By Irwin Loy
SHOCK and hurt, then confusion and chaos – frontline aid groups are scrambling as US funding freezes cascade to the ground in emergencies across the globe.
From Syria to parched Somalia, from Ukraine to Myanmar’s borderlands, local NGOs and aid organisations reliant on suddenly frozen US donor funding are suspending programmes or stalling them – hitting communities facing dire hunger or trapped between warring parties.
Local aid leaders describe days of chaos trying to navigate US President Donald Trump’s sweeping executive order to freeze aid, vague emergency waivers that may exempt some of it, and often contradictory instructions from government counterparts.
“This really tells all of us how powerful one man can be, just waking up one morning, giving this executive order.”
One by one this week, US-funded programmes shuttered as terse stop-work orders pinged into inboxes. A few local aid leaders that suspended programmes rushed to restart them days later, hopeful they qualified under the humanitarian waiver. Others were explicitly told they must apply for vague project-specific exemptions or are still waiting for answers from their US government grants managers or the bigger international agencies that fund them. Some continue to operate, insisting it’s impossible to shut down overnight.
“This really tells all of us how powerful one man can be, just waking up one morning, giving this executive order,” said Mohamed Yarrow, executive director of the Centre for Peace and Democracy Africa, a Somalia-based NGO.
He received stop-work orders from various international NGO partners, forcing him to suspend health, immunisation, and cash aid programmes helping displaced families fleeing conflict and drought. Days later, Yarrow said he has a cautious go-ahead to restart following news of the waiver, which was issued on 29 January by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
“We are now more confident that there would be no more disruptions since it is about humanitarian services,” Yarrow said. “But certainly, the first stop-work order was given without much thought on the impacts. It was a hurried and casual decision.”
Many other local aid leaders who spoke to The New Humanitarian remain in limbo.
On the border between eastern India and western Myanmar, the Chin Human Rights Organization suspended its US-funded programmes. Overnight, mobile health teams and other services for 31,000 people – mired in conflict and under barrage from Myanmar’s junta – ground to a halt.
“The instruction is that we cannot spend anything starting from the 25th [of January] even if we still have the money with us,” said Salai Za Uk Ling, the group’s executive director.
He said he is aware of the humanitarian exemptions but has heard no official word.
“Every minute counts,” he said. “And we don’t know when this is going to take effect or exactly how that would happen.”
Addicted to US funding
The turmoil over Trump’s aid freeze is a symptom of the global humanitarian system’s extreme dependence on voluntary contributions from a few mainly Western donors. US funding typically accounts for anywhere between 30% and 40% of the emergency aid system. Analysts say the global system has also prioritised growth and expansion rather than reforms and shifting power.
More than 305 million people around the globe need some form of humanitarian aid, according to the UN, and those numbers are rising.
Hundreds of thousands have been displaced within days from Goma in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo after it was seized by the Rwanda-backed M23 armed group. Humanitarian and rebuilding needs are massive in Syria after the downfall of the Assad regime. A failed rainy season in Somalia is likely to be followed by another.
“We did not get sufficient rains for the last season; this season is a failure. So we are expecting a lot of bad things to happen,” said an NGO leader in Mogadishu, who asked not to be named in order to speak freely. Like several others who spoke to The New Humanitarian this week, the NGO leader was wary of repercussions if seen as too critical.
The aid freezes, they said, have “really come at the very wrong time for the communities. The future impact will be much worse.”
Confusion over sudden orders and vague waivers
Trump ordered a 90-day review and immediate pause for all foreign assistance when he took office again on 20 January.
It affects more than short-term humanitarian aid: longer-term development support, climate, funds that support HIV/AIDS, and reproductive health for women and girls, for example. The foreign aid freeze is part of Trump’s broader domestic barrage against perceived progressive causes or adversaries.
While Trump’s intentions may be somewhat clear, the swift executive orders, rushed waivers, and a volley of bureaucratic stop-work orders implemented by underlings and bureaucrats have sowed chaos.
“All of the work in Burma could broadly be interpreted as life-saving. I think everyone is nervous about stepping out of bounds of what that could mean.”
Rubio’s 29 January waiver, for example, appears to exempt some forms of emergency aid from Trump’s broad directive. “Implementers of existing life-saving humanitarian assistance programs should continue or resume work if they have stopped,” the waiver stated.
But some humanitarians say US bureaucrats – and humanitarian decision-makers themselves – are following the strictest interpretations of Trump’s orders.
“Despite Rubio’s message, multiple agencies and NGOs have had clear instructions from within the [US government] that humanitarians should not restart until they get specific, project-by-project waivers,” an aid official told The New Humanitarian.
The definition of “life-saving” is also a stumbling block.
“All of the work in Burma could broadly be interpreted as life-saving,” said Za Uk Ling. “I think everyone is nervous about stepping out of bounds of what that could mean.”
Smaller local civil society groups and NGOs – and the communities in which they work – are the first to feel the squeeze. They tend to have scant reserves and fewer donors.
They’re also often in the dark. While US grant managers have been quick to issue stop-work orders – and international agencies acting as intermediary funders quick to pass them along – they’re much slower to clarify exemptions.
Ko Banya, founder of the Karenni Human Rights Group, which operates on the border area of eastern Myanmar’s Karenni State, said he received a brisk letter from USAID this week, ordering immediate suspensions.
Banya immediately paused US-funded programmes helping Karenni communities, including those living deep in the jungle without aid, caught amid years of fighting worsened by the 2021 military coup.
“If we had warning time – one month, two weeks – I think we can find our backup opportunity, we can find our own sources to try and save people who are really in need,” he said. “But just coming in one hour, everything has to be stopped – this kind of decision should not be [made] by these kinds of agencies who are supporting humanitarians.”
A calculated risk: Continuing operations
The aid freeze chaos also hits larger organisations that Trump’s first administration previously supported. A third of the funding for the Syrian Civil Defence, better known as the White Helmets, comes from the US, said its deputy general manager, Farouq Habib.
“You can imagine that the freeze of the current awards – with immediate effect, without giving a notice period – it’s just shocking,” he said. “It’s devastating.”
Habib said it’s unclear whether the White Helmets qualify under the humanitarian exemption: The group has asked its USAID grants officer for clarification but has not received a reply, he said yesterday.
“These are essential, mostly life-saving activities and very urgent. We accepted the risk: Simply, we cannot stop.”
In the meantime, the White Helmets are continuing operations with what they have – a calculated risk.
Habib said humanitarian and rebuilding needs in Syria are too great – and the sheer logistics of stopping work, cancelling contracts, and breaking commitments carry their own legal risk.
“The situation is still chaotic,” he said. “From our side, we continue our service delivery. These are essential, mostly life-saving activities and very urgent. We accepted the risk: Simply, we cannot stop.”
What next?
Like many across the international aid sector, the US-fuelled chaos is pushing local humanitarian leaders to brainstorm short-term workarounds and longer-term alternatives.
Familiar fallbacks like crowd-funding, non-US governments, philanthropies, and newer sources of cash have come up in conversations. But all donor budgets are squeezed, and several noted that the biggest competition is likely to come from big international NGOs with deeper pockets and donor relations teams.
“This is another lesson learned for us,” Banya said. “We should not depend on one particular funding agency. There should be other engagements with the other donors across the world.”
Others are thinking longer-term.
“We have to think about the future,” said the NGO leader in Mogadishu. “We have to come up with a strategy and change the situation.”
Local aid organisations have been underfunded for years, chasing short-term humanitarian money to address long-festering problems. There must be a “deeper solution”, the NGO leader said.
“This is a very big lesson learned,” they said. “It may happen any time, in any moment, in any government: Any donor may take such a decision to stop such crucial support.”
Edited by Andrew Gully.
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The New Humanitarian puts quality, independent journalism at the service of the millions of people affected by humanitarian crises around the world. Find out more at www.thenewhumanitarian.org.
