Flood victims complain aid suspicions

Flood victims complain aid suspicions

Apriadi Gunawan, The Jakarta Post, Medan, North Sumatra

Hundreds of flood victims in Bahorok claimed on Saturday that the
disbursement of aid from the government had been marked by
irregularities.

Indra Hasyim, 41, one of the victims of the flash flood that
swept through the area last year, said that the irregularities
were first noticed in the list of people entitled to receive aid.

And while many victims of the flood have received aid, the
amounts involved were less than stipulated on the list drawn up
by government officials, he said.

Hasyim said that the irregularities proved that the government
was not serious in monitoring and overseeing the disbursement of
aid to the victims.

The government had also failed to alleviate the plight of the
victims as it had not yet rebuilt their houses and markets as it
had promised.

"We demand that the government does not play around with the
aid that is supposed to be ours," Hasyim told The Jakarta Post on
the sidelines of a seminar held in Medan titled "The Development
of Bahorok after the Flash Flood".

The two-day seminar was attended by hundreds of participants,
including environmental activists, the victims of the flash flood
and government officials.

Similar complaints were voiced by another victim, Aca
Alamsyah, 38, who said that he was supposed to receive Rp 1
million in aid, but had only got Rp 500,000.

Aca said he had become aware that something was amiss after he
read the list of aid recipients reported by the Bahorok district
head to the Langkat regent recently.

Aca was surprised to read that he was supposed to receive Rp 1
million.

"This is clearly a crime," he complained.

He said that he and the other victims had reported the
irregularities to the Langkat Police two weeks ago, but there had
been no news so far about what had happened.

Aca said that from the very beginning he had suspected that
there was something fishy afoot in the distribution of the aid.

"We were asked to write our names and sign a blank piece of
paper as evidence that we had received the aid. We did not know
how much we were supposed to receive from the government," he
said, adding that the entire process had been suspicious from the
very start.

He estimated that out of a total of 720 flood victims who are
supposed to receive aid, half of them knew nothing about how much
they were supposed to get from the government.

Separately, the secretary of Langkat regency, Masri Zein, said
that the sums of money involved might have come from third
parties, and not from the government.

A total of Rp 670 million had been donated by third parties,
he said without going into details.

He supported the move by the flood victims to report the
shortfalls in the aid they had received to the police. "This is
an age of transparency. If irregularities are committed by
government officials, feel free to report it to the police," he
said.

Meanwhile, responding to criticism that the government was
very slow in rebuilding houses in the area, Masri said that the
government needed enough time to prepare a proper reconstruction
plan before actually starting the work.

"It takes at least three months to formulate such a plan," he
said.

Besides, the Langkat government had to wait until the central
government disbursed Rp 50 billion that had been promised for
reconstruction. "We don't have enough money. That's why we have
to wait for money from the central government," Masri said.

The flash flood hit a residential area in the Bahorok tourist
resort, Langkat regency, in November last year, killing 157
people. Some 80 others are still missing, presumed dead.

The flash flood, the biggest in the area for 25 years,
destroyed 450 houses and a number of hotels in the area.