Catherine Bragg (centre) and Sitta Kai-Kai,
head of WFP (bottom right) with displaced
people living in the bush north of Kabo.

(Bangui/New York, 30 July 2009): United Nations Deputy Emergency Relief Coordinator and Assistant Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, Catherine Bragg, ended a five-day mission to the Central African Republic (CAR) with a call for improved protection of civilians in the country.

“Despite a general improvement of the situation in some areas, the situation is still very volatile and the displaced population remains traumatised,” said Ms. Bragg. “Fear is very evident amongst the people who had to repeatedly leave their villages and watch their homes and livelihoods being looted, burnt and destroyed,” she added.

She said the absence of the police and the judiciary in some areas has led to human rights violations and a culture of impunity.

Although some displaced people started to return to their places of origin in 2008, hostilities this year caused further displacement and slowed the momentum of return, she noted, expressing hope that efforts by all parties to restore peace and security will help limit displacement and encourage voluntary return of civilians to their homes.

Humanitarian agencies estimate that one million civilians are affected by conflict in the Central
African Republic, including 125,000 who are internally displaced.

Ms. Bragg also deplored the funding shortfall that humanitarian agencies continue to face. Current funding requirements amount to $97 million. Some $48 million of the total required for the humanitarian response remains outstanding.

During her visit, Ms. Bragg met President Francois Bozize and Prime Minister Faustin Archange Touadera. She also visited internally displaced people in the towns of Birao, Kabo and Paoua and had meetings with humanitarian workers in those areas.

Ms. Bragg said humanitarian organisations in some of the areas she visited still had difficulties accessing certain vulnerable groups due to insecurity and the bad state of roads and bridges, particularly during the rainy season.

The Deputy Emergency Relief Coordinator urged the national authorities to ensure that humanitarian agencies had unhindered access to all those in need.

The full text of all press releases relating to this visit are available here:

Press release 1 - English (PDF) - 28 kb
Press release 2 - English (PDF) - 28 kb
Final Press release - English (PDF) - 24 kb

At an event held in Bangui on 28 January 2009, the government of the Central African Republic and the humanitarian community launched the country’s Coordinated Aid Programme (CAP) for 2009.

The CAP provides a coherent humanitarian strategy of the Humanitarian and Development Partnership Team to provide life-saving assistance to one million people affected by violent conflict and banditry in northern and southeastern CAR, protect their human rights and help them restart their lives.
Speakers at the official launch emphasized that the ongoing peace progress between the government and militant groups provided a unique opportunity to improve the humanitarian situation. Yet civilians continue to suffer from ongoing fighting, banditry and a lack of schools, hospitals and clean water in one of the world’s poorest countries.

For 2009, 11 UN entities, 5 local and 18 international non-governmental organisations have included 105 projects in the CAP for which they require $116m. Most urgently, $14.3m are needed for ten projects that were ranked as an immediate priority.

Download the documents

	Coordinated Aid Programme for Central African Republic 2009 (English | PDF | 109 pages | 2.7MB)
	Complete CAP 2009 Project List (English | PDF | 151 pages | 0.6MB)
	Summary of CAP 2009 (English | PDF | 16 pages | 1.4MB) Résumé du CAP 2009 (Français | PDF | 16 pages | 1.4MB)

For further information

• Visit the global CAP website: www.humanitarianappeal.net
• Contact:
  Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA)
  United Nations | Bangui | Central African Republic
  Nicolas Rost | rostn@un.org
  Gisèle Willybiro | willybiro@un.org

In Coordinated Aid Programme, 34 aid agencies ask for $116m for 2009 to fund humanitarian assistance in the Central African Republic

Pierre Holtz/UNICEF

On 19 November, John Holmes, Emergency Relief Coordinator, launched the Humanitarian Appeal 2009, with CAR being one of the countries covered by the appeal.

The country’s Coordinated Aid Programme (CAP) 2009 includes 105 projects which require funding of just over $116 million. It seeks to provide aid to 1 million Central Africans hit by the conflict. The 2009 CAP strategic priorities are to (i) deliver life-saving assistance, particularly health care and safe water; (ii) protect people struck by violence against violations of their human rights; and (iii) integrate early recovery and humanitarian action.

Ten projects to provide basic healthcare and human rights protection, as well as a humanitarian air service to enable aid workers to reach people in remote areas and transport relief items, are ranked as an immediate priority. Just over $14m are needed for these most urgent activities.

Click here to download the 2009 Coordinated Aid Programme for CAR (PDF, 2.6MB) and here for more information, including all projects and the funding status of the Coordinated Aid Programme

Once there was a fairy-tale image of the brave and noble humanitarian, who would storm into conflict zones – armed only with vaccines and sacks of food – and indiscriminately save lives, having no other impact that a strictly humanitarian one. In the mid-1990s, that image was shattered. Strikingly common-sensical, Mary Anderson laid out the idea of Do No Harm, based on the realisation that humanitarian assistance takes place within a political context, and that so-called humanitarians, in their eagerness to do good, risked exacerbating tensions and deepening conflicts. Of course, this insight was not new. As long as there have been conflicts, people in violence-ridden countries have seen foreigners appear and influence the course of events. Having them arrive in white Landcruisers with colourful flags hardly changed the essential point that, in a conflict zone, everything is political.

Pierre Holtz for UNICEF / HDPT CAR

Acknowledging that emergency aid can have unintended and potentially disastrous consequences should not, and has not, led humanitarian organisations to pack up their vaccination kits and go home. On the contrary: while the idea of Do No Harm is as relevant today as ever, there is no reason why it could not have a positive twin. This twin idea – ‘Do More Good’ – suggests that impartial and effective humanitarian action can have a positive impact beyond its primary aim of saving lives and relieving suffering, i.e. to create some breathing-space for conflict-torn communities and lay the foundations for stability and development. Just such a window of opportunity may exist today in the Central African Republic. Although this window may close fast, it does appear that positive change could be possible. Aid organisations are playing a central role in helping to bring it about. Continue Reading »

Pierre Holtz/UNICEF/Feb 08

The United Nations humanitarian wing today appealed for donors to provide another $26 million to support its aid activities in the impoverished Central African Republic (CAR), where more than 200,000 people remain displaced from their homes by persistent conflict and banditry over the past two years.

The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported that the aid programme launched by the UN and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in the CAR this year needs $116 million in funding, but has received only $90 million so far.

UN agencies have vastly expanded the number of programmes they provide in the CAR to help the growing numbers of internally displaced persons (IDPs) and refugees now living in neighbouring countries such as Cameroon, Chad and Sudan.

Humanitarian agencies have also strengthened their presence outside the capital, Bangui, by increasing their number of offices from seven just two years ago to 46 this month.
Continue Reading »

When families are forced to flee their villages because of violence, they often have to leave behind some of their most valuable assets: seeds and tools for farming. This leads to an even bigger loss: their harvest.

Because of ongoing violence, food security is a major issue in the Central African Republic. Although some early projects are making a difference, more needs to be done; local food prices are increasing rapidly for food produced both inside and out of CAR .
Continue Reading »

Highlights

• $ 9 million grant from China
• Energy crisis hits hospitals in Bangui
• Assistance to the displaced in Kamba Kota and Batangafo in Ouham province
• Departure of Toby Lanzer, UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in CAR

Background and security

Deadly attack near Sibut
On 16 July, bandits, also known as zaraguinas, opened fire on the vehicle of the official representative of the Forestry Ministry, Pierre Ndikini, in the region of Sibut, about 180 km north of Bangui. Mr. Ndikini was fatally wounded and died soon after in the Sibut hospital.  The next day, another attack targeted the truck of a humanitarian NGO in the same region. Continue Reading »

Non-governmental Organisations (NGOs) and United Nations agencies together have ranked all projects in the emergency appeal for the Central African Republic (CAR), which is a part of the Consolidated Appeals Process (CAP) for 2008.

Overall, 37 of 75 projects in the country’s appeal were identified as ‘high’ or ‘immediate’ priority. These projects, which carry a price tag of $29 million, will provide life-saving assistance to 1 million people, including 200,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs) and 3,000 Sudanese refugees. Continue Reading »

Despite progress made in many areas, the Central African Republic remains in a state of crisis. To fund and expand the humanitarian response, the Humanitarian and Development Partnership Team (HDPT) in CAR has published its 2008 “Coordinated Aid Programme,” appealing to donor countries to fund urgent projects intended to meet the needs of one million people affected by ongoing violence in the northern part of CAR. Continue Reading »

From 10 to 12 September all humanitarian and development partners active in the Central African Republic will work on their Coordinated Aid Programme (CAP) for 2008.

More than 15 humanitarian organisations, as well as donors (European Commission, France, Germany, Spain, UK, US) and researchers from King’s College will participate in the workshop.

On the basis of previously developed humanitarian scenarios and contingency plans, they will plan the necessary humanitarian projects and programmes to meet the needs of Central Africans affected by violence, displacement, HIV or food insecurity in 2008.

The final Coordinated Aid Programme (Consolidated Appeal) for 2008 will be launched in December by the Secretary General of the United Nations.
For 2007, about 86 million US dollars are required to meet the humanitarian needs in CAR. Funding is currently at 43 million US dollars (see graph below).

Aid agencies working in the Central African Republic have renewed their emergency appeal for the country. The mid-year review of the Coordinated Aid Programme (CAP) for CAR was launched today by Toby Lanzer, UN Humanitarian and Resident Coordinator. Read a summary of the appeal below.

Violence has now displaced a greater proportion of the population in the north of the Central African Republic (CAR) than in any other country of the world. Torching villages, unknown in CAR until November 2005, has become routine, summary executions reign in a climate of impunity, and rape shatters the dignity and health of the country’s women.

This is the reality faced by one million people scattered in small villages or seeking refuge in the bush along the borders with Chad and Sudan. And it comes on top of the world’s most oppressive poverty which has seen almost two thirds of CAR’s population of 4.2 million survive on less than US$ 1 per day. Continue Reading »