New Kitchen Delivers Food for Children’s Thoughts in Dili

The first of the three major construction projects undertaken in Dili, Timor-Leste as part of Pacific Partnership 14 (PP14) has been handed over on-time and on-budget to the students of Comoro Intermediate School.

This project delivered the first kitchen facility to operate at school and will provide food for over 1600 school children.

The Comoro Intermediate School is one of the largest schools in Dili and teaches classes from grades one to ten.

Hundreds of children were watching intently as the ribbon was cut by Filomeno Salsinha, the director of the Comoro Intermediate School.

Mr Salsinha thanked the Australians and Americans for their hard work and their commitment to finish the project.

“The kitchen is a most welcome addition to our school and the children are anxious to finally get to use it,” he said.

Spr Nelson Clayton, from 21 Construction Squadron, 6 Engineer Support Regiment (6ESR), said the construction of the kitchen had gone to plan, and that he was honoured to be part of the opening ceremony.

“Today has been a wonderful day for us all. It seems that all the hard work has paid off,” he said.

“It has been a challenging three weeks to finish the project in time, but now that it has been finished, I can’t wait to see the children use the new facility.”

The event was attended by US Navy CAPT Rodney Moore, Commodore of the 30th Naval Construction Regiment and Commander PP14 South and the Commander of the Australian Contingent, WGCDR Daryll Topp.

Australian Army Engineers from 21 Construction Squadron, 6 6ESR, Brisbane and United States Navy Engineers, Mobile Construction Battalion 1 (the ‘Seabees’) started their work on the construction with East-Timorese Defence Force (F-FDTL) engineers on 29 May 2014.

The opening of the facility has been a much-anticipated event and the kitchen will provide up to three meals a day for the children.