UN says 2.9 million people in Somalia need urgent help “to save or sustain their lives”.
Campaign to raise $1m to deliver humanitarian aid to famine-hit African country gets massive public support.
A social media campaign aiming at delivering humanitarian aid to famine-hit Somalia through a Turkish Airlines flight has gone viral with backing from celebrities and people across the world.
After being initiated with a tweet by Jerome Jarre, the French social media celebrity, on Wednesday, the Twitter hashtags #TurkishAirlinesHelpSomalia and #LoveArmyForSomalia have taken on a snowballing effect with support from a group of celebrities.
Actor Ben Stiller, social media personality Juanpa Zurita and YouTube personality and filmmaker Casey Neistat, American football player Colin Kaepernick and many others swiftly backed the campaign.
The group has started an online funding campaign to raise money to finance food aid, while asking Turkish Airlines, the only company that flies to Somalia, to deliver the aid to the East African country suffering from draught and famine.
“It all started on Twitter,” Jarre told Al Jazeera, adding that they were still seeking whatever support and publicity they could find to hit the $1m mark they are aiming at.
He said he believed his initiative was going to be successful when he was sending out the first tweet.
“Human suffering affect all of us. Famine in Africa is everyone’s problem. We are all connected at a level that we don’t understand. For this reason, I believed this was possible,”he said.
Join GhanaStar.com to receive daily email alerts of breaking news in Ghana. GhanaStar.com is your source for all Ghana News. Get the latest Ghana news, breaking news, sports, politics, entertainment and more about Ghana, Africa and beyond.