News
Sunday, September 11, 2011
Gilani appeals for Sindh rain victims’ help
* Seeks domestic, world community’s support for tackling challenge of rains devastation
* Says federal government support to Sindh to reach Rs 7 billion by month end
ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani on Saturday urged the international institutions, world community and the people of Pakistan at home and abroad to extend full support and cooperation to the government in tackling the situation created by the devastating rains in interior Sindh.
Addressing the nation on television and radio, he also appealed to the country’s political and democratic forces to fully cooperate with the government in helping the distressed Pakistani brothers in Sindh by keeping their political differences aside.
Gilani also mentioned the appeal made by President Asif Ali Zardari to the international community through the United Nations and called upon the world institutions and the international community to give immediate attention to the rain-affected people. “We believe that the international institutions and the world community by giving serious consideration to the president’s appeal will take immediate steps on humanitarian grounds and speed up their efforts for the rehabilitation of the affected people,” he maintained.
The prime minister highlighted the devastation caused by the heavy rains and said, “The affected people are waiting for immediate assistance.”
He said that the scale of destruction was much higher than the initial estimates and the government also required international cooperation for actual assessment of losses.
Gilani, mentioning the past calamities and tragedies including the 2005 earthquake in Northern Pakistan, Azad Jammu and Kashmir and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, terrorist incidents and unprecedented floods in 2010, said that the Pakistani nation faced those challenges with great courage and fortitude.
The whole nation then came out with great motivation to help their flood affected brethren, he said and appreciated the donor agencies and organisations, philanthropists, government and non-government institutions as well as the armed forces for their effective role during the 2010 floods.
The prime minister also expressed his gratitude to the international institutions and the world community for extending their full help and cooperation during the 2010 devastating floods. “Due to the current situation, I want to seek attention of all the countrymen and donor agencies that they by feeling the immediate needs of the rain affected people in Sindh should fully extend their financial and moral support to them,” he added.
“Each and every penny given for the relief and rehabilitation of the affected people will help in saving and improving the standard of their lives,” the prime minister remarked and also appealed to the expatriate Pakistanis to cooperate with the government for the relief of affected people.
The prime minister assured the Sindhi brothers and sisters that in this hour of trial, the whole Pakistani nation and their government was with them and will not spare any effort to address their miseries.
“Let us stand by shoulder to shoulder with each other in helping our calamity-hit and distressed fellow countrymen,” he said.
Gilani said that recent rains in Sindh were 142 percent above normal in the area, which in the initial spell badly affected Badin, Mirpurkhas, Tando Mohammad Khan and Tando Allah Yar areas of Sindh.
During the second spell, he said, the rains also badly affected Benazirabad, Omarkot, Khairpur, Jamshoro, Naushero Feroze and Tharpharkar areas.
He said that as a whole 21 districts had been affected by the recent rains and floods, which inundated 4.1 million acres of land, made four million people homeless while 141 precious lives were lost.
The prime minister said that the federal government had so far provided a relief of more than Rs 2 billion to the Sindh government for flood-victims.
He hoped that continuity in relief from the federal government to the Sindh government would reach Rs 7 billion by September 30.
The prime minister said that 4,000 medical camps have so far been set up where 150,000 people have been accommodated. He said that the rains severely damaged standing crops on more than 1.7 million acres of land and the government without wasting a single minute started relief work in the affected areas and utilising all the available resources for their relief.
He said that the government had arranged 100,000 additional tents from the local tent manufactures during the next three weeks besides arrangements were being made to distribute 100,000 family ration bags among the affected families on daily basis. app
Courtesy www.dailytimes.com.pk