Lions Clubs International seeks more funds for Vanuatu rebuild

Transcript

Lions Clubs International are seeking additional funding to rebuild schools in Vanuatu destroyed by Cyclone Pam in March.

The first Lions vice president Bob Corlew was in Port Vila last week surveying some of the damage to schools on Efate and in Tanna still struggling to rebuild six months after the devastation wrought by Pam.

He told Hilaire Bule that the Lions had raised 100 thousand US dollars to go towards rebuilding schools in the country but he has promising more.

BOB CORLEW: Our major goal is to rebuild classroom buildings. I have been here in Port Vila but we spent two days in Tanna because the tragedy there in Tanna is so great. I saw ten schools there in Tanna many of which had complete destruction of the entire school complex. Others lost a building or two or three and others had the roofs blown off of buildings and need extensive rehabilitation to those buildings. So my goal has been to look at the buildings that were damaged and to see what we the Lions can do to help to reconstruct these school buildings. These class rooms.

HILAIRE BULE: So what will be the step after your visit this week?

BC: This after this step we are going back to look at raising more funds, raising more dollars because it appears that the damage is so great that there are greater needs than the one hundred thousand dollars US will repair. In Tanna we have asked the school board their to examine the classrooms and to prioritise and tell us which schools where they want us to start our next construction project. We look forward to hearing back from them in about a week and from their we will begin to allocate materials and transportation efforts so that we can get the materials to the job site. We have already purchased, Lions clubs here locally have purchased a portable saw mill. Which has already been delivered to the scene and its our hope through that saw mill that we may be able to make our own lumber. So that we won't have to transport the lumber in.  And that will also help as far as making the dollars go further.

HB: Why did you choose the education sector, schools, classrooms to rebuild and not the other infrastructure?

BC: It was a difficult decision but our thought was that the issue of education is so vital. It is so important that the young people the children have the opportunity to learn so that they in fact as they grow they can become productive members of society. And thus we thought schools was the place where we would begin with the limited funds that we have. And within the schools even though there is a need for dormitories and for housing for faculty we elected to begin with the classrooms first feeling that that was where the greatest need was and where we need to get the classrooms up so that the students can get their lives back to normal as quickly as they can.

Mr Corlew says he has asked school boards to examine class rooms and identify priority areas for reconstruction.