Government Appoints Directors to assist with the National Emergency Operation Centres operations

The Government has announced the appointment of Directors to assist the National Disaster Management Office (NDMO) with the coordination work at the National Emergency Operation Center (NEOC).

The appointed Directors will be stationed in different Emergency Operations Centers (EOCs) within the affected provinces of Malampa, Sanma, Penama and in Port Vila. They will assist the emergency operation centers controllers at each of the mentioned provinces to assist the provincial Government to respond to all areas affected by TC Harold.

Director of NDMO, Abraham Nasak made the appointment under the Disaster Risk Management Act 23 of 2019, State of Emergency Regulation Order No. 46 of 2020. The direction is in accordance with the DRM act 23 of 2019, part 3 subsection 13, 1&2 (a).

The following five Directors are appointed to support the National Emergency Operation Centre (NEOC) throughout the country. They are Donald Pelam, Benuel Lenge, Antoine Ravo, Erickson Sammy and Mike Sam Waiwai.

With the scale of the current disaster response, more than twenty government departments’ officers also appointed under the DRM Act to provide assistance in the areas of planning, logistics, finance, information management analysis, communications and other duties as required by NDMO in the established EOCs of the affected provinces and municipalities. 

Logistic arrangements to deploy the government appointed officers to their different duty stations are facilitated by NDMO. 

In assisting the government response efforts, other government partners and stakeholders such as the Non-Government Organisations (NGOs), International organisations and the Civil Based Organisations (CBOs) currently operating in Vanuatu have also assisted NDMO with human resources and supplies.

This is in line with the Council Of Ministers (COM) decision dated April 9, 2020 which approves that all ministries to prioritise resource towards the current disasters’ response efforts.

The NDMO Director wish to thank other government departments, NGOs and other government stakeholders and partners for their assistance as this demonstrate the Government institutional resilience in times of disaster.