While floods and torrential rains have uprooted large sections of the population, who have been deprived of all their worldly possessions, negligence on the part of the administration has played no small role in the ensuing human suffering.
The Khyber-Pukhtunkhwa administration can claim that it was taken unawares and had little time to plan the evacuation of thousands of people from the plains, mountains and valleys. The governments in the provinces downstream cannot, however, make a similar plea. Reports by the media, updated hour by hour for several days, were enough to serve as a wake-up call. While a judgement on the efficiency of the Sindh administration has to wait for a few more days, the reports about the devastation caused in south Punjab indicate that the Punjab government's performance was not up to the mark.
Heavier than usual monsoon rains started lashing the country from July 21 onwards. The Pakistan Meteorological Department had, however, predicted as early as late June that rains would be above normal in the month of August. As the initial havoc was wrought in Balochistan, there were enough straws in the wind to warn that Punjab was soon going to face the wrath of the floods, as some of the worst affected districts were on the borders of the province and rains had already badly hit Rajanpur. Taking note of the seriousness of the situation, the Pakistan Red Crescent Society (PRCS) had carried out a rapid assessment of the situation in Balochistan and had, within days, set up a medical camp in Sultan Kot. What is more, it had employed food packs for 3,100 affected families, comprising 21,700 people, for three months with the support of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).
On the request of the Rajanpur district government, the PRCS had also provided 50 tents for the flood-affected people. The sense of emergency shown by the PRCS should have been enough to set alarm bells ringing in Lahore. Events that were to take place in the wake of the floods indicate that this failed to happen. Monsoon rains and the consequent floods are by no means an uncommon phenomenon in Punjab and Sindh. Over the decades, a machinery has been put together to deal with the problems created by natural disasters of the type. There was a need to immediately draw up plans for dealing with the emerging situation and put all concerned departments into action.
Apparently, this failed to happen. The lack of preparation is also revealed by the fact that unlike other provinces, the Punjab government had yet to set up the Provincial Disaster Management Authority (PDMA). Despite the scale of the floods being unprecedented, the administration could have issued timely warning to the population expected to bear the brunt of the floods. In view of their past experience of the floods, the irrigation department and the flood control department could have predicted where the river banks were likely to overflow or breaches made, to relieve water pressure around vital installations. It was not enough to order the population to leave the area, in certain cases, within hours, without making provision of transport, which was absolutely lacking. That in certain cases, people living in the riverine areas refused to leave is partly due to the fact that they simply didn't know where to go and how to reach their destination.
Reports from four southern districts indicate that thousands of people, who left their villages and towns in time, could not find any shelter and have been forced to live in the open. A day after the area was flooded; the media reported that in Dera Ghazi Khan and Rajanpur, thousands of people were camping in the open, on higher grounds surrounded by water. They face the risk of water-borne diseases. This indicates that whatever camps are claimed to have been set up are either non-existent or are profoundly insufficient. Hundreds of people are stranded on dry strips of roads or railway tracks, which have turned into islands where they are left at the mercy of the raging floods.
Here, as at other places, without shelter, people are forced to drink contaminated water, causing ailments that can lead to outbreak of an epidemic, or even a pandemic, further accentuating their miseries. Despite claims of dispensaries having been set up in the flood-affected areas, the media have found few in working condition.
While one can understand that politicians have to keep contact with the masses, the chief administrator of a province has to supervise the overall rescue activity without running around from place to place accompanied by TV cameramen and reporters. Unless he is able to concentrate on the picture in its totality, he cannot point out weaknesses and failures. The temptation or even habit to micromanage and over-control things can, therefore, have a negative impact on the relief activity. The temptation for photo-ops at times of national emergencies too has to be resisted.