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| National |
| Malawi hunger shocks Jordanian princess |
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by
Isaac Masingati, 31 December 2005
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04:07:19
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Her Royal Highness Princess Haya Bint Al Hussein of Jordan Thursday said she was shocked with the extent of the food crisis in the country.
Princess Haya was on her first field visit as a United Nations World Food Programme’s Goodwill Ambassador to see the impact of the food crisis in the country.
Speaking after visiting a WFP food distribution centre in Chiradzulu and a children’s nutrition and rehabilitation centre at Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital (QECH) in Blantyre, Haya said she was touched to see how people, particularly children, were affected by the food shortage.
She said she would raise alarm for international awareness now that she had seen how children were suffering from the food shortage and how people were affected by HIV and Aids.
“Much of the world’s attention is focused on major crisis areas, but Malawi experiences food shortages every year, and the cameras are not always there to tell the world,” said Haya.
She said she was touched by the food crisis in Malawi because of, among other things, the high prevalence of HIV and Aids which has made people’s livelihood extremely fragile.
Haya, who was made WFP’s Goodwill Ambassador last October by WFP’s Executive Director, James Morris, said it was sad that the world had become used to seeing the faces of hungry children on television clips yet no one does anything to change that.
“What we see on the screen is nothing compared to what is actually on the ground and I feel that it is my duty to experience that myself and relay it to the world,” she said.
Up to 4.9 million people in the country need food assistance and the WFP is providing half of the requirement.
Haya, who came with a tight security of six officers and five officials, flew in on a 200-seat American Arab Emirates (UAE) chartered plane and left for Dubai the same day.
She is daughter of late King Hussein Bin Talal of Jordan and wife of General Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, crown prince of Dubai and defence minister of the UAE.
In his remarks, WFP country director Momenico Scalpelli said his organisation would scale up food distribution from the current 1.3 million people to 2.4 in January.
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