The Department of Disaster Management Affairs (DoDMA) has called on district councils to enhance record keeping for effective camp coordination and management.
DoDMA’s Director of Disaster Response and Recovery, Rev. Moses Chimphepo, made the call Tuesday in Blantyre when he officially opened a four-day camp coordination and camp management (CCCM) orientation for District Civil Protection Committees, (DCPCs) which are structures responsible for coordinating the implementation of various disaster risk management (DRM) interventions at district level.
Chimphepo said record keeping is key for informed decision-making and provision of basic needs for internally displaced persons (IDPs).
“We need to safely keep records of disaggregated data in terms of sex, gender, age and most importantly, the vulnerable for instance women, people with disabilities and people living with HIV/AIDS.
“IDPs need to be treated with dignity by among other things, providing them with basic needs like food, clean water, shelter, sanitary facilities and health care. This can be achieved through having disaggregated data and the needs of each affected group at our fingertips,” said Chimphepo.
He then called upon the DCPC members to encourage people living in disaster-prone areas to move to safer places to avoid displacements that emanate from disasters, saying quite a number of households displaced by Tropical Storm Ana-induced floods have voluntarily expressed interest to move upland.
One of the participants, Blessings Kamtema, who is the Relief and Rehabilitation Officer for Nsanje said the orientation provides a guide on effective camp set-up and management.
“The orientation provides minimum standards on how IDPs in camps can be reached out to with need-based humanitarian support and encourages their (IDPs’) participation in decision making and developing recovery interventions,” said Kamtema.
The orientation, which brought together DCPC members from five districts of Chikwawa, Nsanje, Mulanje, Phalombe and Zomba; was held with financial support from the African Development Bank, under the Post Cyclone Idai Emergency Recovery and Resilience Project.
