Qatar charity may not distribute aid in Sudan

In the northern Sudanese River Nile State, a problem has arisen over the distribution of food and shelter to people affected by the rains and floods. The Commissioner of the heavily affected El Matama locality told a Qatari delegation they were not entitled to distribute aid in the locality. The delegation left angrily after the Commissioner said that he would oversee the distribution himself. In Sudan’s capital, the Khartoum State Ministry of Social Development announced that the Ministry is the only entity in the state authorised to distribute food and shelter to the affected people. Radio Dabanga reported earlier that charity institutions in Qatar allocated US$247.000 for the affected in Sudan, who until Saturday numbered about 40,000. Activists in Khartoum have warned for “fake distributions, as happened last year”. After the heavy rainfall in August 2013, the director of the National Auditing Office had reported that many relief items had been “misappropriated”. File photo: A house in Khartoum, damaged by heavy rainfall in August 2013 Related: Still no help for flood victims in Sudan’s capital (3 August 2014) Sudan’s capital paralysed by torrents, floods (30 July 2014)