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Earthquake victims question slow aid flow

Earthquake victims in West Java said they had not yet received adequate aid or donations, despite extensive media coverage of their suddenly crumbling lives over the past three days

Hasyim Widhiarto (The Jakarta Post)
Bandung
Sat, September 5, 2009 Published on Sep. 5, 2009 Published on 2009-09-05T14:27:30+07:00

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Earthquake victims question slow aid flow

E

arthquake victims in West Java said they had not yet received adequate aid or donations, despite extensive media coverage of their suddenly crumbling lives over the past three days.

Enok Hartati, 61, a resident of Pangalengan district, Bandung, said she was jealous of the government's efforts to support the earthquake victims in remote Cikangkareng village, Cianjur.

"I heard that after President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono visited the place, more volunteers and aid were deployed there," Enok, who saw her house ruined by the earthquake, told The Jakarta Post on Friday.

"My house is located only 20 meters from the main road, so why it is so hard for the government or other parties to quickly deliver their aid here?"

Enok, who lives with her husband, two children and two grandchildren, is staying in a makeshift tent erected in an idle plot of land near her wrecked house.

Every sahur (pre-dawn meal) and fast-breaking time, she walks 500 meters to the nearest emergency public kitchen to get food.

Asep Sutasman, another resident, shared Enok's disappointment, adding he expected the government to soon provide the victims with financial support to enable them to rebuild their house.

"If they can't do so, maybe they can at least provide building materials," said the 53-year-old ojek (motorcycle taxi) driver.

Dozens of people were killed and thousands of houses and buildings were damaged after a 7.3-magnitude quake shook the southern part of West Java on Wednesday afternoon.

The epicenter was around 30 kilometers beneath the sea southwest of West Java's city of Tasikmalaya .

In Cianjur, the quake caused a cliff facing a hamlet in Cikangkareng village to slide, which buried more than 50 residents alive with soil and rocks.

President Yudhoyono on Thursday visited the site, located 100 kilometers southeast of Jakarta, and instructed the evacuation team to quickly remove the bodies.

Meanwhile, West Java Governor Ahmad Heryawan said his administration had allocated Rp 30 billion (US$2.97 million) from its budget to help all earthquake victims receive emergency services, such as medical treatment and logistic supplies.

However, as of today, there was no clarity about when the government or local administration would provide the victims with aid to reconstruct their damaged houses.

Data from the Bandung regency's crisis center shows that 37,850 houses have been damaged by the earthquake. Of the figure, almost two thirds are located in Pangalengan district, which is famous for its tea plantations and milk production.

It is estimated that several emergency public kitchens in the district have to cook at least 4.3 tons of rice per day for the thousands of people who are currently living in makeshift tents following Wednesday's earthquake.

The quake also devastated the 54,000-populated Sindangbarang district in Cianjur. Although the quake has not claimed any lives, it has damaged at least 2,000 houses in the area.

Hasanuddin, head of Seganten subdistrict, said, as of Friday, besides five sacks of rice from Cianjur's disaster mitigation agency, he had not seen any more donations coming for his residents.

Seganten is the most affected subdistrict in Sindangbarang with more than 1,000 houses damaged.

To help ease the suffering of the earthquake victims, Sobar Husein, public relations head of the West Java branch of the State Logistics Agency said the agency had currently prepared 100 tons of rice for every regency or municipality in the province that had been affected by the quake.

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