UMCOR leads disaster training in Africa
9/22/1998 News media contact: Linda Bloom · (646) 369-3759 · New York by United Methodist News Service A series of training sessions are being used to shape a curriculum in emergency/disaster response and management at the United Methodist-related Africa University in Old Mutare, Zimbabwe.
The six-week courses are a collaboration of the United Methodist Committee on Relief (UMCOR), Action By Churches Together (ACT) and the university. The next course begins in mid-October, with 34 participants from 13 African countries, according to F. Lloyd Rollins, UMCOR's assistant general secretary of emergency response.
"This is the first time there will be a resource base in Africa for continuous training," Rollins said. Findings from the three courses - the third one is scheduled to begin in late January - will be used to put together the curriculum for a semester-length program.
The program's objective is to more effectively design and implement emergency/disaster management strategies and to prepare participants to conduct similar training in their own areas.
Dirk Van Gorp, a United Methodist and ACT emergency response officer, said the networking opportunities provided by the course will help expand the program regionally. The involvement of ACT, a growing network of churches, church agencies and church councils committed to humanitarian emergency response, is a key element of the program.
The first training course, from June 22 to July 31, was used by 28 emergency response workers from 18 countries, representing 24 different ACT member agencies. A week after the course's conclusion, participants from Kenya were using their skills to cope with the aftermath of the U.S. embassy bombing in Nairobi.
Sammy Mutua Nzuve, an emergency desk officer with the National Council of Churches of Kenya, said the course allowed him to meet others involved in disaster relief in Africa for the first time.
"What I have gained is actually going to be a very important tool for my council of churches in Kenya because it is possibly the first time we are focusing on the churches actually taking charge of their own communities…and in an holistic way," he said.
Louis Mbogtam, a development officer with the Federation des Eglises et Missions Evangeligues du Cameroon, appreciated the Christian focus of the training.
"What touched me particularly is what we can call pastoral care," he said. "The pastoral care begins after the disaster, after the medicines. We have the psychology, the maintaining of life, but not with money, because, at this time, money is not important."
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*Andra Stevens, communications officer at Africa University, contributed to this report.
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