YPSA organized discussion meeting with leading media representatives from print, online and electronic media for raising mass awareness on climate displacement issues held at Pitstop restaurant of Chittagong on 10 February. Journalists were asked to publish news / documentary about the worst situation of climate displaced peoples in and around Chittagong region by YPSA and they were agreed to report on the newly burning issue of climate displacement in their respective media soon.
The discussion meeting was presided over by Mr. Nasirul Haque, News Editor of the Daily Suprobhat Bangladesh. The media guests were welcomed by Mohammad Ali Shahin, Program Manager of YPSA. He discussed about the role and contribution of journalist on the climate displacement issues. He briefly includes its establishment, objectives, mission, completed activities and plan for future.
In the meeting, Mohammad Shahjahan, Team Leader of Housing, Land and Property (HLP) Rights Initiative project of YPSA shared information on present and future scenario of climate displacement issue in Bangladesh, activities and achievement of HLP program and advocacy action plans for ensuing rights of climate displaced peoples in Bangladesh. After his presentation, participants have participated in an open discussion and shared their idea and commitment to publish report and documentary video news in their media. In the meeting, YPSA informed the media representatives that the news/ documentary conducted by respective journalists will be presented at the planned national civil society program on the climate displacement at Chittagong during last week of February.
Md. Omar Kaiser, Bureau Chief of Daily ProthomAlo, Md. NazimuddinShymol, Bureau Chief of Daily Independent, Md. Hamidullah, Bureau Chief of Daily AmaderSamay, ShamsulHaqHaidari, Bureau Chief of NTV, Saidul Islam, Staff Reporter of Bangladesh Pratidin, Md. SaifulAlam, Senior Reporter of Daily Purbakan, Md. NurUddinAlamgir, Senior Reporter of Daily Sun, MitoonChowdhury, Staff Reporter of bdnews24.com, Tazul Islam, Staff Reporter of Machranga TV, AlamgirSabuj, Staff Reporter of DeshTV, SaburSuvo, Staff Reporter of Daily Azadi were present in the discussion meeting.
The speakers emphasized that five key advocacy action plan by YPSA -i) Climate displacement monitoring mechanism should be implemented across Bangladesh, ii) Rights of climate displaced persons should be incorporated into existing climate change law and policy, iii) Government Khas land distribution should be effective and transparent, iv) Non-agricultural Khas land should be allocated for climate displaced persons and v) Effective return, relocation and rehabilitation programmes should be implemented for all climate displaced persons are right on track. If these proposed strategies will be implement by policy makers the rights of housing, land and property of climate displaced peoples in Bangladesh will be ensured effectively.
Mohammad Sahidull Islam, Program Manager, PrabalBarua, Shahriar Adnan, Subir Das and Md. Omar Sahed, Program Officers of YPSA were presented at the discussion meeting with media representatives.