Blog

Blantyre, Malawi — In Malawi, hundreds of refugees and asylum seekers held protests Tuesday over delays for promised cash assistance to buy food. Protesters told VOA they have waited almost four months for promised handouts and are struggling to feed their families.

During their protests, the refugees marched to the U.N. offices inside the Dzaleka refugee camp in Dowa district, north of the capital Lilongwe, where they burned tires to draw attention to their concerns and anger.

Muhamad Bashiri, who was among the protesters, said “we were complaining about the delay in receiving cash handouts we use to buy food. We received our last handouts four months ago.”

He said the lack of assistance has sometimes made his family of three children go days without food.

The U.N. World Food Program is responsible for providing cash for food assistance to over 50,000 refugees at the Dzaleka camp.

But recently the organization said it lacked the funds to meet the needs of all the refugees.

In February, the WFP halted food rations to nearly 700 “self-sustaining” refugee families, citing funding limitations.

Kenyi Emmanuel Lukajo, the associate external relations and reporting officer for the U.N. refugee agency UNHCR in Malawi, told VOA Tuesday that the UNHCR is aware of the food shortage problems in Dzaleka, and that efforts have been made to update refugees on the situation.

“UNHCR works closely with WFP and camp management and also the refugee leaders. We always conduct meetings to inform the refugees about the challenges, and update them on when they are able to get their cash assistance.”