The humanitarian situation on the continent is preoccupying and Cameroon has by this great gesture shown that it stands in solidarity with the suffering population.
The information was made public by Prime Minister Joseph Dion Ngute, on the side lines of the African Union humanitarian summit that held in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea. Representing the President of the Republic, the Prime Minister noted the importance of the summit, adding that “the Head of State has not been insensitive to the clarion call from the African Union so he has made a very important contribution of FCFA 500 million to assist the African Union in its quest to stabilise the situation and to ensure that people who are in these unfortunate circumstances do not suffer too much.”
According to AU Commission Chairperson Moussa Faki Mahamat, 113 million Africans need urgent humanitarian assistance this year, including 48 million refugees, asylum seekers and internally displaced people. In a statement, the AU said 15 particularly hard-hit countries required urgent aid, with climate shocks and conflicts causing humanitarian needs to increase “exponentially”.
During his inaugural speech AU serving chairperson and Senegalese president Macky Sall urged his counterparts to tackle the root causes of humanitarian crises on the continent, reminding that “prevention” is better and “easier than cure”. Following this session, another centred on terrorism and unconstitutional government change which cause population displacement and insecurity. At the close of the extraordinary summits, leaders pointed out that terrorism, bad governance, and coups d’état could have causal links and aggravate the humanitarian crises that plague the continent.
The first session, dedicated to the humanitarian crisis and a pledging conference, gathered over twenty African leaders, donors as well as the UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator to raise funds.
Claudette CHIN
