Dr. Tayseer Mustafa; the journey of overcoming the challenges of Al-Buhaira region in the River Nile State; Part-1
Alaa Babiker
Sudan is a great country with a great nation. But some inhabitants face real challenges that need the immediate implementation of the well-studied actions and solutions to overcome those challenges and improve the health and social lives of the population. Today Dr. Tayseer Mustafa is shedding light on the important issue of Al-Buhaira at Al-Manaseer region in the River Nile State.
Q1: Tell us about Dr. Tayseer Mustafa?
A1: I am Dr. Tayseer Alfaki Mustafa. I am Global Peace Ambassador, CEO for Ocean 6 (Abu Dhabi Global Market) and for Areena for Investments and Multi-activities in Khartoum, and a Consultant Physician in Occupational and Environmental Medicine.
I was born and raised in Sudan, Graduated from the University of Khartoum, faculty of Medicine, specialized in Occupational and Environmental Medicine. My passion was and still is about protecting and saving lives and defending people. I have been living in the UK for about 30 years, and in the last 4 years I have been relocated to Abu-Dhabi.
I came from a background of Agriculture and Business; as my grandfather is Sheik Mustafa Al-Amin, one of the pioneers of business, agriculture, industry, and exports, and our company was established in 1908.
In Abu-Dhabi; our company specializes in Innovative products. We always try to get the innovations in different fields, particularly in Health Care and Agriculture and introduce them to businesses, and I hope that eventually we would bring that that to Sudan by applying various technologies and innovations in education, banking, Business etc.
Our aim is to build successful businesses that are run by our younger generations to develop Sudan. Through my work as a global Peace Ambassador, I have been engaged in different aspects of Peace Making and developing peace between the nations and the people to people diplomacy of Peace. One of this is the Abraham Accords which are now in the agendas of many countries.
Sudan has an amazing future. We do have lot of resources and everyone knows its endless resources, but the most important asset is the youth of Sudan, those are brains and energy that need to be incorporated in all aspects of life specifically businesses. We would like Sudan to move ahead quickly. We would like to learn lessons from the past and try not to live in the past. We want to open a new page with the world, engage and integrate our country with the rest of the world, and I’m sure this is the way to achieve prosperity for the country.
Q2: When did you start working at the volunteering field? And what is your recent project?
A2: Around 2 years ago, I was nominated by the people of the River Nile State to become the Governor for the state. For certain reasons this has not worked but it put me in a position of ‘responsibility’, and one of the things that has been brought to my attention at that time is (My Scorpion Children), so ‘regarding’ this ‘issue’ I found myself somehow responsible ‘for this work’, which is a complete voluntary one. People of the region came to me asking for anti-venom. I researched and I was provided with evidences that we lose 3 – 5 children everyday due to scorpion stings; my approach was that; we need to see what the problem is?
We need to understand ‘because’ this is not a matter of anti-venom, it’s far beyond that. Therefore, I requested some pictures and documents, and I worked and researched the area, and I concluded that: when the government built the Meroe Dam, some people were displaced, and the issue of these people of the specific region called (Al-Buhaira) has not been properly managed, and the end result was the movement of these people ‘to other areas’ and so did the scorpions.
The region nearby (Al-Buhaira) is very rich with minerals specifically Gold; therefore, Gold Mining is another cause disrupting the ground causing re-surfing of more scorpions. Looking deeper into the scorpions, we found out that this area has the deadliest scorpions ever. In addition; people have no access to any emergency health care with no mobile phones available. This is a place where scorpions are a problem, a place where there is no health care or connectivity (No cellular phones, No internet), and there are no paved roads to get to the nearest cities. There are more minerals in the region, but people have lost their lands due to scorpions, and this has pushed them to acute poverty, basically that’s why I call them (the Forgotten Communities).
Another aspect is that scorpions may be a source of income for these people, as the venom is one of the most expensive materials in the world. Therefore, I thought differently and came up with Short, Medium and Long-Term solutions, but before that we needed to implement immediate solutions. We found that scorpions don’t like light; so, we tried to introduce lights to see the effects.
The area of Al-Buhaira is made up of 5 islands that include 200 villages with a population of about 80,000. Developing a small pilot project; we chose 2 villages that accommodate about 800 children, and some schools. Another risk is that children commute to schools on rudimentary boats every day, some of them drown and die just trying the reach schools.
To start solving these problems, I worked with a group of ladies from the River Nile, and delivered about 60 easy to use Solar Light. The outcome was amazing; the scorpions disappeared instantly in these 2 villages, and the children marks became more better than before (No sting, and Improved Education), and people started to visit each other’s, as getting outside after sunset was very difficult. But, we succeeded in only 2 villages, what about the rest 198 villages?!
To do sustainable work we need to utilize the resources we have including the scorpions. Thinking out of the box, we need to have a view on how to build the place, and make it appealing to investors, and eliminate the death of the children which obviously happening for completely man-made avoidable, preventable, and unnecessary scenarios. That is the environmental and social impact studies for the Meroe Dam; I want to stress the fact that it is always important to involve the science behind every project.
To summarize the challenges: we have simple and complex ones;
- Children and adults dying due to deadly scorpion stings and the lack of urgent emergency care that has the needed anti-venom.
- Children drowning in the river while commuting to schools.
- Patients die due to lack of cellular and internet connectivity; as they cannot call for help.
- Poverty is forcing children to leave education; where boys seek opportunities in deadly mining areas, and girls get married at early age.
You can watch the video with Dr. Tayseer at our Youtube Channel HERE. And remember to check our website for Part-2 of this interview.