JORDAN--UNHCR LOOKS AT NEW WAYS TO MONITOR

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 AMMAN 000894

SENSITIVE
SIPDIS

DEPARTMENT FOR NEA/ELA; GENEVA FOR RMA

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PREF PHUM EAID AORC JO
SUBJECT: JORDAN--UNHCR LOOKS AT NEW WAYS TO MONITOR
ASSISTANCE


1. (SBU) Summary: UNHCR-Jordan recently changed the
composition of its monitoring and evaluation teams to include
staff from both its protection and program offices. UNHCR
invited the Refugee Coordinator for assistance to
participate on March 30, in the first deployment of the newly
constituted teams as they evaluated a partner NGO's
provision of health care through a clinic in Zarqa, Jordan's
second-largest city and practically a suburb of Amman. As
part of the exercise, UNHCR visited the homes of randomly
selected health care beneficiaries to determine their
satisfaction with services and to collect information about
vulnerability. The home visits illustrated the challenges of
establishing a refugee's eligibility for humanitarian
assistance. End Summary.

Monitoring and Evaluation
--------------


2. (SBU) UNHCR-Jordan recently changed the composition of
its monitoring and evaluation (M&E) teams to include staff
from both its protection and program offices. This change in
team composition was designed to give a service-based
dimension to the monitoring of NGOs that implement UNHCR
programming. Until recently, only program staff conducted
M&E concentrating on financial responsibility and adherence
to targets and guidelines. The inclusion of protection staff
is meant to bring a more beneficiary-centered approach to the
evaluation process.


3. (SBU) UNHCR invited the U.S. Refugee Coordinator for
assistance to participate on March 30, in the first
deployment of the newly constituted teams as they evaluated
CARITAS-Jordan's provision of health care through a clinic in
Zarqa, Jordan's second-largest city and practically a suburb
of Amman. The monitoring trip was meant to showcase
UNHCR-Jordan's new concept of multi-disciplinary monitoring.
The team visiting these two families was made up of one UNHCR
staff member, RefCoord, and the representative from the
European Commission humanitarian assistance organizations,
ECHO. As part of the exercise, UNHCR visited the homes of
two randomly selected health care beneficiaries to determine
their satisfaction with services and to collect information
about vulnerability.


4. (SBU) The first visit was to the home of Nadia, who lived
with her family in a two-room apartment inside a larger
complex near a busy commercial district in the working class
suburb of Zarqa. Her mother suffered from heart disease,
hypertension, and a persistent upper respiratory infection
she attributed to their dank, poorly heated apartment. Nadia
arrived in Jordan with her mother and late father in 1996
from Iraq to seek medical assistance for her father. She met
and married her Jordanian husband and made a life for the
family in Zarqa. Both of their children were born in Jordan.
When Nadia's father died in 2005, she returned to Iraq and
sold all their possessions before returning to Jordan. In
late 2006 Nadia and her mother registered with UNHCR to
receive assistance. Nadia qualified as vulnerable and
benefits from UNHCR cash assistance programs in Jordan. (She
did not tell UNHCR that her husband was Jordanian, and so
probably qualified as a single woman head of household.)
The family lived
off of Nadia's assistance and the father's salary from his
job as a laborer. When asked about future plans, Nadia and
her mother both said they would remain in Jordan. They had
no wish to return to Iraq, and no desire to seek resettlement
in a third country.


5. (SBU) The second visit was to the home of Hussein, who
fled Baghdad, where he worked as a taxi driver, in 2003. He
lives together with his wife and child in Zarqa in a two room
basement apartment whose entrance was filled standing water
and rooms smelled of mildew. His wife works illegally as a
cleaner and their 9-year-old daughter attends public school
where she is the only Iraqi girl in her class. To make extra
money, Hussein worked in the home for a local merchant
folding and packaging diapers for sale in the nearby shops.
Hussein said that his whole family fled Iraqi after his
sister died from burns suffered in a bombing in their Baghdad
neighborhood. His closest living relatives were refugees in
Syria. His daughter sat on the floor of the bedroom/sitting
room as Hussein talked to the monitoring team wheezing she
breathed. Hussein explained that since coming to Jordan the
girl suffered from seizures and was taking medication for
epilepsy. Doctors had ordered a CAT scan for the girl, but
the
45 JD (60 USD) test was slightly above the cost threshold
allowed under UNHCR guidelines and had to be approved by the
healthcare provider. UNHCR had rejected Hussein's

AMMAN 00000894 002 OF 002


application for cash assistance. Hussein said his only hope
for the future was resettlement. His family had all fled or
died and he would not return to Iraq.


6. (SBU) Comment: UNHCR will investigate these two cases to
determine if protection staff should take action in either
case illustrated above. It would be injudicious to condemn
UNHCR procedures on the strength of one home visit. However,
the cases presented here highlight the challenges of
determining and keeping track of need among refugees. It is
important that the home visit and vulnerability assessment
system be controlled, and double checked to ensure that tough
decisions are made about who deserves assistance and who
might have other means to support themselves. End Comment.

Visit Embassy Amman's website at
http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/nea/amman/
Brown