Accuracy of data on Nias disaster questionable

Accuracy of data on Nias disaster questionable

MEDAN, North Sumatra (JP): Nias Disaster Center coordinator
A.A. Gulo said in Nias on Wednesday that the data on the
fatalities and damage caused by the recent floods was
questionable.

The most questionable aspect was the number of houses
destroyed by the flood, he said, citing the recent finding in
Telukdalam district where 60 shacks or huts destroyed by the
floods had previously been claimed to have been residents'
houses.

"We had not physically checked out the reports. But after we
crosschecked the reports on the ground, we concluded that all the
reports should be treated with a pinch of salt," Gulo told The
Jakarta Post by telephone on Wednesday.

"Coordination among the people and institutions dealing with
the disaster has been very poor. All the village heads have been
dishonest in the reports (on damage and fatalities) they have
filed with us."

"The result is that we have not yet been able to clarify how
many people were really killed and how much infrastructure was
destroyed in the disaster. We will soon identify how many men,
women and children died in the calamity," he said while
acknowledging that this was very late given that the floods swept
through the Nias districts of Lahusa, Lolomatua, Telukdalam,
Gomo, Bawalato, Lolowau and Ananaraya last Tuesday.

Gulo's statements underlined reporters' skepticism about the
accuracy of the data.

Reporters visiting Nias soon after the disaster took place
last week raised questions about the high death toll reported
after seeing no sign of mass graves for the victims.

The latest data made available at 5 p.m. on Wednesday
indicated that the death toll had reached 103, with 160 people
missing and 859 houses, 11 school buildings, three churches and
four bridges damaged.

Speaking about the dead, Gulo said that the bodies of all the
victims had been claimed by relatives, who buried them near their
own homes.

Chairman of Commission I of the Nias Regency Legislative
Council Ali Amran told the Post that the legislature would soon
summon Nias chief executives and the disaster relief committee
over the inaccurate data being supplied.

In a related development, a Medan-based legal practitioner,
Aldian Pinem, said the intention of falsifying data could be
subject to a maximum punishment of four years imprisonment for
violating Article 335 of the Criminal Code.

While the authorities were busy trying to sort out the data,
aid kept flowing into the island for the disaster's survivors.

The Embassy of Japan said in a press release received by the
Post on Wednesday that its government had donated food and
material aid worth US$38,000.

"The Government of Japan has decided to extend this aid from a
humanitarian point of view, considering the friendly relationship
between the two countries and taking into account the scale of
the disaster," the release said. (42/sur)