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HORN OF AFRICA
IRIN-HOA Weekly Round-up 279
14 - 20 May 2005


CONTENTS:

DJIBOUTI: 5,000 mt of food needed for drought-affected people
ERITREA: EU gives ?620,000 for emergency food security
ETHIOPIA: Opposition now claims election victory
ETHIOPIA: Ruling party claims election victory
ETHIOPIA: Huge turnout for federal elections
SOMALIA: Mogadishu more secure, says Speaker
SUDAN: Policemen, IDPs killed in clashes over forced relocation
SUDAN: Environmental groups warn over new dam
SUDAN: Vaccination campaign against meningitis planned in West Darfur


ALSO SEE:

SOMALIA: Remittances - a lifeline to survival
Full report

ERITREA: Coping with economic hardship
Full report

ETHIOPIA: Election fever grips capital
Full report


DJIBOUTI: 5,000 mt of food needed for drought-affected people

A total of 5,000 mt of food aid is required to meet the critical needs of 
an estimated 47,000 drought-affected people in Djibouti for the next six 
months, a famine early warning agency said.

Those in need included some 9,500 undernourished children, the 
USAID-funded Famine Early Warning System Network (FEWS Net) reported in 
its latest update on Djibouti released on 12 May. About 5,000 other people 
were in need of urgent medical care, the report added.

Three consecutive failed rainy seasons had led to widespread livestock 
deaths and a significant decline in milk production, creating serious food 
insecurity in Djibouti, it said.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), in a 
separate report, said that in the longer term, the government of Djibouti 
needed support to strengthen its disaster-management capacity.

"The establishment of an emergency food stock is part of the long-term 
preparedness plan, which should also encompass the strengthening of the 
information system related to animal marketing in order to better regulate 
the flux of living animals on traditional trade routes," OCHA said in the 
report issued by its Regional Support Office for East and Central Africa.

Full 
report


ERITREA: EU gives ?620,000 for emergency food security

The European Commission (EC) said on Thursday it had allocated ?620,000 
(US $783,447) to fund emergency food security measures for up to 35,000 
vulnerable households in the Gash Barka and Debub regions of Eritrea. The 
aid would be provided through the Commission's Humanitarian Aid 
department, ECHO, and channelled through the UN Food and Agriculture 
Organisation. It would cover the distribution of seeds, tools and animal 
feed. Successive droughts in Eritrea had disrupted traditional seed-saving 
practices, and households had been forced to use their limited seed stocks 
in order to survive, the EC said in a statement.

Adverse climatic conditions, it added, had also resulted in a growing and 
acute fodder deficit far above the "normal" chronic situation at a time 
when the demand on oxen for ploughing was highest, and when the mainly 
female-headed households were in dire need of extra support. On 3 May, a 
senior Eritrean government official said that about one million people in 
the Horn of Africa country would go hungry unless the donor community 
provided support.

Full 
report


ETHIOPIA: Opposition now claims election victory

Ethiopia's main opposition parties claimed they were headed for victory in 
the country's national elections on Wednesday - two days after the 
government announced it had won. The Coalition for Unity and Democracy 
(CUD) and the United Ethiopian Democratic Forces (UEDF) said they had won 
203 seats in the 547-member parliament after results from 260 
constituencies had been counted. "The CUD is very happy to inform all 
concerned that it has won in most of the constituencies where the ballot 
has been counted," CUD party Vice-Chairman Berhanu Nega told reporters.

The trend so far clearly indicates that the CUD would emerge as the winner 
with sufficient seats to form a government." He said the results from 
about 70 other seats were known, but the opposition had not contested 
those constituencies. The ruling Ethiopian People's Revolutionary 
Democratic Front (EPRDF), however, insisted it had won more than 300 
seats, with a clear majority to form a government.

Full 
report


ETHIOPIA: Ruling party claims election victory

Ethiopia's ruling party on Tuesday declared victory in the country's 
national elections, saying it had already taken more than 300 of the 547 
seats in parliament. Bereket Simon, information minister and spokesman for 
the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), made the 
declaration after the initial tally of early polling results. "We have the 
majority," he told reporters. "We can't give exact figures, but we have 
won more than 300 seats. This is a very positive result for us."

More than 90 percent of the 25.6 million voters turned out in what was 
seen as a critical test of the Ethiopian government's commitment to 
democracy, according to officials. The National Election Board (NEB) was 
expected to announce provisional results on Saturday, although results 
were being posted outside polling stations when counting was finished. 
Final results will be announced on 8 June.

Full 
report


ETHIOPIA: Huge turnout for federal elections

Millions of Ethiopians went to the polls on Sunday in elections that were 
widely expected to hand Prime Minister Meles Zenawi a third five-year 
term. At dawn, huge queues of voters snaked around polling stations for 
the country's third-ever elections in what is seen as a key test of 
Meles's plan to introduce greater democracy in this country of 70 million. 
The poll had been marred by the opposition's allegations of harassment up 
to the eve of voting. One of the main opposition groups, the Coalition for 
Unity and Democracy (CUD), said hundreds of election monitors had been 
arrested, and it threatened not to accept the results of the vote.

Government officials dismissed the allegations. European Union observers 
inspecting two polling stations in central Addis Ababa, one of the most 
hotly contested seats, found several hundred pre-marked ballots. 
Observers, however, said the elections had generally been more 
competitively fought than the 2000 polls, which were won by the ruling 
Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front.

Full 
report


SOMALIA: Mogadishu more secure, says Speaker

The Speaker of Somalia's transitional parliament, Sharif Hassan Shaykh 
Aden, said on Tuesday that security in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, had 
improved and hailed faction leaders for trying to unify their forces under 
one command. "I am amazed at how different things are from the way they 
were in February," Aden told IRIN. "There are less militia and less 
technicals [vehicles with mounted guns] on the roads than the last time." 
On 14 May, the faction leaders who control most of Mogadishu, announced 
that they had begun integrating their forces and encamping them in two 
camps outside the city.

Aden said that he had visited the camps. "It is a good beginning and a big 
step in the improvement of security in the city," he told IRIN. Aden 
arrived in Mogadishu on 15 May with some 30 members of parliament. His 
departure from Nairobi, the Kenyan capital, where the interim government 
is based, followed a controversial session of the transitional parliament 
held in Nairobi by a group of MPs in his absence on 11 May.

Full 
report


SUDAN: Policemen, IDPs killed in clashes over forced relocation

At least 30 people were killed on Wednesday in clashes that erupted when 
Sudanese security forces tried to forcibly relocate internally displaced 
persons (IDPs) from Soba Eradi camp, 30 km south of the Sudanese capital, 
Khartoum, officials said. Pareq Osman al Tahir, director of police in 
Khartoum, told reporters on Wednesday, that 14 police officers had been 
killed and 13 injured, while three civilians were killed and 11 injured. 
Other sources on Thursday disputed the number of the dead.

"The fighting between the police and the community has been going on until 
this morning, and I can see the police office and the office of the Public 
Committee [the office responsible for the organisation and registration of 
IDPs] burning," Karak Mayik Nyok, executive director of the local women's 
organisation, Diar for Rehabilitation and Development Association, told 
IRIN on Thursday. "Twenty IDPs were killed and many, many were wounded. 
Most people are fleeing to Mayo Mandela camp [about 15 km away]," Nyok, 
who said she was talking to IRIN while standing outside the camp, said.

Full 
report


SUDAN: Environmental groups warn over new dam

The Merowe/Hamadab dam being built on the River Nile in northern Sudan 
could cause serious environmental problems, two environmental advocacy 
groups said. The International Rivers Network (IRN) and the Corner House 
said in a report that once completed, the 67-metre-high dam would create a 
174 km-long reservoir and flood 476 sq km. It is currently the largest 
hydropower project being developed in Africa. According to the report, the 
dam was likely to cause "sedimentation of the reservoir due to massive 
erosion, evaporation from the reservoir and infestation of the reservoir 
by water hyacinth weed.

It could also lead to massive daily fluctuations of the water level 
downstream, with corresponding impacts on downstream agriculture and the 
spread of waterborne diseases." In addition, the report said, the 
reservoir would inundate an area rich in history and antiquities dating 
back 5,000 years, "from the time of the ancient Nubian civilization that 
preceded Pharaonic Egypt."

Full 
report


SUDAN: Vaccination campaign against meningitis planned in West Darfur

A vaccination campaign against meningitis is to be carried out in the Abu 
Seroj internally displaced persons (IDPs) camp in West Darfur State after 
the UN World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed an outbreak of the 
disease there, health officials said. "We moved the vaccines from Khartoum 
to El Geneina [the capital of West Darfur] on Monday and expect to start 
the vaccinations in two to three days," Gouido Sabatinelli, WHO 
Representative in Sudan, told IRIN on Tuesday.

"The next few days will be critical," Sonja Nieuwenhuis, senior health 
manager in West Darfur for the Swiss-based humanitarian organisation 
Medair, said in a statement. "We have trained staff, and we will work 
closely together with the Ministry of Health, WHO and UNICEF [UN 
Children's Fund] to vaccinate nearly 20,000 people," Nieuwenhuis added. 
"But we need to move fast, to stop this outbreak spreading further," she 
said.

Full 
report


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