Ways of combating disasters

Weekender

By EHEYUC SESERU
A TRAINING workshop has helped community leaders in Bulolo and Menyamya, in Morobe, to be more aware of the processes involved in seeking assistance during and after a disaster.
Thirty-three community leaders – key people involved in disaster assistance – and representatives from Bulolo, Menyamya and Lae attended a workshop on community disaster management (CDM) organised by non-government organisation Care International in Bulolo, from March 27-31.
The districts of Menyamya, and particularly Bulolo are known for natural disasters and are always referred to as ples bilong bikpla hevi (disaster and problem area) by many, including church and national leaders.
The causes of disasters there are landslides, flooding and erosion, water overflow, and tribal conflicts.
Facilitator Helmtrude Sikas said Bulolo is disaster-prone and the workshop was to help government officers, leaders of civil society and community groups to build their capacity in responding to disasters.
Those who attended the workshop included police, community development officers, and patrol officers, executive officers of Local Level Government (LLG) managers, LLG managers, ward councillors, community leaders and women’s and disability representatives.
Wau-Bulolo Mayor SoggaGaumina said it was the first CDM workshop in the district, and thanked the NGO for facilitating it. He said Bulolo is one of the biggest districts in the province and is always facing man-made and natural disasters.
In the last decade there have been disasters such as a mudslides which completely buried the Mumeng Government Station in 1997. There was also a severe drought that year.
The years have brought no respite as the river continues on with its wicked ways. People have drowned, vehicles have been carried away, businesses have been severely hit. In 2005, the Bulolo River floods reached into the Karanas settlement for the first time where mostly Sepik, Madang, Finschaffen, Buang and Garaina people lived. Debris and mud have built up over the years. Submerged houses are a shocking reminder of what the river can do.
The natural hazards caused disaster in the lives of the people when families were forced to move out of homes because their area and food gardens were under water.
In 2006, the Bulolo town community rallied against settlers from the highlands, which saw properties burnt and lives lost at Karanas Tari compound and New Camp’s Rait Kona where mostly people from Tambul, in Western Highlands, lived.
After three years, another tribal conflict over land ownership erupted between the Watut and Biangai people. On March 25, 2006, Watuts, with the help of settlers in Wau, raided Biangai villages.
Lives were lost and properties and homes destroyed.
Some months after that, Pateps attacked the Parakris community near the Zenag chicken farm in Mumeng and burnt down their houses. After a year, the Bulolo locals clashed with Sepik settlers in Bulolo, blaming the settlers of causing law-and-order problems.
The Sepiks are still living in what the authorities initially called a care center. Small things, it seems, trigger explosions in this part of the country.
In 2012, Patep villagers near Bulolo clashed with Madang, Finschaffen, Buang and Garaina people living in Karanas, ward four of Wau-Bulolo urban LLG.
A year after the clash, in 2013, the Watuts attacked the Bubu people of Garaina living in the town.
Many lives were lost and properties burnt. The affected Watuts left for their villages, with some seeking refuge in Golden Pine and Witipos settlements outside Bulolo town. The Bubus on the other hand, sought refuge within the Ward Four communities near the Bulolo River bank and are still living there today.
They are always on alert. Rainy days bring mud and water into their so-called refugee camp.
The Karanas community which lives along the riverbank also has sleepless nights when it rains. Their most recent clash was with the Bubu villages, of Garaina in Waria LLG, has left them homeless.
All these stories of natural events and man-made events were told to the community leaders and key persons in the district, who attended the workshop to enlighten them on how to prepare for a disaster, how to respond during a disaster and how to recover after a disaster.
The highlight was knowing the processes involved in seeking assistance during disasters by the using proper channels of communications to connect community and government or donor for assistance.
Bulolo women’s representative Rose Muingnepe said: “Disaster has been part of our lives that we have been living with whether man-made or natural and we are still facing it.”
She said that during all the disasters that they had faced, the first people that had always turned up were police. “Before any help would come, police are always the first government department to execute duties before others.”