norwegian people’s aidreliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/d84bba... · 2011. 3....

NPA Mine Action Sudan Logobero Camp Yei River County Central Equatoria www.npaid.org/sudan

Norwegian People’s Aid Mine Action Programme in Sudan

NPA MINE ACTION 2ND QUARTERLY REPORT 2009 – 1 APRIL TO 30 JUNE

Report Date: 1 July 2009

General The second quarter of 2009 was much influenced by the tragic accident the programme had in BAC team 1 on 13 May. During sub surface search one of our operators stepped on a suspected Anti Personnel Mine, which resulted in his left foot had to be amputated just over his ankle. The operator is now in Gulu, Uganda, where he is undergoing further treatment and training, and will return to his family in Yei and the programme within July. The internal investigation was done immediately after the accident and the Board of Inquiry in beginning of June. Both reports conclude that NPA had followed the procedures and that this accident was unpreventable.

NPA deminer demonstrating manual demining.

Emily (MAG) and Sunday (SSDC), pleased with the Mine Awareness Day.

On 4 April NPA MA, MAG and OSIL assisted SSDC Yei sub office with arranging the International Mine Awareness Day in Yei Center. This was the first time this day have been marked in Yei, and we would like to thank SSDC for taking this initiative. In recent period we have seen an increased number of people returning to communities in Central Equatoria, especially along the Kaya – Juba road. These are both returnees and IDP’s, and to what degree these people have gone through a Mine Risk Education Training Package differs. Our concern is that it will be an increased number of incidents, and this has been informed to SSDC, UNMAO, OSIL and MAG, who have responded very positive and about to work out a plan. For NPA the increased number of people returning has given us a confirmation that focusing on releasing land for resettlement and agriculture is important. In most of the tasks we have released since 2007, people are now establishing their new homes or preparing it for food production. The issue of access to explosives (TNT) has finally been solved, and the programme would like to thank General Malek Ruben (SPLA Engineers) and Peter Duku (SSDC) for solving this issue. We hope that a more permanent solution on getting access to TNT is worked on in the future. Many communities are still affected with UXO’s, and TNT is needed to clear these items. Also this year we have agreed with UNMAO to be responsible for the site management and follow up of the UN MineWolf during the UN stand down. To keep the machine operational throughout the year will have a big impact on the land released – and the task it will work on in Lainya is a high priority task for GOSS and Central Equatoria.



Personnel, Capacity Building and Training On the 30 June the programme consisted of the following staff:

Nationals: 265

Internationals: 9

Total: 274 (26% females) After a short period working as a Quality Assurance Officer in SSDC, George Awu Awile is back in NPA as a Supervisor. He has gone back to his old position focusing on EOD. He will be the person with the main responsibility of the stock pile / ammo dump destruction project, where we operate in close cooperation with SPLA, SSDC and UNMAO. We are very happy to have him back in the programme. A new Mechanical Technical Advisor has started to work for the programme – Jakkals Pretorius. He has replaced Phillip, who stepped up as a Senior Technical Advisor last period. The skills, knowledge and experience Jakkals brings into the programme will surly help on the capacity building of our staff and productivity on the ground. The system of Elected Representative Meetings has proven to be a success. This has now been extended to the country programme level. A Programme Elected Representative attended the first meeting in Juba on 29 June. The following training has been conducted for national staff:

Mini MineWolf Operator training for 4 operators (1 month), held by the MineWolf Senior Technical Advisor – Michael Kelly

Basic demining course for 2 new Mini MineWolf operators (4 days), held by the NPA MA Manual Supervisors.

The medical department has started the rotation system to Kuluva Hospital in Uganda, which will give the medics good experience. So far 5 medics have been doing “on the job training”. The capacity building of the ICT assistant is going according to plan. During this period Khemis has been trained on;

Mobile Devices Installation, Configuration, Maintenance and Support

Disaster Preparedness and Recovery Measures

Basic VHF / HF Radio Communication Equipment Setup and Support The following training has been conducted for SSDC staff:

GIS / IMSMA attachment for the SSDC Malakal sub office for 1 person (3 weeks), held by GIS / IMSMA TA and GIS officer.

Filed attachment for 5 SSDC operational staff (1 month), with the NPA QA officer as responsible person.



Gender and Cross Cutting Issues Gender:

Based on the evaluation of the Task Impact Assessment Teams results in 2007, we decided to establish a fully female team to do assessment of the future, ongoing and finished tasks released by NPA MA. In the communities we are operating in, the females and the girls are responsible for most of the work related to the household – collecting water and fire wood, and maintaining the garden. Because of this they can have critical information about already registered dangerous areas or new dangerous areas. By having a female team doing this we manage to get a higher percentage of females attending the meetings, and because of that access to information we did not get when the TIA team consisted of men. The programme priorities are based on the TIA, and with more females attending the meetings, their priorities automatically becomes registered in our database.

Environment: The programme has agreed to have the other NPA camps close to our camp to connect to our generator, to reduce the number of generators running in Logobero. The area that was used for training the operators on the Mini MineWolf has been planted with corn. The project of implementing energy efficient stoves in our camp kitchen has been started, and we have stopped procuring bottled water, and are now only drinking water from bore holes to reduce the amount of plastic waste.

Security The security situation has not changed since the last reporting period. The inter tribal fighting is still taking place in Jonglei, Upper Nile and Lakes. In May we also had a tribal conflict in the close perimeters of Juba, when Bari and Mundari clashed. The issues seem to have been solved. The government still reports this as “cattle rustling”, but reports from UN and media are stating that the conflicts also have a political aspect. The LRA activity in the Equatorian states is still ongoing, much focused around the border regions to DRC. The lack of payment to certain government positions is still ongoing, and local strikes / markings has happened in different places in Sudan – mainly in connection to bigger centers or towns. In Juba we have seen an increased numbers of robberies, lootings, car hijacking and rap. The establishment of a new political party SPLM – DC has had influence on the political climate, especially in Juba. Involved in this new party is Lam Akol. The programme have not been heavily affected of the security situation, but indirectly it has had an impact in sedond quarter: On the 29 June the programme had to stop operations on all sites that have Yei Hospital in the Med.Evac Plan – about 80% of our operations. The reason was a strike among the employees for not getting their salary for the last 3 months. On the night to the 30 June our team in Loka had their medical trauma bag and the generator stolen.

According to the UN Resolution 1325 (2000) the Security Council emphasize the need for all parties to ensure that mine clearance and

mine awareness programmes take into account the special needs of women and girls.



Operations

Deployment Operations are conducted according to the Programme Plan for 2009. The following projects were worked on in this reporting period:

Morobo project - ongoing

Kenyi project - ongoing

Loka project - ongoing

Juba – Kajo Keji resurvey project - completed

Nile River Hydro Power route survey - completed

Yei project - started

Bele / Bungo project - started

Lainya project - started



Sketch map of Kenyi Project 8 June 09.

Task in Kenyi just after clearance but before completion.

The NPA MineWolf has worked in Kenyi Project during the whole period. The area is more contaminated than expected, and we have had to extend many of the dangerous areas to secure the area is free of mines. The number of people returning to the area is much higher and intense than we could imagine, and people are moving in and starting cultivating the land as soon as we have cleared the land but before completion and handover. It is very motivating for the programme to see that the work we do have immediate impact for the people in the community.

The Bagger has worked on different tasks assisting the manual teams with clearance of low risk areas in Morobo. It has also worked in Kenyi, to clear areas that are not accessible for the MineWolf. The Bagger was very successful when it assisted MineTech at Yobu Stream outside Yei, when supporting the UNMAO contractor in processing areas that was not accessible with any of the other machines in South Sudan.

On 29 May the Mini MineWolf team started its first mechanical demining task, under close supervision of the MineWolf Senior Technical Advisor. The task is just outside Yei, so that we can have a close follow up of it and gain some experience on the machine before deploying it further away from the camp. So far the machine has proved to be a very useful asset for our programme.



On the 18 June the programme took over the responsibility for the site management and follow up of the UN MineWolf. The machine is now working on a task in Mafao, north of Juba, where the Bangladesh deminers have worked for the last two years. This is a single task, and as soon as the machine is finished in Mafao it will start up the Lainya Project.

Visual search after the MineWolf. Picture taken by: Benjamin Dixi The manual teams are involved in all clearance projects, either to do a standard manual demining, technical survey or follow up after one of the machines. Morobo Project has also this period been focusing on manual clearance following the mine rows on the different tasks. The accident had a setback on the BAC clearance. All tasks were suspended until after the BOI had taken place, and the teams were retrained and tasked to follow up the mechanical assets. Now with the recommendations, the BAC operations will continue as before.

EOD team working on a spot task. Stock pile in Lainya. One of 4 containers soon finished, when a 2 meter long snake temporarily disrupted the activity.

Due to delays on the arrival of the EOD Technical Advisor from the Swiss Army, the EOD training was postponed. The training will take place in July. Because of this the EOD teams have had to focus on assisting the manual teams in demolition of mines and UXO’s on the respective tasks. With the arrival of TNT the EOD teams are back on track on the spot tasks, and the stock pile at Lainya is soon to be finished.



The survey teams have completed the resurvey in Morobo, the resurvey of Juba – Kajo Keji Road, and the route survey of the access roads leading down to the planned hydro power stations along the River Nile. With the increased productivity we are expecting in the coming period with 4 machines in the programme, one of the survey teams will be trained in registering completion of tasks, so that the handover back to the communities is not delayed. The rest of the teams will continue according to the Programme Plan.

Land recently take in use in Miles 38.

With 14 active tasks the TIA team has had full focus on the TIA phase 2 assessments. The team was much involved in the handover ceremony of Loka Secondary School, which was done during the NMFA audit. The TIA phase 3 where we are evaluating the post demining activity has been conducted in Miles 38, and we are very pleased to inform that the area that we have released is now in use.

Productivity in 2nd Quarter

Manual teams have cleared 21,437 m2, verified 1,413 m2 and visually searched 353,571 m2.

MineWolf machines have processed 353,571 m2

BAC team have surface cleared 3,750 m2 and sub surface cleared 4,975 m2.

EOD teams have completed 11 spot tasks. Land Released in 2nd Quarter During the reporting period we have competed 4 tasks, and the following have been achieved: Area released by clearance: 12,586 m2 Area released by tech survey: 144,687 m2 Area released by non tech survey: 0 m2 Total Land Released: 157,273 m2

The tasks completed are:

Wuriba, Morobo County

Midigo, Morobo County

Jomi 4, Lainya County (Kenyi Project)

Kenyi 4, Lainya County (Kenyi Project) Findings in 2nd Quarter

Anti- Tank Mines: 4

Anti- Personnel Mines: 36

UXO’s: 118

SAA: 0



Stakeholders and Visitors On 15 April our GIS / IMSMA Technical Advisor - Ikram Shehu presented the NPA Tech Base for representatives from UNMAO – Reiko Kurihara, Christina Green and Johan Maree.

Auditors visiting SSDC office in Juba. Caroline and Elsebeth talking to the TIA team in front of the handover in Loka. Taban and Sunday from SSDC assisting with local knowledge.

Between 21 – 28 April representatives from COWI did an audit on our programme on behalf of Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. This visit was a part of a bigger audit, on the NPA mine action activity in the last 10 years. During the visit the auditors manage to meet with representatives from NMFA, UNMAO, SSDC, communities we are working in and other NGO’s in Yei, and NPA MA would like to thank all involved in this visit for the assistance. The draft of the report is out and gives a very good feedback on the programme, but also advising on how we can improve, especially on the interaction with other NPA programmes in Sudan. When final, this report will be available for other donors and stakeholders.

On 8 May representatives from the Japanese Embassy in Sudan visited our project in Bungo, where one of our female teams is working, clearing an area for rebuilding a primary school. Between 4 – 6 June the UNDP Mine Action Advisor, Ralph Hassall, visited NPA MA in Yei. This was the first time since mid 2007 that a representative from UNDP has visited Yei, and was really appreciated by the programme, and the southern region. Ralphs visit was a part of UNDP and SSDC head office visit to SSDC Yei sub office, and on returning to back to Juba the delegation lead by the SSDC Deputy Chairlady – Margaret Mathiang, visited our Kenyi Project

.



Between 8 – 11 June the Board Of Inquiry took place. The chair person was Graeme Abernethy from UNMAO. In addition Sunday Roseline represented SSDC and Kjell Ivar Breili represented NPA MA.

Graeme and Sunday being given a site brief as a part of the BOI.

Sunday, Severine and Sarah ready for following the team leader Besta in to the minefield.

Between 15 – 16 June the SSDC Public Relation Officer - Sarah Chan, UNMAS Programme and Public Information Officer – Severine Flores visited our female team in Bungo. Sunday Roseline from SSDC Yei sub office and the UNMAO Operations Officer – Johan Maree also attended the visit. Between 19 - 23 June NPA assisted UNMAO and MineWolf to transport the flail for the UN MineWolf from Wau and back to Juba. On 23 June NPA attended a meeting with UNDP and Crainfield University for planning the future capacity building of SSDC.

On 25 June the NPA Gender Project Manager – Siri Vasshaug and a journalist from BBC – Peter Martell visited the female demining team in Bungo. On 26 June a “reconciliation meeting” was arranged by SSDC, between the community in Mundri and NPA MA Sudan. This to sort out all remaining issues related to the incident in 2008, and to agree on the future operations for NPA in this region. The meeting was successful, and NPA will do a resurvey of the communities of Lui and Armadi, and based on this prepare a clearance project for 2010. This project will hopefully also make way for other NGO’s to go back and work in this region. Between 27 – 29 June Colonel Markus Schefer from the Swiss Armed Force visited our programme, in preparation of assisting the programme with one EOD technical advisor. During the visit the Colonel also informed the programme of other ways the Swiss Army can assist the programme, which we will follow up.



Administration During this reporting period we have had a financial audit on the following projects from 2008:

German Federal Foreign Office – Sudan Project

German Federal Foreign Office – Rwanda Project

Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs – Sudan Project

Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs – Sudan Project

United Nations Mine Action Office – Mechanical capacity All financial audits have been conducted by KPMG. The USDOS Project 2008/2009 has been closed and the project for 2009/2010 been started. In addition to fund the BAC and EOD, USDOS has approved to fund the Jonglei Project we had to postpone in 2009. Hopefully this will happen first in 2010, and we are at the moment working on solutions to make this possible – even if the security situation is as it is today. An internal audit was initiated by the programme manager in May, based on the USDOS audit that took place in 2006/2007. The objective was to check the level of improvement or deterioration and to find solutions to the outstanding challenges. The establishment of bank accounts for all NPA MA employees are ongoing. The only thing that is remaining is to test the system, and then to have it fully implemented for the August salary. The programme will us KCB, which is a bank approved by NPA HO. The changes in tax exception, increased import taxes, the bad road conditions and the tense situation in South Sudan, has resulted in a general increased cost on all goods used / consumed by the programme.

CONCLUSIONS The programme is on track with the Programme Plan 2009 and Capacity Building Plan 2009. On capacity building of SSDC, we have been requested to also assist the SSDC Yei sub office with the priority settings. This has already started, but the first step of the process will be finished in the next quarter, when the priorities for next demining season from GOSS, UNMIS, UN agencies and NGO’s will be agreed upon in the Transport and Demining Steering Group (TDSG). The start up of the Yei Project, and the survey of a ring road around Yei, working close with the County Commissioner and his engineers is a very interesting development project. The roads we are surveying are based on the City Plan for Yei, and will enable the people to access and return to their plots. The cooperation with SPLA on destruction of stock piles and ammunition dumps is another project just started, and that will run into next reporting period. Lainya Project will start in mid July, and we hope to finish 1,4 mill m2 within the year. To be able to do so we will in periods have 3 MineWolf machines working on the task, processing the area. On behalf of the programme I would like to thank all my staff and representatives from Yei Hospital that was involved in the accident and the process after for all the support. It is unfortunate when accidents happen in a programme, but we have now gone through the whole process of investigation and team building for the BAC teams. It is a reminder for all of us that we are in a risky business.



NPA Mine Action Sudan thanks its donors for the 2009 funding period:

Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs

German Federal Foreign Office

Norwegian Ministry of Foreign

Affairs

US Department of

State

Japan’s Official Development Assistance

The United Nations Voluntary Trust Fund for Assistance to

Mine Action

NPA Mine Action Sudan Partners:

South Sudan Mine Action Authority

United Nations Mine Action Office, Sudan

World Food Programme MineWolf Systems AG

norwegian people’s aidreliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/d84bba... · 2011. 3....

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