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NEW LIFE ORPHANAGE-ISLAMABAD-PAKISTAN
CRISIS IN PAKISTAN
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NEW
LIFE ORPHANAGE THE YEAR FOLLOWING THE FLOODS OF PAKISTAN AND HOW
WE FACE THE FUTURE....... The year brought the worst floods in the history of Pakistan and worse than any Tsunami. We are the blessed ones who are saved from the disaster. The main road which connects the area has been washed away. Due to heavy and constant rain, everyone has to travel 15km to get to the other side of the road. The bridge near the Orphanage has been demolished. As the water is flowing at full speed and being in a hilly area, the small streams flow when rain arrives constantly and they wash away the cultivated area too. Livestock and buildings and crops have been totally destroyed. Rebuilding from the devastation will take years and cost billions of pounds. In the surrounding area of New Life Orphanage, rain has destroyed most of the houses. Three houses nearby a wall has collapsed and buried three members of the family. Two have been saved but the head of the family died the next day. New Life Orphanage Volunteer Staff are supporting all they can. As New Life had the good fortune to be able to rent the upper floor earlier this year, and so much of the ground floor is constantly flooded, everything we possess now has been moved to the upper floor. God saved the building and the children. As we are daily faced with torrential rain , many of the houses in surrounding areas, continue to receive massive damage. Water enters into the lower portion of buildings and a number of people have left the area to safer places. The other day it rained some 200mm in just 7 hours and water entered into the lower portion of New Life Orphanage, at this danger the Chairman and Founder immediately moved children and staff to the upper floor. The only refrigerator we possess burnt out because of water, and thank you for your support in this regard, it has now been repaired. As most of the vegetables, pulses and fruit comes from northern area as well southern part of Pakistan, the Northern province has been the worst affected by floods and almost 90% of the population are affected. Crops fruits etc., have been totally destroyed. We are heading towards a severe famine and want to save provisions for the children, especially as winter is approaching, and winter is predicted to be tougher than previous.
New Life Orphanage is facing much trouble especially in purchasing things for breakfast, chicken,sugar and flour. It is a great burden placed on our small but regular supporters and we are working hard to combat this situation bravely. More rain is forecast and we already have prepared for this and New Life is safe now for the moment. OUR URGENT NEEDS AND NEEDS OF THE FUTURE.This morning when our
Founder & Chairman was on his way to University to a part-time Teaching Post (also to support New Life
Orphanage) he passed nearby a camp placed by a Non Government Organisation and met two or three people waiting
for some help from those passing, and Tahir felt sad knowing this. Tahir has taken his details and told him we will try to give him some support medically and financially for his wife. OUR WORK AND SUPPORT GOES WAY BEYOND THE FOUR WALLS OF NEW LIFE ORPHANAGE. The rain destroyed the chemistry and humanities department at the University very badly. Our needs are first - food - which is a basic need. Second to preserve the things better we need a Deep Freezer. Meat chicken and other frozen things can be stocked in bulk. Also preserve fresh vegetables etc. The present refrigerator was donated to New Life by our Founder but capacity is small to preserve the things in it. We need an electric water cooler to keep on upper floor for fresh cold water to be available for the children. At the moment we use small plastic coolers which are good but not sufficient. Even as I write this report, people who are desperate are calling at the Orphanage for help and a meal - we cannot hope to satisfy all requests at the moment. FAMINE FORECAST FOR THE FUTURE AND OUR NEED TO STOCKPILE AVAILABLE FOOD NOW We are alarmed the shortage of food and necessities
- the things which are available in the markets especially fruits and vegetables are stale and at high price.
Yesterday i had to drive some 40km to bring mangoes and apple for children but couldn't find bananas anywhere because
all the bananas come from Sindh province which is under severe floods. I have asked a few people to make some videos of floods
of those areas and soon I get they will be forwarded to you. We need to stock of Rice, Sugar, Pulses, and other things.
We need to take this action urgently otherwise necessities will soon vanish from the market as people are arriving from
affected areas in camps and to stay with their relatives. MEDICAL SUPPLIES AND MEDICAL CARE Well due to this disaster, we need some equipment as assets of New Life Orphanage, like blood pressure machines (we have one sent to me earlier by the President), medicines are available here at considerable cost, ENT equipment, weighing machines. Digital machines are available at 30 pounds here. We use on weekly basis to check the weights of the children growing rapidly.
We are expecting more and heavy rains again. Children are now upstairs and enjoying, as they can go to the roof which has high boundary walls, so they cant climb but can peep from the holes. Children are passing normal life like they were enjoying before the floods. The problem is we cant take children to the parks and hilly areas because of fear of water as well as land slides. I mentioned above about the death of a tea seller's son who was buried in tons of mud after land slides. We are not taking any risk so this is the negative aspect at the moment. I am keeping them busy in playing videos full of knowledge for them and they are used to watching two movies per day. At the moment they are watching Jungle King.
CRISIS
IN PAKISTAN
The ordinary everyday local Pakistani people, middle and lower class in particular, are facing a long list of serious crises which is making their daily lives a total misery. Unfortunately, these day to day problems are getting very little attention. The latest in the long list of severe problems is the Power crisis with Load-shedding, lack of water, Sui Gas and Flour or Wheat! The Power crisis or Load-shedding has been so severe, during the last two weeks or so. that here in Islamabad and other cities, we feel like we are living in caveman’s era. At every hour the electricity goes off and we have to sit in the candle light and wander around in the darkness. The only exception is the 5% who have generators. There are many areas in the surrounding district of Islamabad which are often without any electricity, gas or water for the entire day in this extremely cold weather, dropping at night to generally 3C. There have been difficult situations since the creation of Pakistan but I don’t think that ever before, that so many crises have hit us in such quick succession. During last two years, particularly, we have seen nothing but crisis, one after the other, and not one single one problem, handled properly by government. The latest crisis that has Pakistan from all walks of life, up in arms is the lack of electrical power throughout the country. While rolling blackouts or load shedding as it’s locally known has always been a part of daily life in Pakistan, the problem has become acute in the last couple of years. In the second half of December 2009, the situation got so bad that WAPDA & KESC (power generation entities in Pakistan) resorted to draconian levels of load shedding. The power cuts during this time amounted to 20-22 hours a day in most small cities and even cities like Karachi and Islamabad were seeing 14+ hours of load shedding. Notwithstanding the systemic issues, such as the failure to build new dams, and previous Government’s inability to add even a single megawatt of new power to the grid during 9 years of its rule, it seems that the present crisis is a result of bad management and the lack of foresight. The total installed capacity of WAPDA and KESC totals around 19,500 megawatts. Almost two thirds of this power comes from thermal power plants (fossil fuels), one third is generated by water and about 2% comes from nuclear power plants. The demand for electricity in Pakistan during the winter months actually goes down and this winter has been no exception. Throughout the month of December, the electricity consumption in Pakistan hovered around 11,000 MW, down from the peak levels of 17,500 MW seen in summer. This demand was well within the installed capacity of WAPDA & KESC yet only generating a meagre one third (6500MW) of their maximum capacity during this period leaving a huge gap between supply and demand. There are two main reasons for this: 1. The water flow from all major dams was halted starting mid December to allow the annual cleaning of canals in January. This action effectively took all the hydro power off line. 2. The thermal power plants were working far below their potential due to the lack of money caused by the circular debt between various government agencies reaching a staggering 400 billion Rupees. None of these issues could have possibly come as a surprise to the present government yet they choose to do nothing until violent anti government protests erupted in all major cities. A couple of days ago the President of Pakistan finally convened a summit of all stakeholders and since then the situation has improved somewhat but this fiasco provides another example of the misplaced priorities of our democratically elected leaders. Instead of issuing stamps and coins bearing Benazir’s logo and dedicating existing airports to her name, they should focus on the plight of everyday people and try to make their lives a little bit better. Everyone understands that Pakistan is facing serious problems requiring long term solutions and the present government can’t be expected to make significant headway in the short term, yet there are things where it can make a difference. Eliminating load shedding during the winter months could just be one of them. The problems of New Life Orphanage as a result of all this are severe......but we will continue as long as we can. Thank You for your constant support without it we would not exist. Website: www.newlifeorphanage.org |
