Introduction
The Syrian conflict that has existed for more than four years now has led to a long-term crisis that has left thousands of Syrian citizens displaced. They have sought refuge in the neighboring country Jordan. Before that, the country enjoyed adequate provisions of resources and other important social amenities such as education, proper health care, good security and national food security. The arrival of the refugees has left the government with a lot to do in order to improve the welfare of both the refugees and the host communities. Here, problems arise when it comes to providing for all the children in terms of formal education. The facilities that exist are not enough to accommodate all the children. However, this was never the expectation of the Jordan Government. They never anticipated such big numbers as refugees. Therefore, the influx of refugees continued to overwhelmed the available facilities and resources (Connable, 2015). As a result, the level of service provision and child development have failed a great deal. This paper is set to analyze the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats that Syrian Refugee Relief Project has faced in Jordan.
This is likely to involve the amount of resources the government and other international humanitarian organizations have set aside for the maintenance of the relief project. Are the numbers too many for the available resources? Is the government doing enough to protect the host communities? Are there enough staff members from various bodies that can serve well for the best interest of the refugees? What are the possible sources of difficulties that are likely to limit the quality of services delivered to the victims of civil war? Apart from the problems, the paper is endeavored to find the best action plan that would ensure efficiency in service delivery and proper resource allocation. This follows the rapidly increasing numbers of Syrian citizens who are continuously gaining access to Jordan. It is therefore the responsibility of the humanitarian bodies and the government to make sure that the host communities get the best from their own government. This is important because the overwhelming numbers of refugees are making policy implementation almost ineffective. On main problem that may arise as a result of the interaction between the refugees and the host communities is conflict. This is not looked into with utmost keenness then the two countries are likely turn on each other.
The paper therefore analyses these issues in details. The information presented is reinforced with statistics from research papers that have been published. Despite the negativities associated with the Refugee Relief Project, social cohesion is a tool that has the potential of harmonizing the conflicts that arise between the host communities and Syrian Refugees. The General costs of the project ranging from cost per tent, cost of food and medicine, cost of field hospitals have been looked into and corresponding supporting bodies identified. For instance, World Health Organization in conjunction with the Jordan government has provided several health care resources and field facilities including health care practitioners. Other concerned bodies have done the same: UNICEF, UNHCR… (Wells, 2016). The paper therefore provides an elaborate analysis of the project which touches on the positive implications and the negativities it has brought upon both the host communities, the government and the refugees themselves.
Strengths
The Syrian Refugee Relief Project has positively influenced the parties involved in several ways. First, the refugees were able to be accommodated by the host government. This is a project that required many resources so as to realize a positive impact on the side of the victims of the civil war. The United Nations High Commission on Refugees and the host government have worked hand in hand to ensure that the set goals are achieved. This program under the supervision of Jordan’s Host Community Support Platform, has led to the establishment of building activities and tent erections. The project uses the international bodies to ensure that international aid reaches the displaced individuals. Similarly, the project has seen bodies such as the HCSP that have continued to provide vital services to both the host communities and the refugees. The project involved enough staff members from international bodies and the Jordan government. For instance, formal education was therefore available: By 2013, about 30000 Syrian children were enrolled in schools. This is a positive mark for the project since it has ensured that the basics of formal education are available to Syrian children. By 2014, about 20% of the Syrian refugees were residing in camps. This is so because of the high numbers of individuals who were fleeing Syria. Therefore, about 120000 refugees were under shelter.
The project has continued with the purchase and establishment of tents and temporary buildings with help from such bodies as Community Based Organizations (CBOs). The project has had another positive influence on the education sector of the country. The Ministry of Education has received support from UNICEF to help coordinate the relevant stakeholders in order to provide educational services to Syrian Children and those of the host communities. On the other hand, the Education Sector Working Group (ESWG) has helped identify the gaps that have existed within the education system that are provided to Syrian children. This is a positive contribution of the project since there were no previous assessments in the education sector (Smetana,2016).
Another strength of the project is the move by the UNHCR to introduce new standard operating procedures. These have been geared towards determining the loopholes that exist in the assessments that have been done by the various task forces. These procedures have always helped the refugee initiatives through service delivery and proper resource allocation to be more productive. Jordan government is trying to work closely with the major stakeholders of the project in order to ensure that the majority of the refugees actually benefit and that the citizens co-exist freely with the refugees. Syria being a country that is torn by civil war over last few years, has continued to regurgitate refugees into Jordan. In this respect, the Jordan government has well laid programs that would ensure that conflicts do not prevail between the host communities and the rapidly increasing refugee population. International efforts are some of the strategies that Jordan government is using to counter the increasing numbers. These bodies mainly provide the necessary basics such as health care, educational programs and food and shelter. It is therefore evident that the project has several points of success over the few years (Gustavsson, 2015). In addition, it has helped to widen the scope of government operation and more precisely, it has served its purpose in a way by ensuring that at least a portion of the refugees get the basic needs of life.
Weaknesses
Syrian Refugee Relief Project in Jordan faced a lot of challenges. The influx of individuals coming from Syria into Jordan has risen rapidly over the years. Conflicts have emerged between the refugees and the host communities. The project is unable to cater for all the children academically. The facilities that are used by the refugees are getting outnumbered and as a result, poor services are provided. The tents are becoming inadequate with time and at the same time the government is faced with several challenges and the responsibility of ensuring that the refugees are taken care of. To begin with, the program has failed to address the best way in to manage and control the conflicts that arise between the refugees and the host communities. Instead, the project relies on government and international conflict management programs. Therefore, the project should be at a position of solving problems that arise between the citizens and the refugees. In this respect, the key players of the program should establish an independent body that would promote cohesion and co-existence of the two parties that are involved. It should involve officials from the refugee community, the host community and the host government. Through this kind of structuring, the desired goal is likely to be achieved. Academics require that an individual gain access to a standard educational institution. The program has tried to enroll children in numbers. This wasn’t that successful since about 80% of the refugee children were unenrolled into formal educational institutions (Smetana, 2015). It is therefore evident that the project has failed to provide for everyone when it comes to education. Furthermore, those children with special needs are supposed to have been covered. It is therefore alarming that only 46% of those with disabilities were enrolled into educational institutions.
The project only had the heights attendance of formal education as those between the age groups of (6-11) where 70% were males. This is a clear indication that most of the youth do not actual enroll to schools. One reason being that the population of refugee children has grown over the years as compared to the educational facilities which apparently have remained as fixed. Informal education has become common as a result of inadequate facilities. Other reasons that lie behind low enrollment is the unaffordable cost of transportation to and from the educational centers that offered formal education It is for this reason that other children resort to informal education. The project should prioritize formal education as one of the basic needs of the children. Therefore, the government should liaise with other international bodies so that enough educational facilities are availed to the refugees. This will consequently benefit the host communities.
The project is unable to cater for all the refugees when it comes to health care delivery. The available hospitals are facing congestion as many individuals contract diseases because of overcrowding and confinement. The relief project has therefore presented a program that has proved to be inadequate for the whole population. This is why the refugees end up using the local hospitals that were meant for the host communities. The World Health Organization in conjunction with the Jordan government should establish more field medical facilities that would cover a better percentage of individuals from the camp. About 36% of the refugee children fail to get medical attention in time since the facilities are few and they take time to reach them (Santoro, 2016). The project should therefore take into consideration the action plans and execute within shortest time possible in order to meet the international humanitarian requirements.
Opportunities
The project has several chances of inviting support from various international bodies both on socio-economic and security grounds. The UNHCR has always provided the necessary needs for refugees across the globe. The Syrian Refugee Relief Project is not an exemption. Other bodies such as WHO have been informed about the civil war that has thrived in Syria in the recent few years. They have responded positively towards the welfare of the displaced people. Following all these, the project is able to seek assistance from more other bodies that are socially active and those that administer private humanitarian assistance. Another opportunity that the project has is that it can advocate for social cohesion and reduction of social tension for the establishment of a positive urban environment. All these have to be considered by the major stakeholder of the Relief Project (Eghdamian, 2016).
The war left many people homeless and it is for this reason that they sought refuge from the nearby country. The influx of Syrian citizens into Jordan has been received by the host communities in a way that conflicts and other disagreements arise. This is because they have influenced the adverse shifts of long-term socio-economic and demographic shifts. The resulting situation becomes that of a society that is full of pull factors. The project in coordination with international bodies and the government, have the opportunity to work out an affective plan that would encourage peace among the two parties that are involved in the conflict. Therefore, humanitarian action is required so that a consensus is arrived at with minimal resistance and or casualties. The local governments and other stakeholders must therefore come up with strategic solutions towards the conflict. This is because it is a potential source of another major war that might erupt in the process.
Social tension has the ability to keep women out of homes and children away from school. The Syrian Refugee Relief Project stakeholders have a role to play in ensuring that domestic violence, crime, radical collective action and drug abuse are not part of the refugee society. If that happens to be the case, then social tension would be reduced and individuals would freely interact. Basically, normal operations would carry on. The project therefore has the capacity to continuously contain the numbers in a peaceful manner. Bodies such as the World Vision International has always stepped in to advocate for social cohesion and a peaceful co-existence among citizens. Social cohesion therefore depends on several factors such as aspects of personal, political and development human security. In addition, when institutions win trust, satisfy and participate in civic life then people are likely to preach peace and promote a strong social cohesion. This means that the society would become more caring. These factors however have to be achieved by those involved in running the project.
Through international funding and donation, the project is able to hire more staff members that would be present in educational and healthcare facilities. Similarly, more temporary buildings and tents can be established in order to accommodate as many refugees as possible. This follows the rapid growth of the refugee population. More schools would mean that those individuals whose education were interrupted are able to carry on with their studies. For instance, several refugee youths were university students who still had the desire to further their studies that were cut short by the war in their country (West, 2016). They admitted that Jordan Universities rejected them. This is the government should see to it that the main goal of the project is reached by having to establish a strong foundation for the Syrian University students who would like to further their studies in Jordan Campuses (Brun, 2016). The national, international and the government have the role to exploit the available opportunities with the aim of improving the welfare of the refugees in a timely framework.
Threats
The project faces several threats which include rapid increase in refugee population, fixed social amenities, possible wars between the host communities and the refugees and the rise of social tension within the urban environment. By 2014, Jordan had about 605,719 refugees from Syria. This has the potential of slowing down the operations and the goals of the Relief Project. The increasing amount was never anticipated. In this respect, the government did not prepare for the extra population. The increased population led to the rise in social crimes, congestion in health facilities and decrease the quality of service delivery. For example, the country has fixed resources that were budgeted for using the initial population of the country. This means that any extra population would lead to inefficient and imbalanced resource allocation. This will not only pose as a threat to the project but it would negatively have affected the government’s policy on welfare of the people (Weinthal, 2015).
Despite the extra health resources that the project get from international bodies such as WHO, the increasing numbers contribute to poor health care services. Practically, the number of staff members would exceed the required doctor-patient ratio. As a result, the several individuals would not get medical attention in time. The rapid growth of refugee population has led to conflict that is likely to give birth to a bigger war if not looked into carefully. The host communities have to fight for what they own while refugees scramble for these resources in order to survive. Others resort to social crimes in order to find a way of earning a living in the foreign country. This shows that the locals are ready to defend what belongs to them as the refugees must survive through all these difficulties.
Conclusion
It is evident that the project has several points of success while other negativities have to be addressed. For instance, the project does not avail the necessary social amenities to everyone. This follows the reduced number of staff members in these facilities. The paper has given several reasons concerning ways that can be used to improve the situation so that humanitarian goals of the project are realized. The project however has been able to provide refugees with food and shelter to favorable percentage, until the numbers went up. The government, international bodies and other humanitarian bodies have the mandate to improve educational conditions, health care facilities and encourage the spirit of national social cohesion between the host communities and the refugees. Lastly, the project has to device ways that would help it deal with such threats as rise of social tension, rapid refugee population growth the inadequacy of social amenities. The absence of the above-mentioned factors is likely to hinder the smooth running of the project.
References
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