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| Sunday, 8 May 2005 |
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ZOA for ethnic harmony through community service by Rohan Mathes ZOA Refugee Care Sri Lanka had commenced operations here in 1995, and had been active in Batticaloa and Polonnaruwa districts. Later in 1998, they have been in Trincomalee and Mannar districts. They have also operated at Kilinochchi and Ampara districts in 2001. Their mission is to support refugees, internally displaced persons (IDPs), returnees and other Sri Lankans affected by conflict or natural disasters. Support comes through the implementation of relief and rehabilitation programmes by partners with local capacity and through their own operational presence. 147 full-time staffers work in their district offices and 12 in the country office in Colombo. The funds utilised by them flow from the organisation's own constituency, the general public and institutional donors. ZOA's main funding agency however happens to be ECHO. While maintaining the highest standards of professionalism they strive to adhere to Christian ethos and compassion. Assistance is provided irrespective of race, religion, or social background of the beneficiaries. However, as the ZOA Refugee Care International Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Zeger de Haan pointed out, they have no qualms whatsoever in working with communities professing other faiths. "We don't favour any party, religious or ethnic group, the central government or any other. We are only concerned in serving the most vulnerable and needy people", Zeger de Haan added. One of the main programmes of ZOA is Community Rehabilitation (CORE) which aims at assisting re-settling and/or returning families to rehabilitate their livelihoods, environments and communities, to enable them to resume and normalise their battered lives after decades of civil strife. ZOA applies the CORE concept to a particular village or community group all along the transitional phase normally encompassing a time span of 2 to 4 years. From conflict to peace, instability to stability, dependence to self-reliance and from relief to development, ZOA works with the community concerned. Social activities such as community development, income generation, education and capacity building, psycho-social support, peace and reconciliation, infrastructure re-building (roads, bridges etc.), construction (houses, schools, community centres etc.) and water and sanitation (latrines, wells, tanks etc.) are incorporated in the CORE programme. ZOA Refugee Care aims at contributing to the development of a vibrant, relevant and pro-active civil society capable of playing a vital role in all the segments of a future Sri Lankan society. The programme incorporates training and capacity building of Sri Lankan institutions, NGOs, Community Based Organisations (CBOs), Government Agencies and other partners. The rehabilitation programme strives to meet the most urgent needs of returnees, IDPs, host communities and/or refugees. These programmes are relatively short in time-frame and endeavour to address the community needs in one or a few sectors such as distribution of non-food items to support returnees, rehabilitation of water supply and sanitation facilities, provision of temporary shelter, re-building of an access road to an IDP camp or village, construction of a school or community centre, revolving loan fund scheme for a vulnerable village, rehabilitation of tanks, support to re-establish CBOs and accessing legal documentation such as birth certificates, land title documents. ZOA also maintains an Emergency Preparedness Capacity that could be activated in response to any natural or man-made disaster. Funds, staff and resources would be available to implement short-term emergency projects to alleviate suffering in the sectors of food security, household support, shelter, nutrition, infrastructure, trauma counselling and health. This would also serve as ZOA's contingency planning in the unlikely event of a break-down of the peace process in the ethnic conflict, and a return to a civil war condition again. Assisting 16,200 families in 132 villages in the districts of Ampara,
Batticaloa, Trincomalee, Kilinochchi and Mannar is their target for 2005.
Nonetheless, they plan to serve 10,000 families in Kalmunai, Akkarapattu,
Thirukkovil and Navilavelli in the Ampara district, 3200 in Vallaichchennai,
Kaluwanchikudy and Vakery in the Batticaloa district, 6000 in Kucheveli,
Muthur and Weeruwil in the Trincomalee district and 7000 in Pallai and
Mullaithivu in the Killinochchi district. The direct target group is 130,000
people. |
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