UNHCR along with IOM is helping RRRC to
ensure humanitarian assistance to the Rohingyas in 34 camps
The government has started the process to
take over all administrative responsibilities in the Rohingya camps, two years
since the latest influx of Rohingyas that began on August 25, 2017, due to an
unprecedented brutal military crackdown by Myanmar.
Confirming the matter to Dhaka Tribune,
Refugee Relief and Repatriation Commission (RRRC) official, and Camp-in-Charge
(CIC) Zahid Akhter said: “The government, around two months ago, had sent some
officials for administrative duties here (at the Rohingya camps), and currently
they are getting necessary training.”
“Establishing a definite service system (in
the Rohingya camps) was not that easy. Registered camps have one CIC, and
during the initial influx, the in-charges did not have any extra hands for
assistance in their work. Later, upon expansion, each camp had one CIC. The
concerned CICs got two volunteers to assist them.
“But controlling this large number of
displaced people, along with the huge number of NGOs, was not that easy. Thus,
during the early stages of the influx, the government outsourced recruitment
and site management responsibilities through United Nations High Commissioner
for Refugees (UNHCR) and the International Organization of Migration (IOM) as
it did not have adequate time to respond to the crisis,” he added.
“The principal responsibilities of a site
management team is to help manage the site while ensuring a service map for the
sites, and assist in administrative duties. The best thing about outsourcing
site management responsibilities was ensuring a very good service-map (who,
where will provide what types of services). But there were also some negatives
of this decision.
“These aid workers working at the camps, only
think about providing assistance to the Rohingyas but have failed to understand
what the government is thinking regarding the proceedings, and how they
(government) want to provide services to the Rohingyas. The NGOs working at the
camps (for site management) are deployed through UNHCR or IOM, and their
loyalty seemed to be tilted towards these bodies,” the RRRC official said.
“A good number of humanitarian activities are
taking place inside the Rohingya camps, and in order to achieve the desired
objectives, the government will recruit 40 to 50 individuals.
“But only seven to nine of us are carrying
out this huge task,” he added.
Addressing the proceedings, RRRC Additional
Commissioner Mohammad Mizanur Rahman said, as funding to look after the
persecuted people sheltered in Cox’s Bazar is in the decline, UNHCR has asked
Bangladesh government to take over all administrative duties in the Rohingya
camps.
“As a part of the initiative to bring all
administrative duties under the government’s umbrella, seven to nine officials
were deployed in the Rohingya camps as apprentice officers, and they are
expected to start managing these sites (administrative duties) in full swing,
hopefully by the end of 2019.
“It is a long process, and would take more
time to take over all other activities related with the Rohingya crisis.” he
added.
Led by a commissioner, RRRC is a unit of the
Bangladesh government responsible for the administrative duties inside the
Rohingya camps.
The monumental task of helping Rohingyas
Anybody, who has not been in the camps
recently, will be surprised to see the level of development achieved in the
last two years.
UNHCR along with IOM is helping RRRC to
ensure humanitarian assistance to the Rohingyas in the 34 camps.
In every camp, either IOM or UNHCR leads the
humanitarian operations, while a Camp-in-Charge from RRRC performs the
administrative duties.
According to ISCG, the coordinator of the
whole operation, the camps are divided into 16 different sectors where
Rohingyas get access to 11 types of services. (Bangladesh: Cox’s Bazar refugee
response (4W) – as of 05 August 2019, published by ISCG)
The agencies which are responsible for site
management, are providing referral services (granting special permissions
regarding movement of Rohingyas, and providing services if not received) and
this is playing a key role in abolishing the gaps between the service maps.
The major services that these bodies are
providing include: Site management; site development, education; food security;
health; child protection; protection from gender based violence (GBV); water,
sanitation, hygiene (WASH); and shelter/NFI, and communication with community
(CwC).
In the camps, all services for Rohingyas are
provided by a mix of NGOs (local, national and international) along with the
Ministry of Women and Children Affairs (MoWCA), and Department of Social
Services under the Ministry of Social Welfare, while district units of every
other concerned ministry are also involved in the procedure.
Source: Dhaka Tribune
Don’t forget to read more below:
HRW: Stop Clampdown on Rohingya Refugees https://lnkd.in/ggjFvTg
NVC at Gunpoint: Rights Group https://lnkd.in/gBuCU6i