The system of social protection faced unprecedented challenges – after February 24, the number of internally displaced people in the country increased sixfold. Issuing certificates of IDPs, submitting applications for state payments, applying for damaged property compensation and for humanitarian assistance – this is just a short list of issues that Social Protection employees process every day.
We spoke with Volodymyr Druhakov, head of the Social Protection Department of Nizhynska District State Administration of Chernihivska oblast, about the situation in their region. In August this year, thanks to a joint project with the UNHCR, the Charity Foundation “Stabilization Support Services” managed to provide the Social Protection Department in Nizhyn with a set of equipment necessary for IDPs’ applications prompt processing.
Volodymyr, tell us about the situation in your department. How many people did you receive and how did it affect the work of Social Protection employees?
– Today, 16,000 IDPs are registered in the entire Nizhynskyi rayon. When there was a large influx and active hostilities in our region, this number reached 17,500 people, but now it has decreased somewhat, after some of the IDPs were removed from the register. Nevertheless, people continue to come to us from regions where active hostilities are taking place.
Naturally, the burden on the management and employees has increased along with the growth of the population in the region. In March-April we saw the biggest influx of IDPs, so the registration was carried out by five departments of our administration. The situation was further complicated by the fact that the registration database was regularly “freezing” during the day – the central servers were overloaded. For some time, we had to organize the work of employees in the third shift, because at night after 10 p.m. the database did not freeze that much, and it was much easier to enter it.
That is, additional technical equipment and working in the evening shift accelerated the registration at that time?
– Exactly. And how else to register thousands of people when they come to the specialists, the latter enter the program, input the person’s data in order to create an IDP certificate, register the application for payment (and without such an application it is impossible to assign assistance), and the database “freezes”? A person could sit like this for an hour in the office, and there were another hundred of such IDPs waiting outside. Hence, for some time we worked according to this principle: during the day we processed as many applications as the system allowed, and the rest were registered at night so that in the morning we could issue the certificates to people.
However, our employees managed it – living allowance was paid to 17,500 internally displaced persons. It was quite a big load in such a short time considering that it was done only by our administration, because the territorial community did not have the right to provide payments.
Has the work of your employees been facilitated by the technical equipment transferred to your office by our Charity Foundation, together with UNHCR?
– Yes, of course, it made our work much easier. The last time we updated our hardware was five years ago, but today this equipment is already outdated and works slowly. Therefore, new equipment – laptops, printers, routers – helps us to do our work much better and faster.
Today, we register and provide payments to all the people who arrived from the territories that are in the Ministry of Reintegration’ register. The list of territories that are occupied and where hostilities are taking place changes all the time. Our administration is obliged to meet people, register them, issue a certificate and assign assistance accordingly. We also register the facts of damaged or destroyed property, coordinate accommodation, and, if possible, help with the search for humanitarian aid. Active work continues and all registrations must go through the databases in computers. Therefore, the new technical equipment helps a lot in working with IDPs.
What else can charitable organizations, donors, and the state do today to facilitate and improve the work of Social Protection departments?
– Today, the state is overloaded, it does not have time to promptly cover the needs of Social Protection departments throughout the country. For example, currently we need paper, envelopes, various stationery items for work – we submitted an application to replenish the stocks and are waiting for response.
As for technical equipment, these items are the best one can replenish the administration’s funds with, because it is with their help that we can register a person and provide her/him with material assistance. These computers will serve us for years. Thanks to your Charity Foundation, three of our five departments are provided with technical equipment. If it was possible to provide the other two departments with technical equipment, that would be the best for us.