£30,000 donation to help cyclone victims

THE Overseas Aid & Development Commission is giving £30,000 to the UK Disasters Emergency Committee appeal in response to the devastating impact of Cyclone Idai on several southern African countries.

A family dig for their son who got buried in the mud when Cyclone Idai struck in Chimanimani about 600 kilometres south east of Harare, Zimbabwe. According to the government, Cyclone Idai has killed more than 100 people in Chipinge and Chimanimani and residents say the figures could be higher because the hardest hit areas are still inaccessible.(Picture by AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi)

The donation, on behalf of the people of Guernsey, will help support the work of the DEC’s member humanitarian charities and non-governmental organisations to scale up support to the Indonesian government-led response in the areas of logistics, shelter, safe water and sanitation, health care and food aid.

‘Cyclone Idai has unleashed devastation we can only begin to imagine,’ said commission president Deputy Emilie Yerby.

‘Hundreds of people have been killed, thousands injured, tens of thousands uprooted from their homes by destruction and flooding.’

She added: ‘The cyclone, which has destroyed crops and homes, will have a long tail of hunger, poverty and disease in an already struggling region.

‘We know that the people of Guernsey would want us to respond.

‘So, we have made an immediate donation of £30,000 to the DEC’s appeal, and are considering individual charities’ applications to support the emergency response. Our thoughts are with the affected people at this time.

‘The commission’s donation will supplement the individual donations made by the community of the Bailiwick of Guernsey and the work of other local charities who are addressing this emergency.’