Central African Republic: Funding cuts put humanitarian support at risk

This article is published in association with United Nations.

The Central African Republic (CAR) is making progress towards stability and security but major aid budget cuts threaten humanitarian operations there, a senior official with the UN aid coordination office OCHA said on Friday in New York. 

Edem Wosornu, Director of OCHA’s Crisis Response Division, was speaking to journalists fresh from her first-ever visit to the country, which “is determined to get itself out of crisis mode.”  

For years, the CAR has had “a good funding outlook”, with humanitarian appeals garnering 95 per cent support. However, the 2025 plan was less than 40 per cent funded and only 17 per cent of the $268 million needed this year has been received to date. 

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Fears of a return to ‘crisis mode’ 

“The country is fragile, but the country is hopeful,” she said, but warned that “if we don’t sustain the funding, we will see ourselves slipping back into crisis mode –a context, a situation, we can’t afford.”  

The CAR has faced recurrent cycles of conflict since 2013, when predominantly Muslim Séléka rebels seized power, prompting the rise of the mainly Christian anti-Balaka movement. A UN Mission, MINUSCA, continues to support peace efforts. 

Out of a population of around six million people, 2.3 million need assistance. Humanitarians are targeting over half, 1.3 million. One in five citizens is displaced. 

‘Things are changing’ 

Ms Wosornu travelled to Zemio, a town in the southeast on the border with the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) “where there’s some insecurity”. However, the situation has changed over the past six months as internally displaced people (IDPs) who were sheltering in a church have returned to their communities. 

People are farming their lands “when there’s peace”, with support from a project by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), while the international medical NGO ALIMA, which receives UN funding, operates bi-weekly mobile clinics that serve up to 70 people at a time. 

During her visit, Ms. Wosornu met with CAR President Faustin-Archange Touadéra, the Minister of Humanitarian Action, and local authorities in Zemio. 

It is “clear that things are changing,” she said. “However, it’s also very clear that progress can quickly unravel if attention is not sustained, and if funding is not sustained.” 

Fragile but generous 

Despite its fragility, the CAR is also “generous”.  The country is hosting refugees from Chad. Another 36,000 people from war-torn Sudan have found shelter there and have been given land by the authorities. 

Among the Sudanese refugees are doctors and nurses who want to support humanitarian operations in the CAR. 

She said the OCHA team on the ground “were asking ‘how do we support these refugees that have come over but also help them to feed into the economy and to support in that regard?’”  

Humanitarians forced to cut back 

Ms. Wosornu highlighted her conversations with local people in Zemio, such as a community leader and mother called Fane who just wants stability and peace, healthcare and education for her children, and livelihood support. 

Yet funding cuts threaten the humanitarian response—even though it only costs $16 to feed a displaced person for three months, and $26 dollars to provide them with healthcare for an entire year. 

International NGOs have closed 20 per cent of their offices and satellite offices, or 120 out of 634.  

The UN sexual and reproductive health agency, UNFPA, noted a reduction in reporting on gender-based violence “not because it’s not happening, but because we don’t have the ability as humanitarians to be all over the country.”  OCHA too has been affected. 

“We used to have 15 sub-offices and antenna offices across the country. We’ve cut that down to seven, and I saw firsthand what that means,” she said. 

Meanwhile, humanitarian partners are worried, particularly those working on health because “communicable diseases are very, very rampant”, plus the CAR is surrounded by several fragile States. 

Ms. Wosornu stressed the need “to do all we can to support the communities on the ground to sustain themselves: from health to education, from education to food security, and everything else that we cover.”