Caring Dubai residents offer fresh hope to embattled villagers in the Philippines

Members of Soroptimists International Dubai came to the aid of people left without access to water in their own homes

Noora Almulla, president of the Dubai chapter of Soroptimist International, with group member Renate Wernery. Reem Mohammed/The National

A benevolent band of Dubai residents have completed a vital mission of mercy to help transform the lives of an impoverished community in the Philippines.

Seven members of Soroptimist International Dubai, a women’s networking group, organised a trip to a village near the Davao region of the Philippines last month to help left with arduous treks to access water.

They helped the community to install a water system in their homes, as well as toilets for the villagers who previously had to fetch water from the local river.

A lack of amenities had meant that disease was a common part of life for villagers.

“It was the responsibility of women and children in the village to go to the local river and bring water back to the homes,” said Noora Almulla, Soroptimist International Dubai president, who was among the group of volunteers that travelled to the Philippines.

“They had to do this while the men were working and in some cases they had to walk for an hour while carrying heavy buckets of water.”

She said that dysentery and violent diarrhea were widespread in the region, as families had to rely on using river water for everyday activities that many people, in more privileged parts of the world, took for granted.

Diarrhea kills 10,000 Filipino children a year according to the most recent figures released by the World Health Organisation.

The country has the second largest diarrhea morbidity rate in the world after China.

The World Health Organisation said the rate could be reduced by as much as 40 per cent if children under the age of five had access to clean water and soap.

“They would use the water for everyday activities like cooking, cleaning and washing their teeth,” said the 30-year-old Emirati who helps run her family’s architecture firm in Dubai.

“In some cases they would boil it but that still wouldn’t be enough to be safe.”

Noora Almulla, Soroptimist International Dubai president, helps build a toilet for the community in the Davao region of the Philippines.

In addition to installing water filtration units, the seven members of the Dubai soroptimists also worked with the local community to help install environmentally-friendly toilets in the homes of hundreds of members of the community.

The Ecosans toilet system uses the husks of coconuts instead of water. The husks are placed over the contents of the toilet, to keep it clean, which can then be removed via a shelf below.

“The villagers are then able to use that as fertilizer on their land,” said Renate Wernery, 70, who was also part of the group from Dubai.

“It’s important because most of the industry there comes from farming.”

The German national had previously worked as a virologist in Dubai.

“Dysentery is such a terrible problem there,” she said.

“It was very common for people to suffer from severe stomach cramps and bloody diarrhea which led to people dying in many cases.”

The Soroptimist International group officially launched in Dubai in July last year, making it the first chapter of the women’s networking group in the Middle East.

The ethos of the organisation is to help improve the lives of women and children all over the globe.

The group has more than 75,000 members in 122 countries across the world but there was no branch in this region until now.

Last year, The National highlighted how another member, Dr Hanieh Erdmann, 49, had performed free surgery on burn victims in Madagascar.