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Report on the Situation of the Elderly
at the Fendell and Soul Clinic
Internally Displaced People Camps
By
Marc Maxi, United Methodist Committee on Relief
Liberia
October
2004
62
year old handicapped has no knowledge of the
whereabouts of his 2 children
The plea for help of the elderly at Fendell and Soul Clinic IDP (Internally Displaced People) Camp has turned into an outcry. Their condition is critical. In the last six months, 15 have died in Fendell due to hunger and lack of medical care. The majority of these elderly persons hail from Lofa and Bong Counties. About 30 percent come from Bomi, Sinoe, Maryland, Nimba and Cape Mount Counties. Most have spent the last five years running from one place to the other in search of shelter from the war. In June 2003, during the height of the conflict in Liberia, many of these old people arrived at Fendell and the Last Displace Camp, Soul Clinic, located on the outskirts of Monrovia. They resolved never to run anywhere again.
Presently, there are 3,259 old people in Soul Clinic's Last Displace Camp and 551 in Fendell between the ages of 60 and 98. They are subsisting only on the meager food rations provided by the World Food Program. The elderly have no relative to take care of them nor is the Government in the position to do so. Even those who have children do not know their whereabouts. Often the children are not capable of taking care of them. Each month, an individual receives 6.9 kg of maize meal, 0.45 kg of vegetable oil, 1.05kg of beans / lentils, 1.8 kg of corn soybean and 0.15 kg of salt. Liberia's staple food is rice. They find it difficult to get adjusted to this new diet, so different from their own. Having no source of income, or any relatives to assist them, they are spending their last few days on the earth in misery. The blankets, and other clothing received from UNHCR in July 2003, have worn out. UNHCR also distributed cooking utensils to family heads only. Since most of these old folks came to the camp unaccompanied, they did not receive pots or pans. Instead, they are using empty oil tins as cooking utensils and as buckets to do their laundry or take bath. They no longer have footwear. Soap, toothpaste, toothbrush and other basic necessities are just not available to these older people.
How do they support themselves? Those who can still move around, walk for miles in the bush gathering palm branches to make house brooms that are sold for $5.00 Liberian dollars, which is less than 10 US cents. A 98 year old woman making a broom says, "If I can sell four of these brooms, I will buy one cup of rice and palm oil to eat today."
As the manager of these two IDPs Camps, UMCOR has been doing all in its power to alleviate the hardship these elderly people are facing by setting up a special group in Fendell to cater to their chores on a 24-hour basis. Plans are underway to have similar group organized in Soul Clinic. The group comprises Internally Displaced Persons (8) who have volunteered to help the old and vulnerable. The head of the group is given a small token at the end of each month. Taking full responsibility of such a vulnerable group is not an easy job. Without funding, this challenging task is even more difficult.
68 year old pounds bulgur wheat
- her meal for the day
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