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STORY: OCHA / ETHIOPIA WOSORNU VISIT
TRT: 04:23
SOURCE: OCHA
RESTRICTIONS: PLEASE CREDIT OCHA ON SCREEN
LANGUAGES: ENGLISH / NATS
DATELINE: 22 AUGUST 2025, AMHARA REGION, ETHIOPIA
22 AUGUST 2025, CHINA CAMP, DEBRE BERHAN, AMHARA REGION, ETHIOPIA
1. Various shots, Edem Wosornu entering common warehouse where thousands of displaced people live, displaced people
2. SOUNDBITE (English) Edem Wosornu, Director of Operations and Advocacy, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
“1900 people in a warehouse toppling over each other.”
3. Wide shot, displaced people
4. SOUNDBITE (English) Edem Wosornu, Director of Operations and Advocacy, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
“Children everywhere. Mothers in desperation.”
5. Various shots, Edem Wosornu with children and displaced people
6. SOUNDBITE (English) Edem Wosornu, Director of Operations and Advocacy, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
“It is not right for human beings to live in such indignity. The message from the camp manager was very clear, and an IDP himself who once owned a hotel and a farm. They just want to live in peace. They want to farm their lands. These conditions are not fair. These conditions are what is wrong with war. These conditions are robbing these children. Hawa and her friends of a future. It is cold in this camp. Everyone is wearing a sweater. It is not warm. It is humid. The floors are concrete. People have no mattresses.”
7. Various shots, Edem Wosornu, OCHA staff, , displaced mother Taiba and her daughter, young teenager baking, displaced people and children
8. SOUNDBITE (English) Edem Wosornu, Director of Operations and Advocacy, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
“The good news. When humanitarians have funding, they are able to do something.”
9. Various shots, displaced woman sorting out good maize from bad one
10. SOUNDBITE (English) Edem Wosornu, Director of Operations and Advocacy, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
“Humanitarian assistance in this camp, as little as it is, is being provided by Government of Ethiopia providing maize rations. Diaspora and indeed the generosity, as always, of host communities.”
11. Various shots, Edem Wosornu, camp manager, several OCHA staff, children, muddy camp, tent of a displaced woman
12. SOUNDBITE (English) Edem Wosornu, Director of Operations and Advocacy, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
“I am about to enter the home. The temporary home for four years of Lubaba who's standing behind me. Even the entrance is problematic. It is dirty and it's muddy. My shoes are drenched in mud. And Lubaba has lived here with her family for four years. Because of conflict, because of displacement.”
13. Various shots, Edem Wosornu talking to displaced women
14. SOUNDBITE (English) Edem Wosornu, Director of Operations and Advocacy, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
“Innocent civilians who’ve been caught up in conflict. Lives devastated. Stories unimaginable. Mothers who've lost four daughters out of six.”
15. Various shots, Edem Wosornu talking to displaced women
16. SOUNDBITE (English) Edem Wosornu, Director of Operations and Advocacy, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
“Lubaba’s story is one of many. What she's living in. Undignified. This has to stop.”
17. Med shot, child standing in between tents
18. SOUNDBITE (Amharic) Khadija, displaced:
“While trying to escape with her children from one village to another on November 20, she [my daughter] was kidnapped from the main route by the local youth.”
19. Med shot, Edem Wosornu talking to Khadija and other displaced women
20. SOUNDBITE (Amharic) Khadija, displaced:
“I was expecting they might release them in exchange for ransom, and I was preparing to raise the funds. Sadly, they were all killed.”
21. Various shots, Wosornu talking to Khadija and other displaced women
22. SOUNDBITE (Amharic) Khadija, displaced:
“Alhamdulillah, we’ve been receiving food every three to four months, and that’s how we’ve managed to survive. We have nothing to wear and no mattress to lie on.”
23. Various shots, Edem Wosornu talking to Khadija and other displaced women, people walking through muddy camp
22 AUGUST 2025, BAKELO CAMP, DEBRE BERHAN, AMHARA REGION, ETHIOPIA
24. Various shots, Edem Wosornu walking through Bakelo camp
25. SOUNDBITE (English) Edem Wosornu, Director of Operations and Advocacy, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
“Everyone I spoke with is saying I want my dignity. I met mothers who owned hotels in their places of origin today an IDP for four years because of conflict. People need dignity and a restoration of their lives.”
26. Med shot, Edem Wosornu talking to women and girls, temporary learning space
27. SOUNDBITE (English) Edem Wosornu, Director of Operations and Advocacy, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
“They need cash. They need small income. They need small businesses.”
28. Med shot, displaced woman explaining her situation
29. SOUNDBITE (English) Edem Wosornu, Director of Operations and Advocacy, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
“The humanitarian system is facing a crisis of epic proportions when it comes to funding. There are funding cuts everywhere. Here in Ethiopia partners are thinking about doing things differently to restore the dignity, to build resilience. The humanitarian reset is demanding change, change, changing how we do business to adjust.”
30. Med shot, displaced woman explaining her situation
31. SOUNDBITE (English) Edem Wosornu, Director of Operations and Advocacy, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
“I believe that with the system change, working with government, local actors, local communities, civil society organizations, international NGOs and the United Nations, we can do a lot.”
32. Med shot, Edem Wosornu talking to women and girls, temporary learning space
33. SOUNDBITE (Amharic) displaced and disabled woman:
“If it rains or there’s water on the ground, I can’t go to the kitchen nor use the communal toilet.”
34. Med shot, Edem Wosornu talking to women and girls, temporary learning space
35.SOUNDBITE (Amharic) displaced and disabled woman:
“I spend three to four days eating only one loaf of bread, until the rains stops.”
36. Med shot, Edem Wosornu talking to women and girls, temporary learning space
37. SOUNDBITE (Amharic) displaced and disabled woman:
“I can’t go to the toilet in the muddy ground due to the condition on my leg.”
38. Med shot, two displaced women explaining their situation
39. SOUNDBITE (Amharic) displaced and disabled woman:
“Due to my condition, I can’t go to the market and trade. I can’t do anything. This is how I live.”
40. Med shot, Edem Wosornu talking to women and girls, temporary learning space
41. SOUNDBITE (English) Edem Wosornu, Director of Operations and Advocacy, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
“I am hopeful that together, bringing our minds together to change within this reality, we can leave people in a better place than we found them.”
22 AUGUST 2025, CHINA CAMP, DEBRE BERHAN, AMHARA REGION, ETHIOPIA
42. Various shots, Edem Wosornu engaging with children at China Camp, Debre Berhan.
Nearly 22,000 people – most of whom fled violence in the Oromia Region since 2021 - live across three collective sites in Debre Berhan City.
The situation in the camps is dire. People live in damaged makeshift shelters or warehouses and face high levels of vulnerability.
They remain heavily dependent on humanitarian aid, a situation worsened by the withdrawal of several humanitarian partners.
On 22 August, Edem Wosornu, OCHA’s Director of Operations and Advocacy Division, visited two of these displacement sites to assess the humanitarian situation, engage directly with IDP communities and frontline responders, and advocate for solutions and an increased response.
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