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REBECCA BLACKWELL/AP/Press Association Images

Foreign Affairs committee members visit Sierra Leone

During their visit, they will review Ireland’s development programme and Irish Aid’s work in the country.

THE WORK OF Irish Aid and the impact of Irish government assistance in Sierra Leone is to be looked at by a delegation from the Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs and Trade.

They landed in Sierra Leone yesterday, 14 October, and will stay until Wednesday 17 October.

The visit is being organised by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and will be the first by an Oireachtas Committee to a post-conflict country which is receiving development assistance from Ireland.

The delegation, which will be led by Committee chairman Pat Breen TD and includes Deputies Bernard Durkan, Eric Byrne and Maureen O’Sullivan, will have an opportunity to review Ireland’s development programme and Irish Aid’s programme in the country.

As well as visiting health centres, schools and an agricultural business centre supported by Irish funding, the delegation will also meet with the Minister for Foreign Affairs and representatives from the Human Rights Commission and National Election Commission.

Committee Chairman, Pat Breen TD said:

Sierra Leone has suffered enormously as a result of civil war and under-development. Maternal and child mortality rates are among the highest in the world. Tragically, one in five children in Sierra Leone dies before their fifth birthday. Adult literacy stands at 41%, life expectancy is just 48 years and more than half of the population lives on less than €1.25 a day. The civil war between 1991 and 2002 resulted in tens of thousands of deaths and left hundreds of thousands more displaced.

To date in 2012, Irish Aid has provided €7.2 million to Sierra Leone to improve access to basic healthcare, provide life-saving nutrition to mothers and children, tackle a deadly cholera outbreak and to support peace-building initiatives. The programme is delivered through targeted partnerships with the United Nations and aid agencies.

Irish Aid has supported programmes to provide trauma counselling and access to vocational training to young men and women who were forcibly recruited to fight during the country’s recent war.

Reviewing humanitarian funding and longer term development assistance is a key part of the Committee’s remit. To date, it has met with the Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs, Eamon Gilmore TD, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade/Irish Aid , Irish NGOs and diplomats to discuss aid programmes.

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10 Comments
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    Mute Frank2521
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    Oct 15th 2012, 12:55 PM

    Did the committee borrow the money for their trip and who did they borrow it from? The Trioka need to step in here and stop all the spending. There are people in Ireland hungry and in need.

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    Mute Winston
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    Oct 15th 2012, 11:01 PM

    Do you think we should totally disengage from the rest of the world? Is that the sort of Ireland we want?

    It’s not the Ireland I’d want that turns its back on those in need because of our own difficulties

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    Mute Lesley Mariotti
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    Oct 15th 2012, 2:24 PM

    I think people are forgetting how lucky we are to live in a country where we have access to basic healthcare and amenities. Thank god that some organizations still try and help such savagely underprivileged countries such as Sierra Leone. There is never a bad time to assess aid programs, places like these should not be forgotten. It’s just a pity governmental agencies couldn’t apply similar tactics when dealing with poverty in their own country.

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    Mute Martin Sinnott
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    Oct 15th 2012, 12:40 PM

    The taxpayer is paying for this

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    Mute Deezer7
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    Oct 15th 2012, 10:41 PM

    And your point is….?

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    Mute Winston
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    Oct 15th 2012, 10:58 PM

    FFS! It’s Sierra Leone not St Tropez!

    Grow up!

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    Mute SeanR
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    Oct 15th 2012, 1:31 PM

    A totally inappropriate time for such a visit.

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    Mute Thomas Geoghegan
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    Oct 15th 2012, 4:57 PM

    To all the naysayers, the committee members are surely providing government oversight. They’re our elected representatives. Part of their job is to scrutinise how the government is spending our aid money. I’d be more worried if this wasn’t happening. I want to know what my money is being spent on.

    And, in my experience, I’m confident it’s being spent well. Irish Aid has frequently been found by the OECD, the Centre for Global Development, academic studies, to have one of the most effective aid programmes in the world.

    The people of Sierra Leone have been among the worst affected by greed and avarice and injustice. What we’re experiencing at home pales in comparison to this. I feel, as a citizen, paying taxes to pay for our aid programme, that it’s out duty as a member of the international community to do this.

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    Mute B Lowe
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    Oct 15th 2012, 5:04 PM

    Providing aid to any African state in their current formats is a complete waste of time.
    Corruption is the key here. Unless corruption is stamped out it is absolutely a waste of time. If Ireland wants to help it should instead spend the money investigating where the wanton corruption and waste occur and start from there in these countries.
    It estimated that for every $1 dollar in aid provided to African countries $10 dollars leave through corruption (Treasure Islands by Nicholas Shaxson).

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    Mute jim ahh jim ahh jim
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    Oct 15th 2012, 8:57 PM

    Notwithstanding the corruption, isn’t it better to help these people in their own country than have them arriving here in Ireland ?

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