NDMA’s wrong figures

The National Disaster Management Authority has issued the facts and figures about flood-affected people of Pakistan. According to NDMA Chairman Dr Zafar Qadir’s statistics, 5.15 million people have been directly affected by the floods: 4.82 million in Sindh and one-third of a million in Balochistan. The number of affected houses stands at 800,000, including 470,000 damaged but repairable homes, and 330,000 completely destroyed houses. He further stated that the rains have affected more than one million children in the two provinces, where approximately 9,781 schools are reported to have been destroyed or damaged. The number of affected schools was 9,250 and 571 in Sindh and Balochistan respectively. He also claimed that 90 percent of water has drained from flood- affected areas.
The matter of fact is that Dr Zafar Qadir’s statistics are in contrast with the figures of Sindh Rehabilitation Minister and NADRA record. Both are of the view that more than 90 lac people only of Sindh are directly affected by floods.
Moreover, Sindhi media reports that all flood-affected areas are still under water and only 20 percent of water has drained out.
Sindh has been in trouble for two years with the government blaming it on natural disasters. Ironically, the government tells us that controlling this kind of calamities is not in its hands. Even if we believe what the government is saying, how can we believe the wrong figures presented by the government?
Bungling the figures about different issues has become a favourite game of our high officials. Sindh and Balochistan are directly victimised in this regard about distribution of water, NFC and some other matters of serious concern.
At this moment, we, the Sindhi people, demand that a judicial commission should be established to solve this matter of contradiction in figures between the federal and provincial institutions and for providing relief to the affectees.
SARWECH SARYO
Rato Dero