By: Somalilandtoday
Somalilandsun -WFP is one of the biggest UN agencies headquartering in Hargeisa and several other cities in Somaliland, its mission over the years has been facing critics suggesting WFP’s mission in the country has not been working in the interest of those citizens who’re most in need of food ,water and medical supplies.
While WFP purports its distributions have in many cases been successful in reaching out to those in need of assistance, people in Hargeisa and the country as a whole suggest otherwise.
In 2011, The World Food Program strongly condemned the diversion of food from starving, vulnerable people. WFP said it was investigating the allegations of theft of desperately needed humanitarian food and will suspend any parties found responsible.
Yet, no one has been brought to justice for being involved in theft and diversion of very much needed humanitarian assistance, on the contrary there have been series of allegations regarding stolen food intended to be distributed to the less fortunate people.
Geneva Director of WFP Lauren Landis said in 2011 that the smallest amount of food taken from starving and vulnerable people in Somaliland and Somalia had dire consequences as drought intensified in the region killing tens of thousands of people in the Horn of Africa, and led to the death of almost 70% of livestock animals used for consumption by the pastoral communities.
She said her agency has a very strong system of control in place to make sure food goes to the people for whom it is intended, Landis admitted that WFP employs so-called third party monitors to make sure everything is operating as it should.
In recent years due to recurrent droughts and food shortages, the number of people in need of assistance has doubled including those refugees displaced by the conflict in the neighboring Somalia who have already been dependent on humanitarian assistance; WFP has failed to take active steps in providing the less fortunate people with food and other essential humanitarian assistance.
WFP’s covert, discouraging policies against agricultural communities.
There also has been string of scandals that implies WFP’s mission in Somaliland and if it exists, it can catastrophically put the lives of people in misery including the agricultural communities who have long been suffering serious drops in their agricultural productions due to a number of significant factors.
One of the main factors is WFP’s polity based on importing food and other crops from the overseas as the agricultural communities prepare to supply their products across Somaliland; this has disturbingly discouraged the agricultural communities who subsequently refrained from farming.
It would rather be better if WFP was buying food from the local markets than importing tons of maize and sorghum from the overseas; this is why WFP demands millions of dollars from the donor nations and not even one-third of this money reach the people for whom it was intended.
If the World Food Program purports food shortage in the local markets, there’s sufficient food in the local markets; the problem is always about people who are most in need are lacking cash to buy what they need to consume.
Department of Monitoring of www.Somalilandtoday.com
