DR Congo: Humanitarian Actors Launch USD 64.5 Million-Appeal for Complex Emergency in the Kasai Region

Kinshasa, 25 April 2017: The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs today appealed for USD 64.5 million to respond to the urgent humanitarian needs of 731,000 people over the next six months in the Kasai region, the latest “humanitarian hotspot” in the country borne out of armed clashes that erupted in August 2016 between the Congolese army and a local militia group.

Today, more than one million people are estimated to be displaced as the violence started in Kasai Central and rippled across neighboring Kasai, Kasai Oriental, Lomami and Sankuru provinces. The violence, which led to the death of civilians and other gross human rights violations, also affected schools disrupting education for thousands of children, health centers, and livelihood activities. It has also exacerbated the risks of malnutrition and epidemics in a region traditionally known for high malnutrition rates and a weak health system.

In Kasai Central province alone, the current humanitarian needs are 400% above what humanitarian actors had planned for earlier this year when they launched the country’s Humanitarian Response Plan for 2017, a figure that has required urgent readjustment of programmes, staffing and financial resources. Currently some 40 national and international humanitarian organizations are working across the five provinces. The appeal launched today will provide water, food, medicines and health services, basic household items, and provide protection services, among others, to minors, women who have suffered sexual violence, and other civilians who have been victim of violence.

''The Kasai crisis is an acute crisis of massive proportions in a country that is already going through one of the world’s most relentlessly acute humanitarian emergencies. We are facing a new challenge that requires additional resources to respond to the needs of thousands of displaced people and host families as our current capacities are being outstripped”, the Humanitarian Coordinator in DR Congo, Dr Mamadou Diallo, said in Kinshasa.

“An effective response requires that new and fresh funding be allocated as humanitarian actors cannot afford to take away from their current operations in the eastern provinces to support the Kasai crisis” Dr Diallo said, adding that the current low level of funding of the 2017 Humanitarian Response Plan is a major source of concern. More than for months into the year, the Plan also only received $66 million, representing less than 10 percent of the overall $748-million appeal.

For more information, contact : Yvon Edoumou, OCHA-RDC, +243 970 003 750, +243 817 061 213, edoumoun.org.

Les communiqués de presse OCHA sont disponibles ici : http://ochaonline.un.org ou www.reliefweb.int.

Pour plus d’informations sur OCHA-RDC, veuillez consulter : http://www.unocha.org/drc