The Regional Democratic Council (RDC) of Region Four and UNICEF Guyana have entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on Venezuelan migrants that would see them advancing their work in Regions One and Four.
According to a Region Four release, the arrangement will see the region along with a number of NGO partners collaborating in boosting the birth registration of Venezuelans coming to Guyana.
According to a Region Four press release, at the signing of the MoU, UNICEF Representative, Sylvia Fouet, expressed satisfaction with the level of collaboration that her organisation has been able to establish. She said that is important to ensure that births are registered among the Venezuelan migrants and that they would seek to expand their partnership on child protection, in particular, to the response of migrants from Venezuelans and host communities in Region One.
Representing the various organisations were Colin Marks, Coordinator of Help and Shelter, Josephine Whitehead Director of Legal Aid Guyana and Ayo Dalgety-Dean of Blossom Inc.
“I am very excited because with this collaboration we have partners representing Government and Civil Society and the response is all around child protection but more in particular, the reference service systems which would be done primarily between Regions One and Four and Blossom Inc will do some work in Regions One, Two and Seven, that’s where we will work,” Fouet was quoted as saying.
The UNICEF representative stressed that with the strengthening of collaboration among various partners she is confident that the organisation’s goals and objectives would be achieved. She said that the RDC of Region Four has been leading the charge among the RDCs in terms of advancing the response to the Venezuelan migrant issues and with the addressing of child protection matters taking centre stage, she foresees a more mutually beneficial relationship. She added that with a number of other stakeholders among them being Help and Shelter, Legal Aid and Blossom Inc, she remains confident in having an effective response to the various challenges.
Coordinator of Help and Shelter, Colin Marks, in his remarks said that Help and Shelter is excited to be on board, noting that they have been working over the years with the abused and the vulnerable. “In this particular case we would be focussing on children in the two target communities Region One and Region Four. Also we have always been advocating for the implementation of the laws that govern the acts that govern the response to these particular groups so we are only excited to be working again in this particular area,” he said.
According to the press release, the Legal Aid Director, Josephine Whitehead echoed similar sentiments of her organisation’s willingness be part of the project. She said that Legal Aid has a long history of working along with UNICEF, stressing that her organisation is very grateful for yet another opportunity at collaborating. “We have had a long and strong relationship with Help and Shelter so we are happy to be working with them again as we had started with UNICEF automatic legal aid for all children and we are looking forward to being able to extend our reach beyond the places that we normally serve which is Georgetown, Anna Regina, New Amsterdam and Fort Wellington so we are very, very grateful, hoping to extend our reach,” Whitehead said.
Managing Director of Blossom Inc, Dalgety-Dean said that her organisation is very excited with the collaboration, noting that it forms part of her organisation’s objective in advancing child advocacy centres. “We are very excited to be working with UNICEF and we would be primarily working with the Child Advocacy centres so we would be supporting the establishment of the centre in Region One and also UNICEF is supporting us to strengthen our centres in Regions Two and Seven in order for us to serve the wider community,” she said
