Sudan, the answer was ‘poverty’ every time. Rising food prices, the conflict on the border and the trade blockade with Sudan all add to this worsening situation.

The Government of South Sudan recently approved a Child Act. This importantly sets out the rights of Sudanese children and their protection from abuse, neglect and exploitation. However, an Act on its own does not protect children. It has to be enacted.

Warrup State, South Sudan

Austerity measures 

This is where the government faces multiple challenges. With the closure of the oil fields, they have recently set out austerity measures. If we think the impact of austerity measures are bad in the UK then we need to think again. Oil revenues account for 98% of the income for the South Sudanese government. The oil production/transport shutdown has severe impacts on the economic, financial and social stability of the country. Already, visible economic shocks include the rising rate of inflation, fuel shortages, and rising food prices.

The announcement of the government’s austerity budget, cutting overall spending by 25%, has consequences for the protection of children. John Majok, the Director General of Warrap State’s Ministry of Social Welfare explained to me their plans to bring the Child Act to life and then explained that they only have enough budget to cover staff salaries – no running costs whatsoever!

So what does this mean for the most vulnerable children in Warrap State? It means finding local level low cost solutions that ensure adults are aware of their responsibilities and children are protected.

Dangerous living 

Today I had the opportunity to witness World Vision’s Community Based Child Protection System in action. I met with Akol who is the chairperson of a committee established by World Vision. Akol explained how the committee has been able to raise awareness with communities of child protection, deal with basic cases, refer more complicated cases to World Vision and the state, work with abusers’ families, and provide counselling. He said children are much more aware of their rights and better able to protect themselves. Many community members have reacted well to the messages because Akol and his team are from the same area and are trusted and respected.

Akol spoke about some of the children they are working with: young girls who are are abducted and gang-raped while out collecting firewood in the forest, children neglected as parents seek out ways to survive, young boys sent to work in the local town that end up living on the streets in dangerous conditions, and dangerous traditional practices for six-year-old Dinka boys to become men where their scalps are scarred and their six bottom teeth are pulled out – no clean instruments and just held down by the others.

South Sudan: Africa’s newest nation

Hope of reunion 

Madut, a 12 year old boy, ended up on the streets in Kuajok. He has lost his family. His mum ran off one night with his siblings, baby twin girls and a younger brother, because she could no longer endure the beatings from her husband. Madut’s father then went to the front line to fight at the border. He never came back, killed in the conflict. Madut waited hoping others in his village would care for and protect him, but no-one did. In desperation Madut then walked five days through the bush to Kuajok town trying to find his mother. She was not there and to survive he found some work and lived on the streets. Late one night, sick and shivering, he found his way to the Child Protection Committees ‘safe space’. With the help of World Vision the committee are tracing his mum who we believe is in the next State. There is hope that Madut will be reunited with his mother and siblings soon.

Later the same day I was swamped by 200 returnee children aged between two and 16 who use the Child Friendly Space set up by World Vision. These returnee children arrived from Khartoum during the last 12 months, many having taken nine to 14 days to travel home. Even though many have at least one parent they are quite lost when they arrive never having actually lived in their homeland. Their parents fled to the North 15 to 20 years ago during the worst of the conflict. These children can now be in a safe space during the day, interact with each other through different fun activities and be supported by trained staff who help them to adjust to their new surroundings. They had one message for the us in the UK: “We greet you and ask that you don’t forget us.” They  added: “Please tell the children especially”.

The Dinka people have a saying: “You cannot clap with only one hand”. They are so right – it takes partners to be able to make a difference in the lives of children in some of the toughest and most dangerous parts of the world. Those that support World Vision are critical partners in caring for and protecting children like Madut.

Raw Hope, by World Vision, aims to save and protect children from physical harm, exploitation, and immediate threat in the world’s most dangerous places. Despite the continued instability of their surroundings, your pledge of £10 a month will provide children in these areas with an increased chance of survival, and offer hope for their continued protection. Find out more here

David Thomson, Director of Policy and Programmes at World Vision UK, blogs from South Sudan. The country was formed last summer, splitting from North Sudan following a peace deal and referendum.

Life is so very fragile in South Sudan

Today I travelled East out of Kuajok Town across the dry bed of the River Juer to visit two Primary Health Care Units in Ajieb. The river is still dry even though the rains have started. Soon the river will fill up and the World Vision staff will not be able to cross this way. Rather than a one hour journey, it will be six hours. But more importantly, the next level of health care for pregnant women is even further from reach. This is why these health care units are so vital.

Community midwife Rose

Life-saving skills

Rose, one of only two trained Community Midwives in Warrap State explained how critical the work was in building the capacity of local birth attendants. The birth attendants, attached to the Primary Health Care Units, serve 16,000 women of child bearing age through building home based life saving skills. This means that complications in pregnancy can be identified early and women referred to the units.

Anger Deng, her first baby due anytime in the coming days, walked 2.5 hours to reach the PHCU afraid of the pains she was having. Abuk Mamer, a mother of 8, walked 2 hours to get her 6 monthly check up. Their clear and simple demand of World Vision was to have qualified staff to care for them. They know that at the moment the Government of South Sudan do not have the capacity to run these life saving health units. The State Minister of Health, Dr Solomon Angui, knows what needs to be done but with the national austerity measures in place can barely cover the salaries of his state health department.

Aluet Ngong

Hanging in the balance 

On 13th May Aleut Ngong gave birth to her third child, Aguek Akol. She was 16 when she had her first child. Today she walked 3 miles back to the health unit, scared because ten-day-old Aguek was struggling to breath.

Aguek was diagnosed with severe pneumonia. The Health Unit was able to give amoxicillin but knew he would die soon if he did not get more care at the Primary Health Care Centre (PHCC). The staff at the health unit were trying to organise a bicycle to give them a lift more than ten miles across the river to the PHCC. Thankfully World Vision was able to organise better transport and Aguek was admitted one hour later to get the care he so desperately needed. I hope and pray that he was not too late.

Life is so fragile in South Sudan. Lives literally hang in the balance that most of the time do not seem to tip in favour of the most vulnerable children but these clinics bring hope to thousands of mothers in Ajeib.

David Thomson, Director of Policy and Programmes at World Vision UK, blogs from South Sudan. The country was formed last summer, splitting from North Sudan following a peace deal and referendum.

What a country. South Sudan, one of the poorest countries in the world, is not even one year old but it is in the throes of an escalating food crisis that is affecting nearly half the population.  90% of the people of South Sudan live on less than 70p a day.  South Sudanese are returning home from the North in their thousands, expected 120,000, only putting a greater strain on the food situation.  Travelling around Kuajok today I heard ‘HUNGER’ mentioned more times by more people, young and old, than I can remember.

The returnee camp I visited today in Kuajok hosts 15,000 people and is called “Khartoum Jedid”, which means “New Khartoum”.  Most of the residents of the camp have returned from Khartoum where many had a better standard of living than they do today.  The children had access to education (boys and girls), women and children to health services, and many had a livelihood.  Back in their homeland they have far less and the strain is obvious on them and the communities they move back to.  Many were born in Sudan so this is their first time back to the South and to get there they travelled days overland to get ‘home’.

I had the privilege today to talk with a group of girls aged between 10 and 15.  They had made the journey in the past 12 months.  They were still adjusting to the reality of being in their homeland but were so thankful to be attending a school built by World Vision, a school with nearly 2000 pupils of which just under 50% were girls.  This is quite unusual in South Sudan.  The girls spoke of the many challenges they faced on their long journey, especially when separated from parents or caregivers.  I can’t even begin to imagine how frightening it would be to be a child alone in that situation.  But somehow they put that behind them!  Natalina who is only 13 lit up when she shared about what she will do for her country when she become s a doctor.  And when Ileza, just 15, clearly explained how she would run the Ministry of Education and ensure that all children in South Sudan had a good education I begin to be transformed by their vision and hope for a different future.  Very humbling.

At the returnees health centre run by World Vision we found the team dealing with 100s of people in need of health care.  They were dealing with people suffering from malaria, diarrhoea, pneumonia and skin disease.  But what they wanted me to see was the life saving work they were doing in through the outpatient therapeutic programme.  With the support of UNICEF and WFP, World Vision is providing life saving assistance to nearly 6 hundred children under the age of 5, over 100 of these children are severely malnourished.

Manut, a 16 month old boy, was presented by his distraught 11 year old sister.  Anome explained that she was the sole care giver and that Manut was not putting on weight.  She was the sole care giver because her father had died and then her mother was murdered in the camp trying to protect them. Manut weighed only 6.1kgs!  At the age of 16 months a boy in the UK at the 50% quintile will way approx. 10.5kgs.  The World Vision team were afraid for both Manut, fearing he may have malaria, and Anome and arranged for them to be transferred to an inpatient facility in the next county. Without their intervention Manut would die. Soon.

The World Vision staff were not providing this assistance in an air conditioned hospital but in a makeshift tent sheltering from the midday sun scorching the ground at 38’c.  I am so thankful for the people who serve these children so selflessly in these conditions on a daily basis.  It is so very far away from our lives in the UK but so very real for thousands of children across South Sudan at this time.