Lessons from 2005

On October 8, Pakistan remembered the tragic earthquake of 2005 in Azad Kashmir and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa which killed over 80,000 people. The earthquake was one of the deadliest in recent history as 3.5 million people were left without shelter and displaced from their homes. Around 800,000 buildings were left destroyed. It was a disaster of a scale unknown to us before. The earthquake led to the creation of the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) and Provincial Disaster Management Authorities (PDMAs) to ensure that Pakistan was prepared for any future natural disasters. But – as is usual in most such matters – despite their large mandate, the federal and provincial governments have continued to fail their respective disaster management authorities and the people of the country with constant budget shortfalls as well as low commitment. Pakistan has faced an average of at least one major natural disaster a year over the last decade. Each time, it seems that the preparedness for the event was as poor as the last one.

Eleven years later, life in the earthquake effected region is still not back to normal. The Earthquake Relief and Rehabilitation Authority (ERRA) estimates that around 40 percent of all planned projects for the earthquake victims remain incomplete. The result is that thousands of earthquake affectees are still without employment while similar numbers of children have no schools to go to. This is a tragedy created by humans. Instead of taking responsibility, the KP and federal governments continue to push the blame on each other. Billions of dollars of aid received has been squandered away, and the causes of the damage have not even begun to be addressed. Over two-thirds of the new houses built in the earthquake affected area have not been built according to ERRA guidelines. The responsibility of ensuring these recommendations are met is the government’s – federal and provincial. Even a much more basic measure, installing seismographs to measure the movement of the Earth’s plates has not been completed. Pakistan has only 21 seismic monitoring stations compared to Japan’s 10,000. Three of these are not operational. The fact that there has been no major damage in the more recent earthquakes is not because the government has done its job. Instead, it has been mere luck that despite two major earthquakes last year, the loss of life has been restricted. The credit for rebuilding their lives belongs to the affectees themselves. The government has done little to assure us that our welfare is in any way a priority.