Some quake survivors still awaiting help

 

 

 

 

Ecumenical News International
NIAS, Indonesia—More than a month after tsunamis swept across Indian Ocean shorelines on several continents, people are still stranded in parts of Indonesia.
Emergency helpers are battling to reach areas where bridges and roads were washed away and helicopters cannot land.
International media attention has focused on flattened cities like Banda Aceh and Meulaboh on Sumatra island, which have received an outpouring of assistance. But on the west coast of Indonesia, people are still stranded, despite efforts to reach them.
The effect has been equally catastrophic on communities in such remote areas as Sirombu on Nias island, a Christian pocket isolated from Indonesia in north Sumatra. Here, the tsunami killed 119 people and displaced more than 4,000. It swept away five schools, five churches, two mosques, two health centers and 111 bridges. More than 400 homes were destroyed.
Ama Aspirasi Gulo sat amid the ruins of what was once his home in Sisarahili. The area is accessible only by foot or motorbike, three kilometers from Sirombu.
He explained how the earthquake shook their homes, but no one fled. They didn’t expect flooding. Then the waves rose and enveloped the whole village.
“People were crying and shouting to God to come and help them,” Ama said. “But God didn’t come—only more water.”
He said he knew 68 people who died, but his family escaped by climbing coconut trees.
Sirombu and Mandrehe are areas on Nias not known in many places, and few outsiders visit. Aid workers say lives are a cycle of poverty and neglect in which women die in childbirth, most people are illiterate, and malaria and other diseases kill.
Surf Aid International, the only international medical organization operating on Nias and the Mentawai islands, said the area faces a serious risk of epidemics. Malaria is already prevalent, affecting 25 percent to 30 percent of the population.
“We need to get these whole communities under nets,” said Dave Jenkins, Surf Aid’s medical director. He noted that malaria weakens the population through chest infections and malnutrition as well as directly killing people. Surf Aid is distributing mosquito nets, vaccinating against measles and supplying micronutrients and vitamin A.
The United Methodist Committee on Relief is providing assistance to tsunami victims in Indonesia and other parts of South Asia.