Daily Times

While politics dominate the country’s media, a large part of Pakistan is drowning. Political leaders are ignoring the affected people as they fight for power.

The situation is extremely bad and getting worse as help is slow in reaching the thousands of flood-affected people across the country particularly in Balochistan and Sindh. Delayed and inadequate reaction from the authorities has added to their problems. It is time to take extraordinary steps to reach these people and give them the required support.

As things are, it seems “leaders” do not have the time to help their voters and are too busy playing politics. The inundated areas of Balochistan and Sindh are not their priority. The trickle of hollow words and promises is of no use and only drowns in the dark flood water. The truth is political slogans are useless for the parents who wait for the flood to recede so they can bury their children.

The list of problems is endless, but the most pressing ones are the deaths and displacement of hundreds of thousands of people who have lost their homes and have nowhere to go. However, these don’t seem to be pressing issues for them as their callous indifference becomes deafening, as they move safely within the exalted corridors of powers. They should remember that the affected people are the voters who are their ticket to the lavish and privileged life in the capital.

Act now or Pakistan could be looking at an enraged starving mob of millions, an extremely dangerous situation, even for the VVIPs.

With little or no data on the flooded affected provinces, we rely on data from outside. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) estimates the flood death toll to be at least 580 people including 224 children across Pakistan. Adding, “Nearly 23,000 people have reportedly been displaced from their homes and some 107,000 livestock have perished.” The losses and destruction will only increase as time passes, but the authorities have learned nothing from the past. Pakistan has seen floods and heavy monsoon rains over the last decade, with the intensity increasing as time passes.

Even developed countries are indeed finding it hard to manage situations created by weather and climate changes, but it helps if you have prior information. And Pakistani authorities did have a warning from the Pakistan Meteorological Department (PMD) that had predicted way back in May and June that Sindh was ‘likely to receive first pre-monsoon rain spell on June 21-22’. The PMD also predicted that ‘a monsoon weather system is likely to dump heavy rains on Karachi from July 1, said Pakistan Meteorological Department’, adding that Sindh would be getting more rain compared to last year.

It is not as if the authorities didn’t know, they had a warning. It is only that they were busy in politics. The country has been unable to move forward due to political stagnation for more than six months, and no one had the time to pay attention or prepare for the monsoon and disaster. It would be absurd to think the authorities could have stopped the rains and floods, but they could have taken timely steps to plan to contain the damage. A chain of disaster centres could have been set up across the country; shelters identified, properly equipped with provisions like drinkable water, food, clothes, first aid and medicines, and education facilities for students.

Disaster management training should have been conducted months before the monsoon hit teaching local authorities and rescue workers how to conduct disaster drills, how to heed early warnings, and when to evacuate during heavy rains and floods.

There is no surprise that nothing was done to provide the necessary emergency funds to begin preparations. There was no support system to help and so people died, and their lives were destroyed because no one really cared. And the worst part is that no one will take responsibility for all this, and the blame will pass around, and in the end, everyone will forget until the next time.

However, at this time the most important thing is to move ahead and try to save what can be saved. The government needs to make a proper assessment of the death and destruction to begin work. But it can save time and seek help from those who have experience and data to tackle the situation. The authorities can begin by studying the “recent Integrated Phase Classification (IPC) analysis of acute food insecurity [which] projects over 955,000 people being food insecure in the flood-affected areas of Balochistan between July and November 2022.” (12 Aug 2022)

There is a probability that Pakistan will face a national food crisis in the coming months as acres and acres of agricultural land remain submerged, and crops are destroyed in Balochistan and Sindh. The government should begin to work on resolutions immediately and plan to calculate and then tackle the losses and begin rehabilitation work now. Delays are not an option. Things will only get worse due to inaction. Act now or Pakistan could be looking at an enraged starving mob of millions, an extremely dangerous situation even for the VVIPs.

Politicians need to get their business sorted out quickly and get over their fixation on the coveted political throne. They need to back off for now in the national interest and let the government focus on priorities of flood disaster management and rehabilitation.

The writer is a journalist who writes on gender, human rights, social issues, and climate. She is currently working as IFJ’s Pakistan’s Gender Coordinator and Media Trainer.