A phone call from the UAE ambassador to offer help during a live report on TV

Screen grab from the report featuring one poor family Image Credit: Screen grab

Dubai : UAE Ambassador to Lebanon, Hamad Saeed Al Shamsi, pledged to provide care and assistance to a family living under the poverty line in the city of Tripoli in northern Lebanon through the "Emirates Red Crescent".

A local Lebanese channel, MTV, got a phone call from the UAE ambassador to offer help during a live report on families that live under the line of poverty in Tripoli.

The anchor interrupted the reporter in the middle of the live program saying, "We have received a phone call from the Emirati ambassador in Beirut, Hamad Al Shamsi, and he has informed that the UAE Red Crescent will start, from tomorrow, to provide assistance to these poor people in Tripoli."

During the report, the reporter described the room of the family as a cave that he couldn’t walk into. The room had no lights, was humid and the TV crew couldn’t go inside or shoot. Inside, they found a man, left paralysed from a stroke, unattended or cared for in a house that did not seem healthy for humans to live in.

The father had lost his job, collecting junk to sell, after the stroke. He has two children, two boys, while their mother left as she couldn’t bear their impoverished life.

The son is seen on camera crying, when one man tells him to “stop crying” and added,”… it’s not your fault, it’s your country’s fault. Stop crying and be proud because you didn’t steal, but your country stole your lives.”

The TV crew were also in tears seeing the state of the family. At that point the studio anchor cut the live report short, and told the reporter that Al Shamsi had pledged full financial support for the family.

In an interview with online news website 24, Al Shamsi assured that the father was moved to a hospital by a team from the embassy that same night, and that another team was looking for a house to move the family into.

Al Shamsi also pledged to renovate an old age home in the city of Sidon in southern Lebanon, same program reported that it will be shut down due to insufficient funds.

Al Shamsi, speaking to 24 a news website, said “A TV channel reported the deteriorating and difficult situation residents of the old living house were suffering from, which would have been closed down after 3 months due to financial hardship,"

After ensuring that the building needed a restoration, a team from the embassy went on Saturday morning to assess and help.

The renovation of the home, according to Al Shamsi, will be funded by a grant from the Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan Foundation for Humanitarian Work.