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Archive - Archive 2004 - July 2013

Major forum ran to help serve community better |15 March 2013

 Major forum ran to help serve community better

Minister Meriton addressing guests and delegates at the launch of the meeting yesterday


Their meeting was entitled: Our community: our engagement: together we can, and launched by MSACDS Minister Vincent Meriton in the presence of Vice-President Danny Faure, ministers, leader of the opposition in the National Assembly David Pierre, Anglican Church Bishop James Wong and top government officials.

The ministry said 300 partners with projects in the districts evaluated their past performances and the forum offered them the chance to meet and share good practices and suggestions on how best to improve local actions this year while embracing the national theme for 2013 -- Striving for our Seychelles.

Mr Meriton told the delegates the recent disasters on Mahé and La Digue which were triggered by record rains and the flooding that followed seriously tested our solidarity.

“It is not always in victory or moments of success that we discover our strength, but also in moments of distress when everything seems lost that we discover our true capacity as we surround our colleagues and show true compassion towards others,” he said.

He recalled how people and organisations from all corners of the country “put their hands in the mud and helped those who were in distress.
“I will never stop thanking them all,” he said.

How the partners can now make volunteerism and those other qualities shown during the disaster become a way of daily life in our community was one of the points he urged the delegates to consider.
“We are the ones who form the community and our community reflects our way of thinking, our actions and the way we live,” he said.

Mr Meriton talked of the need for dialogue at district level and urged people to stand together against social ills challenging our communities.
Father Emeric Louison, who heads the Ile Perseverance Roman Catholic church, offered prayers and reflection before the meeting started.

Among the speakers who gave presentations about the sectors they head or represent were the principal secretary for social affairs Linda William-Melanie, Dan Frichot of the community development and sports department, Michel Laporte and Allan Kilindo of the Ministry of Land Use and Housing, Inspector Henry Nancy of the Seychelles Police, Patrick Nicette of the Seychelles National Youth Council, Francis Remie of the department of community development and sports, Simon Julienne and Georges Madeleine of the Ministry of Health, Nicholas Hoareau and Stephany Rosette of the Seychelles Land Transport Agency, Allain Decommarmond of the Ministry of Environment and Energy, Ravin Sunassee of the Public Utilities Corporation, and Timothe Sinon of the Property Management Company.

The principal secretary for community development and sports department Denis Rose closed the meeting.

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