• EDITORIAL POLICY
  • ABOUT US
PML Daily
No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • NEWS
    • Politics
    • Education
    • Regional
    • Africa
    • World
  • INVESTIGATIONS
    • National Archives
    • Special Reports
  • OpEd
  • BUSINESS
    • Agriculture
    • Tech
    • Finance
  • FEATURES
    • Health
    • Tours & Travel
    • Entertainment
    • Society
  • COLUMNISTS
    • The Suited Penguin
  • SPORT
  • Jobs
  • Magazines
  • Home
  • NEWS
    • Politics
    • Education
    • Regional
    • Africa
    • World
  • INVESTIGATIONS
    • National Archives
    • Special Reports
  • OpEd
  • BUSINESS
    • Agriculture
    • Tech
    • Finance
  • FEATURES
    • Health
    • Tours & Travel
    • Entertainment
    • Society
  • COLUMNISTS
    • The Suited Penguin
  • SPORT
  • Jobs
  • Magazines
No Result
View All Result
PML Daily
No Result
View All Result
Home NEWS

Debt, danger facing refugees due to critical funding cuts in Uganda

NELSON MANDELA | PML Daily ReporterbyNELSON MANDELA | PML Daily Reporter
December 17, 2019
8 1
14
SHARES
124
VIEWS
FacebookWhatsAppTwitter
Esake, 27 fled from DR Congo across Lake Albert into Uganda. She came in at the Sebagoro landing site along the Lake Albert shore. Her husband, Patrice, was killed in the tribal fighting in Ituri Province of DR Congo. Widowed and without food, she has reached the breaking point in her quest for survival (PHOTO/NRC/India Dwyer).

KAMPALA – Grim survival tactics are being adopted by desperate refugees in Uganda due to the critical underfunding of the humanitarian response. People are getting into debt, they are skipping meals to save food, parents are selling off their daughters and asylum seekers are engaging in ‘survival sex’ to make ends meet.

Ulrika Blom, the Country Director for the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) said “Uganda is at breaking point. It is struggling to cope with the humanitarian needs of a growing refugee population who in turn, are facing debt and danger because there is no funding available for an adequate response.”

Uganda is currently hosting over 1.3 million refugees and asylum seekers making it the third-largest host nation after Turkey and Pakistan.

Despite more people crossing into Uganda, the funding for 2019 remains critically low. The Refugee Response Plan is just 39 percent funded as of December 2019.

Giramiya Weema, 25, fled DR Congo with her two children. Here she is at Kagoma Reception Centre in Uganda, waiting for a plot of land to live on (PHOTO/NRC/India Dwyer).

As a result, refugees are adopting harmful practices to survive and are exposed to grave protection risks because they have little to no access to basic services such as food, shelter, health or livelihoods.

Tabu (30) fled to Uganda from DRC with her children earlier this year: “There is never enough food. People sleep outside because the rooms are so overcrowded,” she said.

Recent focus group interviews found that Congolese refugees living in Kyangwali settlement along the Uganda/Congolese border are selling food rations to make rent and are taking out loans with 50 percent interest rates. Many parents are skipping meals, often for days, to ensure their children get enough to eat.

Refugee parents also told NRC staff how they are arranging child marriages for their daughters to give their family security. Lack of adequate housing or shelter is exposing female head households to sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV). Some female asylum seekers have admitted to engaging in ‘survival sex’ to make ends meet.

Refugees wait in a centre to receive plots of land and household items. The conditions in the centre are poor and extremely overcrowded. Underfunding of the Congolese refugee response has led to many gaps in assistance (PHOTO/NRC/India Dwyer).

“This is what funding gaps look like. These grim coping strategies are an appalling indictment of our inability as humanitarians to provide the most basic support to vulnerable refugees. It further illustrates the international community’s cavalier approach to responsibility-sharing and it must end now,” added Blom.

The NRC is urging donors to increase funding for Uganda for 2020 or risk the country potentially taking regressive policy measures towards refugees in the future. “If these funding gaps continue, we risk Uganda ending its progressive open-door policy and shutting its doors on refugees for good,” Blom said.

Related

Leave a comment

Tags: Grim survival tacticsRefugeestop

Get real time update about this post categories directly on your device, subscribe now.

Unsubscribe

Advertisement

About

The PML Daily, published via www.pmldaily.com is a publication of Post Media Ltd, a professional Digital/New Media company in Uganda.

Follow us



  • EDITORIAL POLICY
  • ABOUT US

© 2022

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • NEWS
    • Politics
    • Education
    • Regional
    • Africa
    • World
  • INVESTIGATIONS
    • National Archives
    • Special Reports
  • OpEd
  • BUSINESS
    • Agriculture
    • Tech
    • Finance
  • FEATURES
    • Health
    • Tours & Travel
    • Entertainment
    • Society
  • COLUMNISTS
    • The Suited Penguin
  • SPORT
  • Jobs
  • Magazines

© 2022

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In

Add New Playlist