What We Do

Emergency and Development

Due to the rise in recurrent natural and man-made disasters, Save the Children Swaziland has decided to set up a programme that would respond rapidly to emergencies. This programme, like most of our programmes, interlinks with Save the Children Alliance at both regional and international level. Most of our efforts this fiscal year were directed towards establishing some linkages with local and regional organisations that deal with disasters. We have also been able to respond to some geographically located disasters.

Objectives

To work towards formulating an emergency response plan
To respond to local and national disasters where children’s lives are in danger
To compliment government efforts in planning and responding to disasters
To participate in developing disaster related policies
To network with Save the Children Alliance members in resource mobilisation strategies.

Networking

As the first step towards setting up of emergency programme we designated a post for an emergency resource person. We then linked with regional alliance on emergency issues. Subsequently, a regional alliance workshop for West and South Africa fully funded by Save the Children UK took place in Pretoria late September 2000. As a member of the Alliance, we participated fully with support from Save the Children UK Regional Office.

Objectives of the Workshop were to:

Improve knowledge and understanding of basic principles regarding emergencies
Clarify Save the Children’s internal procedures and approaches in emergencies
Support the process of emergency preparedness planning
Develop action plan on how to take the work forward.

Considering the fact that the emergency programme is fairly new in Swaziland, we feel the workshop was very useful in broadening our scope of understanding and certainly contributing towards preparatory work in emergency preparedness planning.

Hailstorm Disaster Assessment

At the end of the year 2000, beginning of 2001, parts of the Shiselweni region experienced a devastating hailstorm. The hailstorm destroyed mainly crops and buildings. Our immense experience in the school feeding programme prompted the National Disaster Taskforce (NDTF) to request that we carry out a food security assessment reflecting the impact of the hailstorm in schools within the affected area. We carried out the assessment with our local resources covering ten schools within the affected area. The schools covered included:

Ngudzeni Primary School
Velabantu Primary School
Hhohho Primary School
Dzakasini Primary School
Njanini Primary School
Njanini High School
Sandleni Primary School
Entabeni Primary School
Ka-Zila Primary School

The assessment was designed to cover all stakeholders, including the local Inkhundla, community members, teachers, government field workers, Rural Health Motivators, local authorities and most importantly children themselves. During the assessment, efforts to gt children’s perception of the problem and recommendations were exhausted in all possible means. This was done through our trained and experienced field officers who have immense skills in communicating with different groups of people including children.

In summary, the report reflected that there is need for an urgent intervention to arrest the current food shortage, particularly in schools. The huge number of children that were reported to have only one meal per day implied urgent intervention. A small number of children from very poor families were reported to skip a full day without a meal. The community including the children themselves recommended that any assistance rendered in the form of food should be directed to children because of their vulnerability. Therefore there is a need to support a comprehensive school feeding programme, so that children can at least access one nutritious mean per day. In schools where the programme does not exist, there is a need to initiate it as a matter of agency. Government (NDTF) is determined to get financial support for this particular relief programme.

Displaced Children and their Families

Working in partnership with a number of organisation including Baphalali Swaziland Red Cross, CARITAS Swaziland, Swaziland National Association of Teachers (SNAT), Lutheran Development Service, Council of Swaziland Churches and many more, we have spontaneously been responding to the needs of displaced families subsequent to their eviction from Mkhweli and Macetjeni areas.

The needs of the displaced families ranged from shelter, clothing, food, water/sanitation, education (schooling), toiletries, transport and general health. The total number of displaced children was over 120. We have been very much engaged with child and family tracing and supporting school-going children with basic school needs such as school fees, uniforms, textbooks and exercise books. We also engaged with our partners in providing food and clothing. In some cases we provided hard cash for children who had to commute from their temporal residence to school. The support to school-going children would not have been possible without the cooperation of some schools that were prepared to enroll the displaced children at an awkward time of the year.

Challenges

Mobilising local resources for providing relief to the displaced families was very difficult because of the political nature of the evictions
It was also challenging to handle the media in the manner it was reporting facts, consequently, the reported facts turned out to inflict fear and make the affected more vulnerable to the powers that be.
Due to ill preparedness within the organisation and partners, there was a delay in responding to the needs of the evicted.
The so-called progressive groups that had a vested interest in the matter because of their political inclination overshadowed demonstrating non-partisan to the public.

Future Plans

Produce a fully-fledged emergency preparedness plan
Train relevant staff on basic emergency response mechanisms
Formalise the emergency network in the country
Participate in regional alliance emergency networks
Raise an emergency reserve fund that we would tap on for immediate relief response
Advocate for disaster policy