Communications and fundraising in Eastern Ukraine

From Copenhagen – the capital of the happiest, politically and economically most stable countries on the planet, to Severodonetsk – the administrative center of the most underdeveloped region in Ukraine, which apart from declining industries has been torn by war during the last 6 years. The change could not be more contrasting and were it not for my familiarity with post-soviet societies, I would probably have been appalled or perplexed by many things. 

     Photo: Milan Zaitsev

However, despite the lack of comfort, glamour and abundance of offers and activities in large cities, Severodonetsk is a charming town in its own way, with its decaying soviet enterprises and abandoned ruins, typical 5- and 9-storey residential buildings lacking maintenance and repair for decades, old trolley-busses and roads in poor in condition. “It’s like the end of the world here”, a Belgian freelance journalist said to me. “Actually, every city here is like the end of the world”, he added after some thought.

Even at the end of the world life continues. People go to work, kids go to school and the old grannies sell their fresh produce and pickled vegetables on the market because their pensions are not enough to pay their bills, food and medicine. 30 kilometers away is a different world: the front-line, or ‘contact line’ and ‘demarcation line’ as it is more commonly called among international organizations. The protracted low-intensity armed conflict, largely forgotten outside Ukraine, continues here on a daily basis.

Severodonetsk is quiet and peaceful and doesn’t look like a city in a conflict zone at first glance. Only the unusually large amount of military personnel, a military base on one of the central streets and the fading red letters on almost every building - “УКРИТТЯ” meaning bomb shelter – make you conscious of where you are. And so does working in an non-governmental organization whose primary mission is to assist victims of the conflict in every way possible, be it delivering humanitarian aid, psycho-social support, legal assistance or educational activities, civil society development and capacity-building.

Working for Vostok-SOS has been a rewarding and extraordinary experience both professionally and personally. The team is very motivated and passionate about the work they do. Being internally displaced themselves, they have dedicated their lives to help others in the same situation and people who live along the frontline where shelling and shootouts still occur daily despite the first careful steps of troops withdrawal, prisoner exchange and the first meeting in the Normandy format in 3 years. 

My work here started with communication tasks such as making content for Facebook and Instagram accounts, feature stories and translations of reports for the website, but gradually I moved over to translating and assisting in writing project proposals, communicating with existing and potential donors and partners.

Photo:Nikola Skuridin

Among some of the most interesting processes I was part of was the planning and execution of the Opinion Festival in September 2019 – a yearly outdoors festival that brings together people from different social layers and regions of country for open debates, discussions and creative events on important social issues. 

In 2019, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UN OCHA) established the Ukraine Humanitarian Fund – a country specific humanitarian pooled fund aimed at addressing the acute needs that are least funded to support the Humanitarian Response Plan efforts. We applied for the first project call within the fund which was a technically challenging and time-consuming process, especially for a multi-cluster project, but the lessons learned and experience gained were valuable. As a part of this process, Vostok-SOS underwent a capacity assessment by OCHA which included the preparation of documents, policies and guidelines of the organization and an interview with a commission from OCHA. We received an evaluation and recommendations for possible areas of improvement.

One of the exciting moments during my deployment was receiving the news of approved funding for one of our project proposals. I was actively involved in editing the application and communicating with the donor organization along the way. The project is aimed at strengthening the capacity of local self-government in frontline towns of the Luhansk region and consists of an educational course for the leadership and employees of local authorities as well as representatives of civil society. During the course, participants will gain knowledge about the structure, powers and duties of the local self-government and state bodies, the competencies of effective communication between government and the civil society, resource mobilization and other competencies necessary for the sustainable development of democratic transformations in local communities. During this work, government officials together with active citizens will work on developing strategies for sustainable development of the eastern regions.

Photo: Nikola Skuridin

I am grateful to have stayed here long enough to see this project launch!