Malawi banks on Sadc relief appeal
Department of Disaster Management Affairs (Dodma) says the Southern African Development Community’s (Sadc) $5.5 billion humanitarian aid appeal will amplify Malawi’s own call for help to mitigate the impact of weather-related shocks.
Sadc, during an Extraordinary Virtual Summit of Heads of State and Government, on Monday resolved to seek support for 61 million people affected by drought and floods in the region.
Responding to a question on how the new development will affect Malawi’s appeal, Dodma Commissioner Charles Kalemba yesterday said some donors responding to the Sadc call may also want to help the member States directly.
“But others may go through Sadc and the regional bloc will remit the resources to the member States depending on the level of impact,” he said.
In April this year, President Lazarus Chakwera launched the Disaster Response Plan which aims to raise K782.24 billion to support about two million people in 23 of the country’s 28 districts affected by the El Nino weather phenomenon.
Dodma spokesperson Chipiliro Khamula is on record as having said Malawi has mobilised K32.3 billion for the disaster response and K112.5 billion in pledges, leaving the country with a deficit of K637.44 billion.
Zambia and Zimbabwe also declared national disasters this year due to crop failure caused by El Nino.
Zambia targets to raise $941 million (K1.6 trillion) to provide humanitarian assistance to 6.6 million affected people while Zimbabwe is targeting $2 billion (K3.5 trillion) to help more than 2.7 million people impacted by drought.
Sadc Secretariat acting head of disaster risk reduction unit Nana N. Dlamini said in an interview with The Nation yesterday that the Sadc Regional Humanitarian Appeal is a consolidation of the needs collected from all affected member States and the resources mobilised will be channelled directly to the affected countries.
She said: “The regional appeal is to shine a light on the plight of the affected member States because it becomes a disaster of regional proportion when more than one member State has declared state of emergency from the same disaster at the same time.”
Meanwhile, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs and the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) have pledged a combined $43 million (K75 billion) to the regional humanitarian appeal.
