Islanders to have their own safe house

 The LIHIR Group of Islands, in New Ireland, is set to get its own Meri Seif-Haus centre.

The proposed location is close to the Lihir medical centre

Lihir, Meri Seif-Haus will not only provide integrated and best practice Family Sexual Violence (FSV) services to the women and children, but it will provide numerous capacity building services to a network of village based seif-haus throughout the four islands of Lihir.  

 “We realise that a lot of women will not be able to come to the main seif-haus for due to transport as well as cultural reasons,” Liz Daimol, the Lihir Red Cross president said. 

“So, if women are unable to come to us for help, then we will provide them with services in their own villages. 

“This will not only be done through outreach programmes whereby staff and volunteers travel to the villages, but through a programme of capacity building whereby we will train villagers in all sorts of counselling including trauma, sexual assault, and drug and alcohol.”

The Lihir Meri Developmen Senta (LMDS) project manager Lorna Romaso said that the women of Lihir have been calling for these sorts of services for a long time but have become increasingly vocal since last year’s National Haus Krai.

Numerous organisations including Red Cross and LMDS have been involved in progressing the Lihir Meri Seif-Haus concept to a reality.  

Newcrest Mining Ltd has recently completed the initial land survey and geo-technical engineering assessment.  

Local landowner company Anitua has committed to funding the construction of the seif-haus building.