By Binta Jaiteh
The National Assembly of the Gambia on Monday ratified the Constitution of the International Civil Defence Organisation (ICDO) with the mandate to contribute to state development by providing protection assistance to its population.
Speaking during the second ordinary session in the 2023 Legislative Year, Muhammad BS Jallow, the Vice President of the Gambia moved the motion and it was seconded.
Deliberating on the matter the VP said, ICDO is an intergovernmental entity with a mandate to contribute to state development by providing protection assistance to its population and safeguarding property and the environment. The ICDO supports member states, National civil defense and disaster management institutions and systems as well as emergency services in their efforts to prepare and respond to natural and man-made disasters.
He said, the ICDO contributes to the improvement of civil defense and disaster management agencies and is structured by providing technical assistance consulting, training, and access to an International Network of experts specialized in the prevention and management of disasters, on a structural level. This organization, he said, evolve from an association in 1931 to a non-governmental organization in 1958 to its current form of international organization in 1972 with envy into force of its constitution.
The organization has a history of over ninety years and the organization has broadened its scope from the protection of civilians and historical monuments during wartime to the protection of the people, property, and the environment against natural and man-made disasters.
In the same vain in the face of climate change characterized by seasonal malfunctions with surprising effects on community planning the ICDO has developed forecasting mechanisms based on information technologies to reduce the vulnerability of people exposed to disasters to have become recurrent increasingly wide and devastating as well as risk to some of which are emerging only now.
Speaking further, he said the ICDO comprises three bodies – the general assembly, executive council, and the permanent secretariat and the ICDO has a long record of achievement in building the managerial and physical capacities of members and non-member states to deal with its disaster risk.
Furthermore, as part of its responsibility for response preparedness particularly in terms of proactive decision-making by its communities at risk, the ICDO has developed a permanent monitoring tool and the International Monitoring and coordination center which branches in certain countries.
VP Jallow concluded that the ICDO has sixty member countries, sixteen observer states and twenty affiliated members, and out of this total member countries more than twenty-eight countries are from Africa including Senegal, Nigeria, Ghana, Mali, Burkina Faso, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Liberia, Benin, Mauritania, and Togo, etc. The annual subscription to ICDO is 21 thousand Swiss francs.
