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IRIN-WA Update 543 of events in West Africa (Friday 3 September)
LIBERIA: UNHCR recommends relocation of Sierra Leonean refugees
The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) on Friday recommended to Liberia's government to relocate Sierra Leonean refugees living in Kolahun in the northwest Liberian county of Lofa.
UNHCR said in a news release that it made the recommendation because of the security problems the refugees have been encountering since the evacuation of aid agencies from Lofa.
"An inter-agency humanitarian mission led by UNHCR and which included members of the NGO community in Monrovia visited on 2 September Kolahun and Vahun in Lofa ... and received testimonies from refugees that they no longer felt secure in the area," UNHCR said.
Refugees cited numerous incidents of harassment by Liberian security forces, it added. They also said that for the moment food, water and medical care were available, but they feared that aid agencies would no longer return to Lofa.
Aid agencies pulled out of the county last month following the outbreak of fighting between government troops and rebels. The mission's aim was to verify reports that everything had been looted, including millions of dollars' worth of food stocks, vehicles, and office equipment.
Since last week, thousands of Sierra Leoneans fled camps in upper Lofa and headed south to safer areas. According to UNHCR, some 5,000 have arrived in Targbe in lower Lofa and are receiving assistance from UNHCR and other aid agencies. Thursday's inter-agency mission counted 8,000 who had remained in Kolahun.
According to the UNHCR regional director for West and Central Africa, Abou Moussa, "the conclusions of a security mission sent in the area earlier this week as well as those of this humanitarian team are the same: insecurity is prevalent in Lofa and in these conditions we recommended today to the Liberian Government to relocate the refugees".
The "exercise would require the mobilisation of huge financial and material resources, but it is essential for the protection of the refugees, which is the mandate of UNHCR," Moussa said. "...in the meantime, UNHCR is working in partnership with other organisations to bring relief to the refugees who have left their dwellings in Lofa'
Some 35,000 of the 90,000 Sierra Leonean refugees in Liberia live in Lofa, including 15,000 in Kolahun, according to UNHCR.
Focusing on reconciliation
Clashes in northwest Liberia between rebels and government troops and speculation on the possible involvement of former faction leaders in the fighting have drawn attention in Monrovia to the issue of national reconciliation.
President Charles Taylor said at a meeting with opinion
leaders on 16 August, just under a week after the fighting
broke out in Lofa County, that the government "has
done everything possible to reconcile with former warring
factions".
Taylor was reacting to a suggestion that he should intensify
efforts to bring former faction leaders back to Liberia.
"Do you think that those who took up arms along with you [the other faction leaders] are comfortable sitting where they are after having tasted the power of government administration?" a prominent criminal lawyer, Marcus Jones, asked Taylor at the meeting. He was referring to the participation of all faction leaders in a 1995-1997 transitional government.
But questions have been raised about whether former rebel chiefs and opposition leaders would be safe if they returned to Liberia.
[See separate item titled 'IRIN special report on reconciliation']
GUINEA-BISSAU: Preparing for elections
Preparations for elections to be held on 28 November continue in Guinea-Bissau, where voter registration is expected to be completed this month.
In the capital, Bissau, the registration started on 22 August and was scheduled to end on 2 September, but was extended this week to 4 September, according to the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).
Up to 31 August, about 63 percent of eligible voters in Bissau had been registered, according to OCHA. Other sources said on Friday that the percentage had now topped 80.
The Commiss"o Nacional de EleiÁies (CNE - National Electoral Commission) hopes to register an estimated 600,000 eligible voters countrywide, Lusa reported on 22 August.
Registration in the rest of the country began on 29 August and was expected to end on 9 September, a humanitarian source told IRIN.
However, the process may be in jeopardy if financing is not received in time, OCHA quotes the President of the CNE as saying. OCHA reported that the European Commission had not yet disbursed US$ 2 million it pledged earlier this year in support of the elections at a UNDP-sponsored emergency roundtable on Guinea-Bissau.
The European Union (EU) said the delay was directly related to the fighting on 6-7 May that resulted in the overthrow of then president Joao Bernardo Vieira. Following consultations with Prime Minister Francisco Fadul in July, cooperation has restarted and the funds are expected to be disbursed.
President Malam Bacai Sanh. reportedly remains committed to the elections. Lusa reported him as saying on 31 August that "even if it is necessary to freeze government spending for two months, the elections will be held".
NIGERIA: Power company to receive financial injection
Nigeria's government has decided to spend about US $30
million to reduce power outages in the country by half,
according to a report on state-owned Nigeria Television
Authority (NTA).
The National Executive Council decided this week at a meeting chaired by President Olusegun Obasanjo to provide the Ministry of Power and Steel and the National Electric Power Authority (NEPA) with 2.3 billion naira to improve the generation, transmission and distribution of electricity in the short term, NTA reported.
The naira is valued at about 99 to the US dollar.
AFRICA: Health ministers discuss policy
A range of key health issues for the next millennium have been under discussion by African health ministers in Windhoek, Namibia, at the World Health Organisation (WHO's) annual regional meeting.
A WHO official told IRIN that the topics raised at the 49th Session of the WHO Regional Committee for Africa which started on 30 August and ended on Friday, included: reproductive health; the quality of health care; polio eradication and measles control; community-based rehabilitation; regional information and education strategies for health promotion; epidemiological surveys, and HIV/AIDS.
The 46 African health ministers focused on four issues proposed by WHO: a programme of regional health for all for the 21st century to guide national policies; a regional strategy for mental health; a regional technical policy; and a strategic plan for 2000-2005 on the integrated management of child illnesses.
TOGO: Government challenges Amnesty on abuse charge
Togo has challenged Amnesty International to provide
proof at the summit of Francophone nations, which began
on Friday in Moncton, Canada, of its charge that scores
of people were killed last year at the behest of the
Togolese government, AFP reported.
"The Togolese government challenges Amnesty International
to bring to public awareness on the occasion of the
Moncton summit the slightest proof to back its accusations
against Togo," AFP quotes the government as saying
in a statement on Thursday.
On Wednesday, Amnesty had urged member states of La Francophonie - which defines itself as the group of nations that share the French language - to "reiterate their commitment to the protection of human rights in Togo and to ensure that perpetrators of human rights abuses are brought to justice".
In a May report, Amnesty accused Togo's security forces and paramilitary police of killing many people and throwing their bodies into the sea in mid-1998.
Abidjan, 3 September 1999; 19:41 GMT
[ENDS]
[IRIN-WA: Tel: +225 217366 Fax: +225 216335 e-mail: irin-wa@ocha.unon.org ]
Item: irin-english-1546
[This item is delivered in the "irin-english" service of the UN's IRIN humanitarian information unit, but may not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations. For further information or free subscriptions, or to change your keywords, contact e-mail: irin@ocha.unon.org or fax: +254 2 622129 or Web: http://www.reliefweb.int/IRIN . If you re-print, copy, archive or re-post this item, please retain this credit and disclaimer.]
Copyright (c) UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs 1999
Editor: Ali B. Ali-Dinar
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