Over 20 ex-combatants graduate in Wau
By Manyang Mayom
August 11, 2010 (KHARTOUM) – The Disarmament Demonization and Reintegration (DDR) commission in Western Bahr el Ghazal State on Tuesday announced that 22 ex-combatants had graduated from a one month training business and management course.
The training was run by the UN’s International Organization for Migration (IOM).
The State Director of DDR Commission, Mr. Romano Opio Kuot, speaking in the state capital Wau said that he welcomed all DDR efforts in his state and over southern Sudan.
Kuot said that he appreciated the work the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and IOM were doing supporting former soldiers as they attempt to reintegrate into society.
“Yes, I thank all eventual responsibilities of UNDP and IOM for implementing the integration package on behalf of the Government of South Sudan – I congratulated the entire ex-combatants participant for their efforts and their long difficulties they have [had to] bear until they reach their graduation day,” he said.
The DDR commissioner said that the graduation ceremony was an historic event as it was the first time ex- combatants in Western Bahr el Ghazal State had received business and management training.
Last year the UN Mission in Sudan announced the release of $30 million DDR in southern Sudan to be spent on ‘the provision of good-quality, environmentally-sustainable and low-cost homes for ex-combatants.’
The UN estimate that as of June last year 4,500 combatants from the Sudan Armed Forces (controlled by the ruling National Congress Party- NCP), Popular Defense Forces (PDF – a government aligned militia) and Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA – the former rebels who now govern southern Sudan) since the 2005 peace deal between the north and south.
The DDR program supported by the UN was agreed as part of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) between the SPLA and NCP that ended over two decades of civil war.
Initially it aims to target ‘some 35,000 people designated as members of “special needs groups” – the disabled, veterans and women associated with armed forces and groups’ according to the UN.
(ST)