Shabunda: MONUSCO Officially Hands Over Completed Job Skills Training Center Project

24 avr 2015

Shabunda: MONUSCO Officially Hands Over Completed Job Skills Training Center Project


South Kivu, 20 April 2015

– MONUSCO handed over the completed Training Center for Vocational Trades Learning and Community Reintegration Project to local authorities in Shabunda on Friday 17 April 2015.

Located in the chiefdom of Bakisi, the center was built by MONUSCO in the framework of the community stabilization and violence reduction project. The center has training rooms, and the first 389 beneficiaries have been provided as reintegration kits, which should enable them to be immediately operational.

The center includes a carpentry/joinery workshop, a tailoring and sewing room, and a classroom. In addition, MONUSCO has provided 11 batches of two tons of kits for the 389 beneficiaries (230 men and 159 women). The beneficiaries are grouped into four tailoring/sewing associations, four masonry/bricklaying associations and three carpentry/joinery associations. Four other rooms have been hired to accommodate some of the beneficiaries.

In her remarks on this occasion, the MONUSCO head of office in South Kivu, Mme Christine Kapalata, reminded the audience of how this project came about. She said this vocational skills training center, which is organized in three training sections (Tailoring/Sewing, Masonry/Bricklaying, and Carpentry/Joinery) was built in response to the wish expressed by the Shabunda population in January 2014.

There had in fact been wide consultation with the communities to identify priority needs in terms actions to put in place to reduce community violence.

Mme Kapalata assured that MONUSCO will spare no effort to complete all other on-going projects in Shabunda so that this island of stability, established to guarantee the permanent restoration of State authority, can become a reality throughout this territory.

For his part, Mwami Mopipi, leader of the chiefdom, thanked MONUSCO for all its efforts to promote the development of the communities and the transformation of Shanbunda.

The representative of the provincial Government, Mme Agnès Sadiki, expressed her appreciation to MONUSCO for involving local communities in identifying projects to be implemented in Shabunda territory. For “What you do for me, but without me, is against me,” she said.

It must be noted that this community stabilization and violence reduction project has been carried out to relieve the plight of the populations affected by such violence, improve their precarious living conditions and offer them other means of survival than the resort to arms.

This is why the Disarmament, Demobilization, Repatriation, Reintegration and Resettlement (DDRRR) section of MONUSCO, in synergy with the provincial Government, has initiated in some targeted territories a series of community consultations which have resulted in MONUSCO’s financing of 4 projects in South Kivu. These projects should attract ex-combatants who have been so far unwilling or are non-eligible for the DDRIII process, vulnerable women and girls as well as idle youths.

It is worth noting that building in Shabunda is a herculean undertaking because, apart from sand, gravel and bricks which can be found locally, all other building materials must be transported by from Bukavu, as the 350 km-long Bukavu-Shabunda road is impracticable.

Biliaminou Alao/MONUSCO