On 2nd birthday… al-Raqqa Civil Council made great achievements

The council was established in April 18, 2017 during a meeting attended by the dignitaries of al-Raqqa, and opened its headquarters in the city. Immediately after the Syrian Democratic Forces' declaration of liberating al-Raqqa in 17 October 2017, the council took a bold step to assume the quantum of destruction where the mechanisms of the reconstruction committee entered the city to be the first to remove the rubble and open the roads with the participation of engineering teams of the internal security forces for demining.

On the occasion of the 2nd anniversary of the establishment of the al-Raqqa Civil Council, our agency met with the member of the Presidential Body in council the Munir Al-Khalaf, who recalled the most important achievements of the council during the second year of incorporation. "Soon we achieved large projects and gained the confidence of the people with the participation of more than 10 thousand members in different civil and social institutions that fall under the roof of the Civil Council".

With limited potential, 100,000+ students joined educational process

For 4 years, al-Raqqa city was under the grip of Daesh mercenaries, which was able to create a generation of illiterate children and this is what mercenaries sought after the closure of schools and educational institutions under fake pretexts only that related to their obscurantism, and this was the subject of difficult confrontation before al-Raqqa Civil Council in the second year.

In this context, Munir Al-Khalaf talked about the efforts made by the Education Committee on how the committee achieved tangible results on the ground. In one year, the committee managed to rehabilitate about 82 schools in the city center, thus contributing to the incubation of more than 100,000 students from different educational stages under the supervision of a teaching staff reached to 5 thousand teachers of various subjects.

The economic nature of the zone drew broad plans for the council

The region of a agricultural character contributed to economic development, the council plans to support the agricultural field that will achieve self-sufficiency of the majority of crops and contribute to a large extent to increase the proportion of green areas, which saw a significant decline a year, after neglect for several years during Daesh mercenaries occupation.

Al-Khalaf explained in his speech that the council in its current plans for the current year is considering the mechanism of forming agricultural associations and instructions units that will contribute significantly in terms of developing the agricultural sector and organizing the agricultural lands in order to secure fertilizers, pesticides and fuel for all farmers which amounts to 12 stations covering all the agricultural areas in rural areas, which had been subjected to systematic acts of sabotage over the years of occupation of the mercenary factions, the most recent of which was Daesh.

Future plans collide with the limited potential

Two years of continuous work and efforts exerted by al-Raqqa Civil Council, and is still seeking more under the conditions that hinder those efforts and stand in the way of achieving them, which is the weak potential compared to the size of the requirements imposed by the reality of the region in the second year of liberation from the grip of Daesh mercenaries, which got al-Raqqa to a stage described as catastrophic at all levels.

At the end of his speech, Al-Khalaf drew attention to some of the guidelines laid down by the Civil Council as the basis of his future plans in the third year. He stated that in the coming days the council will be able to open the Old Raqqa Bridge, the main nerve in the city which has been completely out of service, only a few days to its opening.

"We will focus on the development and rehabilitation of the service sectors and provide all elements of life for the residents of al-Raqqa city with electricity and water as required, especially after these two sectors are completely out of service after the theft of power transformers and electric transmission networks, destroying drinking water pumps, which in turn reflected negatively and clearly on the daily lives of the people of the city of al-Raqqa."

J.O

ANHA