Experts warn of quake relief mistakes

BANDUNG (JP): Researchers have warned that mismanagement and the transformation of the Bengkulu earthquake into a "political commodity" was inflicting damaging trauma and huge material losses to an area and its people already suffering from natural disaster.

After a four-day visit to the region, the researchers, from the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB) and grouped in the Indonesian Urban Disaster Mitigation Project, also lamented on Saturday the "inaccurate and exaggerated news" coverage of the disaster.

The team cited an example of how political figures used the occasion to criticize the President rather than make a significant contribution to ease the victims' burden.

The experts, consisting of geophysics and seismic structure experts, also said misinformation and a lack of understanding were having a negative psychological effect.

"We visited Bengkulu and Enggano island, which previously had been reported to have suffered 90 percent destruction. Information like that is certainly damaging to victims' psychological states," team leader Krisna S. Pribadi said.

"It turns out that the damage is actually only about 20 percent and there are incompatible facts between the number of victims, the damage and the tremor magnitude."

He pointed out that out of every six houses that were rocked by the earthquake, only one was destroyed while the others were still livable in.

The researchers claimed the source of the inaccurate information was the provincial Natural Disaster Coordinating Unit (Satkorlak).

"The unit (Satkorlak) was not prepared at all and started to spread false information about the quake which added to people's psychological burden," team member Jodi Firmansjah added.

Satkorlak's major mistake was distributing donations equally between those who still had adequate housing and those who had lost their homes, Jodi said.

"Many of those who actually still have functional homes are unwilling to go back to them, preferring to stay in tents or shelters with the rest of the victims," Jodi said. (25/edt)