TimeDesk & de toekomst van werk en inkomen

Alle Afrikaanse landen groeien dit jaar, terwijl een groot deel van de wereld lijdt onder de crisis’, jubelde de Afrikaanse Ontwikkelingsbank dinsdag. De Amerikaanse minister van Buitenlandse Zaken Hillary Clinton toert momenteel door Afrika (7 landen in 11 dagen) om ‘booming Afrika’ met eigen ogen te aanschouwen. Wordt Afrika the place to be of is de euforie weer niet gepast?

I have just come back from our partnership project in Uganda. I spent a month there, sorting out a donation for their library (we bought many new useful books) and for the new buildings that now function as dormitories for orphans who board at the school (we are planning to buy new beds and mattresses for them). Also a friend of mine came there with me and spent a month doing IT training with the teachers and pupils. She had successfully obtained funding for bringing two laptop tablets, solar lights and chargers for the project. All in all, this is a great new development for the project!

The Uganda Red Cross Society (URCS) is appealing for sh4.5b towards its emergency and recovery interventions for 100, 000 people (14, 000 households) affected by landslides in the Mt. Elgon zone in Eastern Uganda. The funds will support communities who are already displaced and those staying in areas with evident cracks in the districts of Bududa, Sironko, Mbale, Manafwa, Kapchorwa, Bukwo, Bulambuli and Kween. The Uganda Red Cross Society will support the affected people who are staying with host families, relatives and friends in safer places within the districts. This is to enable them live a dignified life as they await for a durable solution that is being planned by the government.

On another memorable day, the medical students who were here (and who have since departed) and Dr. Lisa traveled to Bunabumali, a nearby village, to perform physicals on the 250 orphans who lived there in the mountains. They set up a physical exam conveyor belt so as to systematically and methodically examine every single child, but soon felt the system clogging as bad as Kampala traffic. Elyssa and I were pulled from our task teaching the proper use of medicine to a group of sixth graders to aid in the examinations. We were given a crash course in vitals, and managed to record the basic health information of every child who was thrown at us. I EVEN got to use a stethoscope. Doctors without Borders, eat your heart out.

Prme Minister Mbabazi last evening leaving Bulobi village in Bududa district after he formally conveyed government’s condolence and commiserations to residents over the Monday mudslides. He said 45 victims are still “missing” and that government is working round-the-clock to ensure those in high risky areas are evacuated, if necessary to towns. Photo by Tabu Butagira  Read more 

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KAMPALA, 27 June 2012 (IRIN) - Following a third landslide in as many years that left at least 18 dead and over 100 missing in eastern Uganda’s mountainous district of Bududa, experts are warning that unless long-term measures are put in place, similar disasters are inevitable. full report

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Update 1800  

Pictures

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Update  16.30

The Ugandan government halted rescue efforts at the site of Monday’s landslides as the death toll reached 30 people and officials warned of massive population displacement as rains continued.

“There is no hope of finding any anymore survivors,” said Stephen Malinga, Uganda’s minister responsible for relief and disaster preparedness. “The focus is on the recovery of bodies, assessment of the needs of the displaced and provision of humanitarian assistance.” Read more

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Update 1300 - May 26 2012

The Uganda Red Cross Society says efforts to recover bodies believed to have been buried by mud and heavy boulders in Buduuda district are still futile due to lack of equipment.

An estimated 400 people still feared unaccounted for, following a series of devastating landslides that buried two villages of Namaaga and Bunakasala in parts of the mountainous Bugisu sub region in Eastern Uganda. read more 

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Update 1200- May 26 2012

As last evening wore on and darkness descended on the eerie Bududa villages of Namaga and Bunakasala that were buried in a landslide, hope started to ebb from the weary faces of survivors when it dawned on them that over 400 people could have perished. More

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Landslides induced by torrential rain have destroyed three villages in the mountainous district of Bududa in eastern Uganda, killing scores of people but possibly hundreds, officials say.

The disaster preparedness minister, Stephen Mallinga, said it was still too early to say how many had been killed in Monday afternoon’s landslides, but officials from Bududa said the final death toll would probably be in the hundreds.

more good news from Bunabumali projecct