Challenges facing humanitarian community

The challenges now facing the humanitarian community in Sierra Leone include improving immunisation coverage, nutrition levels and education, UN and government officials said on Tuesday in Freetown.

"As agencies gain access to previously inaccessible areas, mass
immunisation campaigns are needed to prevent epidemics," UN
Humanitarian Coordinator for Sierra Leone Kingsley Amaning said.

Amaning and S.U.M. Jah, head of the Commission for National Reconstruction, Resettlement and Rehabilitation (NCRRR), spoke at a press conference in Freetown on the challenges facing the relief community now that the Lome Peace Accord has been signed.

Amaning referred to a number of key areas for the humanitarian community, including primary health care, feeding programmes for malnourished children and the rehabilitation of shelter and water supplies. "The needs of children are an especially high priority," he said, "whether in the area of health,
education, family reunification or demobilisation."

Both Jah and Amaning said urgent support was also needed for the
return, resettlement and reintegration of nearly half a million Sierra Leonean refugees in neighbouring countries.

Jah, whose commission is the government body responsible for coordinating relief activities, said that "over 3,000 villages and towns wiped out by the rebels are expected to be rebuilt".

"We also expect to rehabilitate and reconstruct community infrastructures, including about 1,700 educational facilities, 400 health facilities and 3,000 water wells," he said.

The humanitarian community has been planning a series of missions to previously inaccessible areas to assess the specific needs of war-affected populations, starting with Makeni in the north.