Tale of 2 villages a year after Pakistan's floods
By SEBASTIAN ABBOT - Associated Press, 28.7.11
MOR JANGI, Pakistan (AP) — Residents of this Pakistani village whose lives were washed away by last year's floods complain they have been largely forgotten. Sewage runs through the street. Some people still live in tents under the searing summer sun. Others had to sell their cattle and take on heavy debt to rebuild their homes.
Not far away, in Wairar Sibra village, locals are getting ready to move into new houses, complete with electricity and courtyards, thanks to the largess of the wealthy man who owns the power plant looming over the settlement. The villagers are excited because the new homes are even better than the ones they had before the floods.
The contrasting fates of the two villages in central Punjab province are a testament to the uneven response to Pakistan's worst-ever floods, which hit a year ago and inundated a Britain-sized chunk of the country.
Often the deciding factor between success and failure in Pakistan is how much access people have to the rich and powerful, a rule that seems true even in the wake of a natural disaster.
Many of the 18 million people affected by last year's floods, which were triggered by heavy monsoon rains, were among the country's poorest and most vulnerable. Despite hundreds of millions of dollars spent by Islamabad and international donors, millions of people are still in dire need of help, and the disaster has left them even more susceptible to flooding that has already started again this year.
Nazir Ahmed is still living with his family in tents set up amid the ruins of his home in Mor Jangi. The 35-year-old brick kiln worker has little hope of rebuilding his house since his daily wage of less than $3 is barely enough to feed his family and pay to treat their frequent bouts of malaria and diarrhea.
"I haven't been able to save money, and I don't have any land or cattle to sell," said Ahmed, as his five young daughters and two young sons gathered around him. "Only God can help us rebuild our house."
Mor Jangi's 3,000 residents had no warning last year that floodwaters, which originated in northwest Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, were rushing toward their village, located on the banks of a branch of the Indus River. Over seven hours on July 28, the water level rose 15 feet (4.5 meters), damaging hundreds of houses in the village and destroying acres of crops, said Abdel Latif, a 28-year-old farmer.
Many of the villagers fled to relief camps and returned two months later after the water receded, said Ishfaq Ahmed, a 26-year-old highway patrolman. They were counting on receiving about $1,160 promised by the government through its "Watan" cash card program — the minimum needed to rebuild one room of a house, he said.
But the government has only distributed about $232 per family, and the Watan card program has been plagued by allegations of corruption. Some families in Mor Jangi didn't receive Watan cards, which are meant to be used at local ATMs, and complained that a local landowner asked for about $14 to get them a card and then pocketed the money. The claims could not be verified, but similar allegations of corruption have surfaced throughout Pakistan.
Residents did receive seed and fertilizer from an aid organization in November, allowing them to grow a good crop of wheat they harvested in May. But many villagers had to sell their cattle and take out loans of up to $1,160 to rebuild their houses, Ahmed said.
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