Last Updated:
February 7, 2012
As the winter is approaching …
Although flood waters in the northern part of the city receded over a week ago, those displaced are complaining that not enough government aid is reaching them.
Apart from food, water and medicine, affected residents also need household items like mattresses and pillows as all were damaged in the floods.
Soon the weather is going to change and people will face cold nights along the area which has come under floods. In some cases of severe weather the temperature can go down to negative 20 degrees. Its really hard to survive the winter living in tents. They won’t live too long in the cold temperatures. We have to get them in some sort of housing within the next two to three months.
There is a demand of 8000 winter packs (1 Quilt + 2 pillows) and the price of this pack is Rs. 1000. So far only 2000 packs has been arranged you are requested to update the information on your website for additional aid.
Despair of Pakistan’s forgotten flood victims
Nimani Bakhsh lost her twin girls, who were just 12 days old
Liaqat Babar, a farmer in Pakistan’s southern province of Sindh, sees just one escape from the hunger, loss and torment inflicted by the recent catastrophic floods. Suicide.
“When I see my kids, I feel like killing myself,” he says.
“We are powerless. We just keep quiet and ask God for death.”
Three months after the flooding which affected 20 million people and one fifth of the country, Liaqat has no home, no hope and no answers for his six children.
“They are crying for food, ” he says.
“I tell them God will send someone very kind, and I send them to sleep. In the morning they ask again for food, and I say again that God will send someone.”
Queuing in vain
Liaqat Babar among queues of desperate flood victims waiting for help
Liaqat was among a throng of broken men queuing for hours under a blistering sun, at a distribution of aid in the town of Daur.
Like many other areas in Sindh, Daur is cut off by water – an island of desperation.
Troops were deployed to control the hungry, who began gathering at six in the morning.
With a single helicopter the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) could only bring in 250-300 rations. But three or four times that number had joined the queue.
“It is heartbreaking,” said WFP’s Dorte Jessen, looking across at the swelling crowd.
“The need is so big, and you want to help everyone.”
But they could not all be helped that day. Liaqat was among those who was left empty-handed.
Soon there could be even less to go round. The WFP says it will have to cut rations – by half – in November because of a lack of donations. The UN’s $2bn (£1.26) appeal for Pakistan is less than 40% funded. (more…)
One month on, Pakistan’s torment worsens
Flood victims returning to their homes in Basera, Punjab, as the waters recede
Up to a million people have fled their homes in the past two days, as floods, never seen on such a scale, continue to sweep south.
A month after devastating floods first brought havoc to Pakistan, thousands of people were still fleeing surging water yesterday as the Indus broke its banks close to a historic city in the country’s south.
Officials said water had breached the river’s defences close to Thatta and had also flooded a second canal that feeds from the Indus. Yesterday evening, officials estimated that the 20ft breach in the levee, which happened early in the morning, could cause flooding in the outskirts of the city by nightfall.
Most of the 200,000-strong population of Thatta, 75 miles south-east of Karachi, have already left the city, camping out by the sides of roads or trying to move to cities out of the flood zone. Hundreds of families were taking shelter in an ancient Muslim graveyard and in a nearby Hindu temple.
Up to a million people have been forced to flee their homes in the past 48 hours. With so many needing help and so little relief reaching the southern parts of Sindh province, scores of people blocked a road in Thatta to demand more assistance. They complained that the scant supplies available were usually thrown from the backs of trucks, resulting in crowds of people fighting among themselves for food and water.
“The people who come here to give us food treat us like beggars,” an 80-year-old woman called Karima (who has just one name) told Associated Press. “They just throw the food. It is humiliating.” (more…)
UN Received Less Than Half Of Pakistan Flood Aid It Needs
Flood survivors in Pakistan are not only facing the threat of serious illness with a lack of doctors and medication, but food shortages as well, as the water has also washed away crops and submerged hundreds of thousands of hectares of fertile farm land.
The United Nations has so far received less than half of the $459 million in immediate aid funding it appealed for last week. Another $43 million has been promised. On Tuesday the World Bank announced it would redirect $900 million of its existing loans to Pakistan to assist in the flood recovery effort.
Canada has pledged up to $33 million.
Meanwhile, thousands of people await medical assistance, emergency shelter and food supplies and anger continues to grow over the government’s perceived sluggish response to the crisis. Aid agencies and the British government have complained the international community hasn’t stepped up to provide the money needed to help those in desperate need of basic life-saving necessities, including clean drinking water, food, emergency shelter and medicine.
The torrential downpours and the subsequent flooding has so far killed approximately 1,600 people and left as many as 20 million people in need of immediate assistance. The nation’s northwestern Sway Valley region has been hit particularly hard, where water has washed away entire villages and destroyed bridges and other key infrastructure, including hospitals and schools. Large swaths of the Punjab and Sindh provinces are also submerged.
Authorities warned Tuesday that the Indus River could burst its banks again.
Water-borne illness poses a great threat and the UN said cases of diarrhea are rising, increasing the risk of malnutrition.
Looting and protests over food shortages have also been reported in Punjab. The water washed away approximately 700,000 hectares of wheat, sugar cane and rice crops. Fruit crops have also been destroyed. Food prices have spiked since the flooding began more than three weeks ago.
