RESEPECT Organizes Spelling Competition for Refugees
The Buduburam Refugee Camp in Ghana held its second annual spelling competition in July, thanks to the efforts of 29-year-old Shetha Koon Myers, RESPECT Ghana's program coordinator at the camp.
Shetha has been working in Buduburam for about six years, which "has made me to find myself," she says.
Buduburam is a refugee camp opened by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Ghana in 1990. As Shetha explains, the refugees are almost all Liberians who fled their country during the Liberian Civil War (1989-1996) and the Second Liberian Civil War (1999-2003).
Before the on-going repatriation exercise, there were approximately 35,000 refugees. Nowadays this number has decreased as many of the refugees are returning to Liberia.
Within this frame of wars and violence, we can easily understand how even simple events, such as the spelling competition, can bring smiles again to the people; even if for a short time.
The event is also relevant from the point of view of the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), in particular to "ensure that, by 2015, children everywhere, boys and girls alike, will be able to complete a full course of primary schooling."
"This is also a yearly program of RESPECT Ghana, done through the bigger youth RIC [RESPECT Intellectual Club]," Shetha adds. The competition has been organized by Smart Kids, one of RESPECT Ghana's programs which is run on camp. Spelling Competition