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SENEGAL: Drought response slowed by election fever
DAKAR, 10 February 2012 (IRIN) – While it is clear that Senegal was one of the eight Sahelian countries to be hit by poor rains in 2011, unlike most of its neighbours, the government has not yet declared that parts of certain regions are suffering drought conditions. This low-profile approach is slowing down donor and aid agencies’ preparations and responses to help pastoralists and farmers get through the lean season.
Some 10 million people across the Sahel are expected to face food insecurity this year, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).
“The government is aware that there are pockets of drought, but unfortunately because of elections they are not doing enough about it,” said Abdou Aziz Diallo, president of the Senegalese Red Cross in Dakar. “The elections make the whole response sensitive – we’re a bit blocked.”
Presidential elections, which have been immersed in controversy as to whether or not it is constitutionally legal for incumbent President Abdoulaye Wade to run for a third term, are planned for 26 February.
Some 850,000 people are, or will imminently be, food-insecure in Senegal with the lowland northeast agro-pastoral and central pastoral zones most affected, according to a joint assessment by the government National Council of Rural Executives (CNCR), the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, the UN World Food Programme, the Senegalese Red Cross and NGOs.
Some 21 departments (out of 45) in six of the country’s 14 regions have been severely affected and are in need of immediate help, according to the assessment.
Global acute malnutrition rates – the total level of acute malnutrition among under-fives – ranges from 10 to 14 percent in the departments of Matam, Diourbel, Kolda, Louga, St Louis and Thiès departments, with Matam’s 14 percent rate just shy of the World Health Organization’s 15 percent emergency threshold, according to yet-to-be official results of a government assessment (from the Food Security, Nutrition and Child Survival Department) sponsored by the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF).
Government position
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