Floods recede as victims cry for help

Floods recede as victims cry for help

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The floods, which have paralyzed the city for the last three
days, slowly started to recede on Thursday but remained an
inconvenience for many.

Meanwhile, many thousands of victims were in desperate need of
help.

"We see the floods are beginning to go down today. I hope
they'll go down even further," Subroto, an official at the
Pasanggrahan floodgate in South Jakarta, told The Jakarta Post on
Thursday night.

He said that the water level in the sluices had gone down from
255 centimeters on Wednesday to 165 centimeters on Thursday.
Several floodgates, including Katulampa in Bogor, and Manggarai
in South Jakarta, also witnessed receding water levels.

Paulus Agus Winarno, an expert from the Meteorology and
Geophysics Agency, estimated that the rainfall had reached its
peak during the five consecutive days up to Wednesday. A
cumulative total of around 300 millimeters of rain fell on the
city.

But he warned the public that heavy rain could still occur
until the end of February.

Over the last two days, the floodwaters reached up to six
meters in depth in the most severely affected area in Cawang,
East Jakarta.

As of Thursday night, the floods were still disrupting daily
activities and preventing thousands of people from leaving their
homes.

Commuters on trains on the Rangkas Bitung-Tanah Abang line had
to stop in Palmerah and continue their journey by other means of
transportation as the Tanah Abang railway station in Central
Jakarta had been inundated.

A number of factories in Tanjung Priok, North Jakarta,
including the Mitsubishi plant, were closed because of the
floods. "Maybe we will open again next Monday," Ramot S. told the
Post.

Many government offices had also yet to return to normal.
"Today some 25 percent of our employees are absent as they have
to clean up their homes," said Sophia, a public servant with the
city administration.

Although the floodwaters had receded from the Kebon Jeruk and
Jagorawi toll roads, the toll road leading to Soekarno Hatta
airport was still flooded up to a depth of one meter. Some cars
were left stranded.

As the toll road was impassable, motorists had to seek
alternative routes via Jl. Daan Mogot or Kapuk Kamal. Congestion
on these roads was heavy, with the result that many intending
passengers failed to get to the airport on time. "As a result,
some 80 percent of flights were delayed," an airport official
told the Post.

Iin Mumkin, an official with the city's education agency, said
that some 170 elementary and junior high school buildings were
still inundated, causing classes to be suspended.

The floods also damaged the telecommunications network with a
total of 17,100 telephone lines in the Greater Jakarta suffering
disruption.

As of Thursday, PLN had cut the electricity supply to 600
relay stations in the flood-affected areas, up from only 400 on
Wednesday.

The floods have so far caused at least 17 deaths. Five persons
were also missing, presumed washed away by the raging floodwaters
in several areas.

Raya Siahaan, a secretary in the city's Center for Social
Disturbance Control, said the floods had affected at least
365,450 people, or 93,387 families, across the capital.

Of the affected people, some 195,000 were taking refuge in
school buildings, subdistrict offices and mosques, and even a
public cemetery in the case of about 1,000 residents of Cipinang,
East Jakarta.

Most of the victims are in urgent need of assistance, but
seemingly little has been done to ease their sufferings. Worse
still, the assistance provided was often inappropriate or even
life-threatening.

Rice was distributed to many victims who were unable to cook
it as their homes had been inundated.

Among the medicines distributed to the victims were at least
ten large boxes of medicine that were due to pass their use-by
dates in a matter of days.

Dr. Aryono Pusponegoro of the Ciptomangunkusumo Hospital
(RSCM) admitted that the Doxycycline 100 milligram antibiotics,
aid from Japan, which was distributed to victims, should have
been destroyed this month. But he said that the medicine was
still safe to be used for up to six months after its expiry date.

"I think you shouldn't report this as we have worked hard to
release the medicine from storage. We need it for the flood
victims," he said.

President Megawati Soekarnoputri and a number of officials
have visited the flood locations, but only some of them brought
real assistance to the victims.

Megawati herself was welcomed by demonstrators when she
visited the flooded Jl. Arus area in Cawang, East Jakarta, where
the water reached up to six meters deep. Banners erected by
residents read, among other things, "We don't need visits, we
need food" and "We are flooded with water while officials are
flooded with money".

Megawati toured the area in a rubber dingy.

Accompanied by Governor Sutiyoso, the President then visited
Jl. Cipinang Pulau Maja, also in East Jakarta.

Meanwhile, public health officer Dr. Kusdiyanto at the Flood
Monitoring Post admitted it was difficult for health officials to
provide aid to the flood victims due to the limited number of
rubber rafts available to evacuate them.