There has been no let-up in nature’s fury; torrential rains and gale-force winds continue to lash many parts of Sri Lanka, triggering floods and landslides. About 60 lives had been lost at the time of writing. What is unfolding has been described as one of Sri Lanka’s worst weather disasters.
At this hour, the focus of the nation must be on mitigating the crippling impact of natural disasters and helping the victims crying out for help. Some areas have been totally cut off by floods, landslides, rockfalls and damaged bridges. Armed forces, the police, state officials and volunteers are braving inclement weather to continue rescue operations and provide relief to the victims trapped in disaster-stricken areas.
Sri Lanka’s history is replete with instances of floods, landslides, storms and other such disasters. Climate change is usually blamed for these adverse weather events. But in this country weather disasters have taken a turn for the worse over the last few decades, with death tolls rising alarmingly, due to unbridled human activities harmful to the environment, such as the ever increasing encroachment on forests and wetlands, illegal sand mining and deforestation caused by illicit felling, agricultural expansion and unplanned growth of settlements. These causative factors have gone unaddressed.
Sri Lankan Scientist Dr. Thasun Amarasinghe, attached to the Climate Research Centre in Indonesia, has aptly described the current situation here: “These are not natural disasters. They are governance disasters. Sri Lanka destroyed the very systems that protected it. What’s happening now is the predictable result of political mismanagement,” Dr. Amarasinghe has told this newspaper, adding, “For decades Sri Lankan wetlands — the nation’s most effective natural flood-control mechanism — have been bulldozed, filled, encroached on, and sold. Many of these developments were approved despite warnings from environmental scientists, hydrologists, and even state institutions.”
During Thursday’s parliamentary sitting, the Opposition sought to gain political mileage by criticising the government’s disaster response and belittling its knowledge of the laws related to disaster management. The Opposition MPs themselves pathetically failed to respond to disaster situations properly, while in power, and are therefore without any moral right to treat the current administration to lectures on disaster management. While in opposition, the JVP/NPP leaders also had a field day, criticising the previous governments, whenever disasters occurred.
During his Opposition days, President Anura Kumara Dissanayake would tear the previous governments into shreds for their policy blunders and failure to make timely interventions to prevent tragedies caused by weather disasters. Videos containing his past speeches on natural disasters and criticism of his political opponents in power to act on weather forecasts and adopt a scientific approach to disaster management have resurfaced in the digital realm. As Dr. Amarasinghe has pointed out, a window of opportunity has presented itself for him to act.
The success of any disaster prevention or disaster impact mitigation strategy hinges on the effective law enforcement and the implementation of policies in place to prevent disasters, manage their impacts, save lives, and look after victims and help them rebuild their lives.
A parliament, located in a wetland, is a monument to a nation’s callous disregard for environmental conservation. The Parliament of Sri Lanka has been affected by floods several times during the past few decades. The irony of Parliament cancelling sittings for two days to enable its members to return to their disaster-stricken electorates may not have been lost on the environmentally conscious citizens. One can only hope that Parliament will not be flooded during the ongoing budget debate.
Dr. Amarasinghe has said nature has delivered a dire warning, and if Sri Lanka fails to respond with decisive action, the next disaster will not be an accident — it will be a consequence. One cannot but agree with him. All politicians, policymakers, community leaders, the business community, and the general public must heed his prescient warning and act accordingly.
