The Overseas Community Affairs Council (OCAC) yesterday announced a fundraising campaign to support survivors of the magnitude 7.7 earthquake that struck Myanmar on March 28, with two prayer events scheduled in Taipei and Taichung later this week.
“While initial rescue operations have concluded [in Myanmar], many survivors are now facing increasingly difficult living conditions,” OCAC Minister Hsu Chia-ching (徐佳青) told a news conference in Taipei.
The fundraising campaign, which runs through May 31, is focused on supporting the reconstruction of damaged overseas compatriot schools, assisting students from Myanmar in Taiwan, and providing essential items, such as drinking water, food and medical supplies, Hsu said.
Photo: Tu Chien-jung, Taipei Times
Funds raised through the campaign would support a five-year plan to fully rebuild the 60 affected overseas compatriot schools in Myanmar, she added.
They would also be used to support students from Myanmar living in Taiwan, more than 3,000 of whom are studying at high-school level and above, Hsu said.
Donated funds would be used by the Myanmar Taiwanese Chamber of Commerce to procure and deliver medical supplies, which Hsu said are the most urgently needed essential items.
Most of the essential items would be procured in Myanmar, while some would come from neighboring countries and a portion would be shipped from Taiwan, she added.
Most people in the city of Mandalay and nearby areas in Myanmar lost the means to support themselves and are now dependent on external aid, she said.
Hsu added that international assistance has been “far from promising,” urging people in Taiwan to support the fundraising campaign.
Meanwhile, many Burmese students in Taiwan are “extremely anxious” about their families back home who only have access to limited assistance, she said.
The council is to hold a multifaith nondenominational prayer event tomorrow night at the University of Taipei for students from Myanmar, followed by another on Saturday afternoon at National Chung Hsing University in Taichung, she said.
Department of Overseas Compatriot Student Affairs Director-
General Wang Yi-ju (王怡如) welcomed faculty members and other students who wish to offer their blessings to Myanmar to attend the events.
Buddhist, Christian and Muslim representatives are to lead prayer rituals at the events, symbolically sending “hope, light and warmth” to those in Myanmar, she said.
The death toll from the earthquake has surpassed 3,600 and is “still climbing.” An Associated Press report on Tuesday, citing UN data, said that more than 17.2 million people living in affected areas were in urgent need of necessities such as food, drinking water, healthcare and emergency shelter.
Donations to the council’s fundraising campaign can be made to the “Overseas Compatriot Culture and Education Foundation” (財團法人海華文教基金會) — a nonprofit organization supported by the council — via Cathay United Bank’s Guanchian Branch (館前分行) to account number 001-50-169089-5.
Donors are asked to include “Myanmar Earthquake Relief Donation” (緬甸震災捐款) in the payment notes and to e-mail their donation receipt along with their name, identification document number, and contact information to occeftw@gmail.com.
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