Govt view of floods as common disaster deplored

Govt view of floods as common disaster deplored

Yogita Tahilramani, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Calling killer floods a "common" disaster, particularly floods
that sweep away 65 lives nationwide within days and leave
hundreds of thousands of people without homes or employment,
reflects the government's ill intentions of not wanting to part
with extra relief funds.

Former Jakarta governor Ali Sadikin said on Tuesday that the
killer floods were a national disaster because of the
unprecedented damage to the economy and infrastructure of the
capital and other major cities, not to mention the loss of lives,
homes, food and jobs.

"People are dying daily because of floods and hundreds of
thousands of people nationwide have lost everything... no homes,
no jobs," Ali, who served as Jakarta governor from 1966 to 1977,
told The Jakarta Post.

"The distribution of food nationwide has been severely
disrupted due to damaged roads and swollen rivers. Flood victims
are prone to illnesses. They are literally living in water,
without electricity or communication. If this is not a national
disaster, what is it then?"

Ali added that the government's failure to declare the floods
a national disaster clearly reflected its reluctance to part with
extra relief funds, which could most likely amount to hundreds of
billions of rupiah.

"By declaring that it is a national disaster, the government
would also be admitting its failure in delivering relief to the
thousands of homeless and sick people across the nation," Ali
said.

The government's sluggish response to the floods prompted
People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) Speaker Amien Rais to urge
the government to declare a national disaster.

"What the government has been doing is far from adequate. The
designation of the floods as a national disaster is needed to
help maximize interdepartmental cooperation," Amien said, adding
that complaints were still pouring in from flood victims who said
that aid had not reached them.

Former president Abdurrahman Wahid issued a decree last year
establishing a national coordinating body to handle natural or
manmade disasters, and the problem of refugees as a result of
those disasters. The body is known as the Bakornas PBP.

Decree No. 3/2001 not only states that the body's executives
answer only to the President, but also that the body is in charge
of the formulation and execution of policies on overcoming a
disaster, whether natural or manmade.

Paragraph 1a of Article 12 of Chapter 6 of the decree states
that Bakornas PBP must provide clear guidelines in the policies
formulated, particularly "on distribution and use of aid, and
transparency in the distribution of aid."

Meanwhile, political analyst Arbi Sanit added that it was
impossible for local administrations to deal with the aftermath
of the flooding on their own, without extra funds from the
central government.

Arbi said that the central government should not simply wash
its hands of the problem, by implying that it was more the
problem and responsibility of each local administration.

"This is not the problem of individual local administrations
alone. One problem creates another... and it becomes a national
burden, in matters of infrastructure, the economy and loss of
jobs... as an example, see what happened in Lampung," Arbi said.

Floods over the last week that have affected nearly the entire
province have brought not only material losses to local people
and the administration but also have disrupted schools, farms and
the supply of electricity to Lampung and the surrounding areas.

Thousands of hectares of rice fields which were to be
harvested in another month in East and South Lampung, Tanggamus
and Way Kanan, have been seriously damaged.

Speaking along the same lines, Ali Sadikin said that the
massive mudslides in Situbondo, East Java, and the vast flooding
that inundated nearly all of Pekalongan in Central Java, had
shocked the nation.

"Is the central government telling us that the East Java
governor or Central Java governor can handle this horrific
problem by themselves? Impossible. Regional autonomy is no reason
for the government to wash its hands of this problem," Ali said.

Minister of People's Welfare Jusuf Kalla had earlier said that
the declaration of a national disaster was more appropriate to
past years when the government was very centralized, adding,
"It's now the regional autonomy era. We don't need those kinds of
terms."

Ali said it was crucial that certain local administrations of
major cities considered one option to overcome natural or manmade
disasters. The administrations of Jakarta, Tangerang, Bekasi and
Bogor, for instance, would be stronger if they "united into one
administration, called the Jabotabek administration," he said.