Khaleej Times Online
From Habib Shaikh
Monday, April 30, 2007
The bank will dispatch in the next few days a special mission to Mogadishu to supervise the delivery of medical kits and the purchase and distribution of the relief items. IDB President Dr Ahmed Mohammed Ali has appealed to philanthropists, local, regional and international relief agencies and organisations to help the wounded and displaced persons before they are affected by disease, starvation and dehydration and thus avert a major humanitarian disaster. He said failure to provide relief assistance as soon as possible will mean that the elderly, women and children will be the victims of such a disaster. Ali also had a meeting with Prime Minister of Somalia Ali Mohamed Ghidi during his recent visit to Jeddah. The latter requested the bank to help finance the Mogadishu Port Rehabilitation Project given its importance as Somalia’s link with the overseas. It may be recalled that the bank has so far approved financing estimated at $67 million. It includes infrastructure development projects such as education, health, water supply, animal husbandry as well as grants and emergency aid worth over $10 million designed to boost relief assistance as well as help in locust and drought control and to build and equip clinics, institutes and vocational training centres. The IDB has also granted scholarships to 107 students for studies in medicine, pharmacology, engineering, agriculture and computer science. So far, 25 physicians and engineers have graduated in these disciplines. Meanwhile, IDB has signed an MoU with agencies of the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation (MOSTI) of Malaysia, in the areas of Knowledge and ICT for Development (KICT4D). The signing ceremony was witnessed by Deputy Prime Minister of Malaysia Dato Sri Najib Tun Razak and Dr Ahmad Mohamed Ali, the President of IDB Group. The MoU was signed by Dr Amadou Boubacar Cisse, Vice-President of Operations, on behalf of the IDB, and Badlisham Ghazali, CEO, Multimedia Development Corporation (MDC) and Abdul Aziz Abdul Kadir, Senior VP, MIMOS Berhad, on behalf of MOSTI. Ali said the MoU comes as part of the Knowledge and Information & Communication for Development KICT4D Programme adopted by the bank. Source: Khaleej Times, April 30, 2007