A decade on, reconstruction work still incomplete

Residents of Balakot, Azad Jammu Kashmir come together to remember victims; demand completion of work

At 8:52 am on Sunday morning, locals gathered at the site of the Balakot High School in a solemn ceremony to mark the twelfth anniversary of the 2005 earthquake. The 7.6 magnitude earthquake had left over 85,000 people dead, including 63 pupils at the high school, whose crumbling debris became a tomb for the students. The earthquake had flattened Balakot city – ground zero – while rendering damage across the region.

The Mansehra District Nazim Balakot Tehsil Nazim along with members of the Balakot Traders Association and a host of locals gathered at the school and offered prayers for the students and the thousands who had lost their lives in the temblor. All businesses remained closed in the city. Angry over the government’s failure to build a hospital in the area over a decade after the earthquake, locals rallied to protest the government inefficiency.

They also announced they will unilaterally ‘inaugurate’ the unconstructed Tehsil Headquarters Hospital in Balakot on October 20. MPA chastised Later on Sunday, two village councillors criticised the local member of provincial assembly over his attitude towards his constituency. Village nazims from the Natrah and Garlat villages criticised MPA Ziaur Rehman for not doing anything for the residents of Balakot affectees of the earthquake red zone. Calling him “unqualified”, they said the MPA’s criticism of the 11-member committee - formed by the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Pervez Khattak comprising local government members for resolving problems of New Balakot City – on the floor of the provincial assembly was baffling.

Natrah Village Nazim Haji Noor Hussain, Garlat Nazim Riaz Ahmed, Master Maroof Awan, Raja Tahir, Awami Action Committee President Muhammad Ashraf and others said residents of the area had elected Rehman in 2013 with the objective of raising a voice for their issues including the development of the New Balakot City, building schools and hospitals there. However, despite the passage of four years, they complained, Rehman had failed to raise his voice over these issues. However, now, when a committee led by former MPA Mazhar Ali Qasim had met with K-P Chief Minister Khattak for over two hours to raise their issues, Rehman was criticising the committee and insulting his constituents. They demanded that Rehman apologise to the residents of Balakot.

Muzaffarabad remembers The twelfth anniversary of the devastating earthquake was marked in Muzaffarabad on Sunday. The earthquake had rendered hundreds of thousands homeless apart from destroying the basic infrastructure of Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK). The day was marked with special prayers in mosques for those killed in the calamity apart from a minute’s silence at 8:52am to pay tribute to them throughout the region.

The prayers were followed by seminars to remember the work by rescue workers. Speakers said that as much as Rs39 billion was still required to complete reconstructionrelated projects in the region. Acting AJK Prime Minister Raja Nasar Khan presided over the main event at the Khursheed Hassan stadium after laying a floral wreath at the earthquake memorial.

He also inaugurated a school which had been built under the reconstruction programme. State Reconstruction and Rehabilitation Authority (SERRA) Secretary Sardar Farooq Tabbasum said that there were hundreds of schools and other buildings on which work was yet to be completed and that they still required Rs39 billion to complete the work. Earlier on Saturday, a memorial walk was organised by the State Disaster Management Authority (SDMA) led by SDMA Secretary Zaheer Quraishi. The walk aimed to create awareness about precautionary measures to meet any catastrophe or disaster.

A large number of locals along with activists, government officials, traders and others participated in the walk, holding up banners about preparatory measures. A candle-lighting ceremony followed at the Noluchi bridge on Saturday evening. SERRA’s Tabassum said that there were 7,836 projects planned under the reconstruction programme of which 5,393 have been completed while work on 1,595 projects was still continuing.

He lamented that work on many of the projects planned under the reconstruction programme has yet to start. However, he was confident that the reconstruction authority had the capacity to complete its remaining work within two years if the requisite funds are made available. WITH INPUT FROM APP

Published in The Express Tribune, October 9^th, 2017.