Ivoirians at 'Kouankan 2' refugee camp in southeastern Guinea are working to keep alive a vocational training centre, which refugees and aid workers say is important to the camp community’s future and present.
On 4 August a food distribution was underway at the camp, in Guinea’s N’zérékoré region, and the training centre was empty but for two men seated at foot-pedalled sewing machines. But, they told IRIN, even on a normal day the centre is not nearly as bustling as it was a few years ago.
“It used to be that hundreds of people would come to the centre daily,” 39-year-old Sanogo Moriba, one of 3,369 Ivoirians at Kouankan 2, told IRIN. He volunteers to teach sewing at the centre. “Now people are so discouraged.”
Thousands of Ivoirians have sought refuge in Guinea and other neighbouring countries since a 2002 rebellion in Côte d’Ivoire.
Sewing and woodworking are the only two activities at the centre; skilled refugees volunteer their time to train others and income from sales goes toward new supplies. Up to 2007 there was also soap-making, tie-dying and hairstyling and trainers were paid for their work, according to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) in N’zérékoré.
But with the December 2007 departure of the NGO Jesuit Refugee Services (JRS), which funded and ran the centre, activities stopped, according to UNHCR. A number of international NGOs have left southeastern Guinea in recent years as aid operations for hundreds of thousands of Liberian and Sierra Leonean refugees wound down.
And UNHCR’s 2009 budget for the Ivoirian refugees was based largely on the expectation of presidential elections in Côte d’Ivoire in 2008, with repatriation of most refugees to follow, according to Pierre Njouyep, head of UNHCR in N’zérékoré. But the election was cancelled and Ivoirians at Kouankan 2 say they are not ready to return given continued uncertainty.
The Guinean Red Cross began working at Kouankan 2 in 2007 and took over some of JRS’s activities in January 2008, including the training centre, according to Mohamed Nasser Keïta, Red Cross social coordinator. He said JRS had left some materials for sewing and woodworking.
“But people at the camp have told us they want to resume all the activities,” Keïta told IRIN.
Njouyep said UNHCR is seeking funds to support the centre. UNHCR met with donors in the Guinean capital Conakry in July and presented current funding needs, he said.
UNHCR is also assisting Liberians and Sierra Leoneans who could not or opted not to return home, including Liberians who live in neighbouring ‘Kouankan 1’ camp.
Work and healing
Mansaré Moussa Kaba of the Guinean Red Cross said the training centre is important not only for refugees’ economic future but also for their well-being and social stability.
He said it is detrimental and even dangerous when youth in the camp do not have outlets like the training centre. Many of them, when idle, turn to drugs and other behaviour harmful to themselves or others.
Kaba, who manages a centre for victims of sexual violence at the camp, said the training centre is also critical in their healing. Standing nearby was a woman who told IRIN she was gang-raped during the rebellion in Côte d’Ivoire. “There is one of our trainees,” Kaba said. They both smiled.
“To avoid withdrawal and isolation of victims, we want to bring them to the training centre, where they could learn sewing, embroidery, hairstyling or another skill,” he told IRIN. “After a violent incident, if someone is left alone that will just engender further vulnerability.”
The Red Cross’s Keïta told IRIN the training centre used to provide day-care so young mothers could come and learn a skill. “Unfortunately without this opportunity many young women go into prostitution or seek work in the mines,” he told IRIN. “Often young women are exploited when they seek work in neighbouring villages.”
Fatigue?
Ivoirians at the camp told IRIN they have the sense that the refugee situation in Guinea has fallen off the international community’s radar, with the phase-out of the vast aid operation for Liberians and Sierra Leoneans.
“It is as if donors lump the Ivoirian community in with the Sierra Leonean and Liberian refugees who received assistance in Guinea for some 20 years,” B. Toualy Apolinaire, an Ivoirian refugee, told IRIN.
“What about the Ivoirians who are here now?” he said. “This training centre could give people an opportunity to learn a trade.”
Toualy said donor fatigue seems to have set in, yet the Ivoirians’ needs remain urgent. “All we ever hear is, ‘Not enough funds’. Donors and NGOs must dissociate the assistance provided for refugees all those years from our case.”
UNHCR in a July appeal says it lacks funds to carry out planned assistance to Ivoirian refugees as well as what the agency calls “self-reliance” programmes for Sierra Leoneans and Liberians remaining in Guinea, including income-generating activities and agricultural assistance.
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On 4 August a food distribution was underway at the camp, in Guinea’s N’zérékoré region, and the training centre was empty but for two men seated at foot-pedalled sewing machines. But, they told IRIN, even on a normal day the centre is not nearly as bustling as it was a few years ago.
“It used to be that hundreds of people would come to the centre daily,” 39-year-old Sanogo Moriba, one of 3,369 Ivoirians at Kouankan 2, told IRIN. He volunteers to teach sewing at the centre. “Now people are so discouraged.”
Thousands of Ivoirians have sought refuge in Guinea and other neighbouring countries since a 2002 rebellion in Côte d’Ivoire.
Sewing and woodworking are the only two activities at the centre; skilled refugees volunteer their time to train others and income from sales goes toward new supplies. Up to 2007 there was also soap-making, tie-dying and hairstyling and trainers were paid for their work, according to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) in N’zérékoré.
But with the December 2007 departure of the NGO Jesuit Refugee Services (JRS), which funded and ran the centre, activities stopped, according to UNHCR. A number of international NGOs have left southeastern Guinea in recent years as aid operations for hundreds of thousands of Liberian and Sierra Leonean refugees wound down.
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The Guinean Red Cross began working at Kouankan 2 in 2007 and took over some of JRS’s activities in January 2008, including the training centre, according to Mohamed Nasser Keïta, Red Cross social coordinator. He said JRS had left some materials for sewing and woodworking.
“But people at the camp have told us they want to resume all the activities,” Keïta told IRIN.
Njouyep said UNHCR is seeking funds to support the centre. UNHCR met with donors in the Guinean capital Conakry in July and presented current funding needs, he said.
UNHCR is also assisting Liberians and Sierra Leoneans who could not or opted not to return home, including Liberians who live in neighbouring ‘Kouankan 1’ camp.
Work and healing
Mansaré Moussa Kaba of the Guinean Red Cross said the training centre is important not only for refugees’ economic future but also for their well-being and social stability.
He said it is detrimental and even dangerous when youth in the camp do not have outlets like the training centre. Many of them, when idle, turn to drugs and other behaviour harmful to themselves or others.
Kaba, who manages a centre for victims of sexual violence at the camp, said the training centre is also critical in their healing. Standing nearby was a woman who told IRIN she was gang-raped during the rebellion in Côte d’Ivoire. “There is one of our trainees,” Kaba said. They both smiled.
“To avoid withdrawal and isolation of victims, we want to bring them to the training centre, where they could learn sewing, embroidery, hairstyling or another skill,” he told IRIN. “After a violent incident, if someone is left alone that will just engender further vulnerability.”
Photo: Nancy Palus/IRIN  |
| Vocational training centre at Kouankan 2 camp in N’zérékoré |
Fatigue?
Ivoirians at the camp told IRIN they have the sense that the refugee situation in Guinea has fallen off the international community’s radar, with the phase-out of the vast aid operation for Liberians and Sierra Leoneans.
“It is as if donors lump the Ivoirian community in with the Sierra Leonean and Liberian refugees who received assistance in Guinea for some 20 years,” B. Toualy Apolinaire, an Ivoirian refugee, told IRIN.
“What about the Ivoirians who are here now?” he said. “This training centre could give people an opportunity to learn a trade.”
Toualy said donor fatigue seems to have set in, yet the Ivoirians’ needs remain urgent. “All we ever hear is, ‘Not enough funds’. Donors and NGOs must dissociate the assistance provided for refugees all those years from our case.”
UNHCR in a July appeal says it lacks funds to carry out planned assistance to Ivoirian refugees as well as what the agency calls “self-reliance” programmes for Sierra Leoneans and Liberians remaining in Guinea, including income-generating activities and agricultural assistance.
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This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions
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