UN agency builds school for 1,700 refugee children in southern Chad

Some 1,700 children from the Central African Republic (CAR) who had been learning under trees at a refugee camp in southern Chad will soon take their lessons in classrooms built by the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), an official told IRIN on Thursday. "The classrooms will be ready for use in two weeks," Emile Segbor, the UNHCR representative for CAR and Chad, said. He had returned to the CAR capital, Bangui, after visiting Camp Gore in southern Chad between 28 October and 2 November. The camp hosts 13,000 CAR refugees. Segbor said workers recruited from among refugees were currently making desks and completing the school's roofing. When complete, he said, the red brick-walled and zinc-roofed classrooms would accommodate 1,400 primary school pupils in the mornings and 300 secondary school students in the afternoons. He said the primary classes would be taught by CAR refugee teachers and the secondary school classes by both CAR and Chadian teachers. Segbor said the agency was planning to build a similar school at Camp Maro in southern Chad, which is hosting 15,000 CAR refugees. Thousands of CAR nationals, mainly from the north, fled their country between October 2002 and March 2003 following fighting between government troops and rebels loyal to former army chief of staff Francois Bozize, who is now the CAR head of state. Bozize seized power on 15 March from President Ange-Felix Patasse. At least 41,000 refugees are reported to be in camps in southern Chad. Apart from Gore and Maro, two towns near the CAR border, there are other smaller refugee camps in southern Chad. Segbor said all the refugees were receiving food and medical aid, and that they had access to safe drinking water. He added that the refugees were also engaged in farming and that the UN Food and Agriculture Organization had provided them with bean and sorghum seeds as well as farming tools. The refugees had opened a market in the camp to sell their produce, he said. Despite the CAR transitional government’s efforts to repatriate all its refugees, those in southern Chad are hesitant to return due to insecurity in their home areas in the north. A CAR mission headed by Social Affairs Minister Lea Doumta toured the camps in September to convince the refugees to return home. "For the time being, repatriation is not one of our immediate plans," Sebgor said.