Adamawa/East: Refugees assisted by UNICEF and other relief agencies

More than 150,000 refugees living in the Adamawa and the East Region of Cameroon are receiving free medical and Educational facilities from the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and other relief agencies.

These refugees, who left Central African Republic due to conflicts in 2013, have been settled in six different camps of the Adamawa and East Region.

The displaced sprouted from different ethnic and religious groups with the Mbororo tribes being the majority, and making work more difficult for UNICEF and relief agencies like Plan International and the International Red Cross.

The United Nations Children’s Fund has however devised a means to combat this difficulty-that of employing some community relay and mobilisation agents to pass their messages across.

These mobilization agents who are also refugees are either selected by the relief agencies or elected by the refugees themselves.

With their megaphones these community workers reach out to numerous refugee families early in the morning with the common message of reminding parents to take their children for either medical check-up to the various health units or to school.

By so doing they help to cub the high rate of mal-nutrition and illiteracy especially among the Mbororos whose culture is opposing to education and medical health facilities.

With this effectively put in place, UNICEF and relief agencies such as the International Red Cross and Plan Cameroon are sure to accomplish three quarters of their visions in these two regions.