Aceh rebuilding gets on track
By Rachel Harvey
BBC News, Aceh
December 19, 2005
The trouble with measuring progress is that there are
always two sides to the story - how far you have come,
and how far there is still to go.
One year on from the earthquake and tsunami that devastated
the Indonesian province of Aceh, critics argue the pace
of reconstruction has been too slow.
Aid organisations say an enormous amount has been achieved.
Both are correct.
The provincial capital, Banda Aceh, has been transformed.
Streets that are now clogged with traffic were a year
ago six feet deep in mud, twisted metal, lumps of concrete, coconut
trees and decomposing bodies.
It took months to clear the debris. But although the centre of Banda
Aceh is bustling again, you do not have to go far to find areas of deserted
wasteland.
ACEH ONE YEAR ON
Statistics can never tell the whole story, but a few numbers are worth
repeating.
An 800km (500 mile) strip of Aceh's coastline was ravaged by the tsunami.
More than a 130,000 people were killed. Another 37,000 are officially
listed as missing. Half a million survivors were left homeless.
Entire communities were wiped off the map. The scale of the destruction
was staggering. Rebuilding Aceh was always going to be a mammoth undertaking,
and so it is proving.
Frustration
One year on, more than 60,000 survivors are still living in tents.
Baharuddin is one of them. He pitched his tent on the foundations of
his old house - the house he once shared with his wife and five children.
After the tsunami he was the only one left.
Baharuddin has fashioned a vegetable patch out of the dusty earth outside
his canvas home. He does not want to be dependent on food hand-outs.
"I've heard there's a plan to build us new houses a little way
from here." he said. "But I don't know when. We've already
waited a year. I just don't understand what's holding things up."
On reflection we should have considered transitional housing, and that
is now happening
Douglas Keatinge, Oxfam International
His frustration is understandable. Most humanitarian
organisations took a decision early on to try to move survivors directly
from "temporary shelter" to new permanent homes. But it has
taken longer than expected.
A number of different factors are to blame.
There is a shortage of building materials and skilled labour. The main
road down the west coast is still impassable, so heavy supplies and
equipment have to be transported by boat.
Over-ambitious
Then there is the question of land. Thousands of documents were destroyed
so establishing who owns what is problematic. In some places, land has
disappeared under the encroaching sea. Then add to all that the multiple
layers of bureaucracy, much of it put in place to safeguard against
corruption.
Some organisations now acknowledge that their original plans were too
ambitious.
"The international community tried to go straight to permanent
shelter because that's what local people said they wanted and this was
a rare occasion when we had the money to do it," said Douglas Keatinge
of Oxfam International.
"On reflection we should have considered transitional housing,
and that is now happening," he said.
The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent societies
has been asked to provide the new transitional shelters. Made of light-weight
aluminium frames with wooden floors and walls, they are designed to
be quick and easy to assemble. But they are also robust enough to withstand
the earthquakes which still rock the province with alarming regularity.
The aim is to have everybody out of tents by the end of March next year.
The other major issue which hindered the humanitarian operation in
its early phases was security. For 26 years Aceh had been the scene
of a bitter conflict between the Indonesian government and separatist
rebels of the Free Aceh Movement, known as Gam.
The tsunami brought the two parties back to the negotiating table
Bakhtiar Abdullah, Gam
International aid organisations had to negotiate acute
political sensitivities as well as ensuring the protection of their
foreign and local staff.
But in August a peace deal was signed. And, as Bakhtiar Abdullah, a
Gam spokesman acknowledged, it was last December's disaster which made
the difference.
"The tsunami brought the two parties back to the negotiating table," he
said, "to allow free passage for humanitarian workers to be able
to carry out their noble duties".
There are still major obstacles to be overcome, but so far the peace
agreement appears to be going smoothly. So much so that Mr Abdullah
has returned to Aceh after 23 years of political exile in Sweden.
The other piece of good news is there is no shortage of money for the
long term reconstruction of Aceh.
In fact, thanks largely to the generosity of individuals from all around
the world, slightly more has been pledged than is likely to be needed.
So things should begin to improve more quickly over the next few months.
As former US President Bill Clinton, the United Nations' special envoy
for tsunami relief, noted when he visited Aceh in November: "We
shouldn't rest on our laurels, but things are moving in the right direction."
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/4542320.stm
Published: 2005/12/19 15:03:29 GMT
© BBC MMV
7548 Preston Road #141-172
Frisco, Texas 75034
214-505-3695
Email
