Martin Henry GRENADIAN PRIME Minister, Dr. Keith Mitchell, in gratitude, said it well: Jamaica's offer of assistance was more than Grenada could expect from Jamaica, given its own response to Ivan. Silver and gold we may have none (at the best of times), but such as we have we give unto a hurricane-ravaged sister Caribbean island.
The Jamaican Prime Minister went himself. Under the circumstances of having to politically lead the relief and reconstruction effort here after our own rough handling by Ivan, the full measure of which is still being counted, the Prime Minister could easily have opted to send a deputy to Grenada. Keith Mitchell and the Grenadian people would not have expected more and would not have been disappointed. But Prime Minister Patterson went himself bearing the famed Jamaican spirit of magnanimity, despite our own hardships and needs.
Grenada was savaged by a weaker hurricane than the version of Ivan which passed off our south coast. The spice island is off the regular hurricane track and had not seen a big storm since the 1950s. Some 90 per cent of buildings have been damaged, including the Prime Minister's house. Telecommunications went down to the extent that the Grenadian PM saw no point in broadcasting from the British naval ship which arrived early with assistance, since the Grenadian people could not hear his message.
ECONOMY FLATTENED
Prime Minister Patterson here has used broadcast media well and regularly to communicate with his own people as our own telephone and media infrastructure stood up to Ivan well. The agriculture-based economy of Grenada has been flattened. We have the well-honed habit of battering our own country worse than any Ivan. But we are not quite the disaster case that we often think we are. Public infrastructure and private houses stood up here much better than in Grenada. Of course, we have the fairly recent experience of 'Gilbert' to make us wiser. As a number of commentators have pointed out from the records,
several areas of national life, from roofs to roads, have stood up better than during Gilbert and recovery is proceeding faster.
Telephone service didn't go; electricity and water are coming back faster. One of the Jamaican gems which is going to Grenada is the ODPEM. When Gilbert passed 16 years ago, the ODP (without the EM then) was a fledgling disaster preparedness organisation seeking to find its feet. Expanded to cover emergency management, the ODPEM was strong, steady and ready, before, during and after Ivan. The ODPEM, the Prime Minister announced in St. George's, will be providing assistance in the tracking and distribution of relief, public information and education, and the management of psychological trauma. The Office is also going to help Grenada strengthen its NERO (National Emergency Relief Organisation).
The ODPEM has acquired a great deal of experience and technical expertise from having been there and done that with our own disasters and emergencies over 20+ years. The NSWMA is going in with its solid waste management experience and expertise. There will be technical assistance in housing and security and in the preparation of reconstruction project proposals for donor and lending agencies.
One of the things that Jamaica has done well almost from the day of its independence is the establishment of specialised public agencies. We are comparatively in a good position to provide the "technical assistance" to Grenada which our head of Government so generously offered. One of the things the Grenadian Government has done, post-Ivan, was to release the names of the dead through the NERO Minister. Gilbert took away with him 45 Jamaicans. Grenada, with a population of 130,000, had 29 Ivan deaths. Jamaica, with a population of 2.6 million had only 17 deaths.
FUTURE EVACUATIONS
Sad, but true, even fewer Jamaican lives would have been lost if the voice of the ODPEM for evacuation from the most vulnerable areas and structures had been heeded. What are we going to do about evacuations in the future? The Government is adamant that it will be clamping down on the reconstruction of homes in very high-risk areas. But what will be done about getting people to move out of the line of greatest danger as a disaster approaches? What will be done about the security of their property?
Another area of concern is the availability of water, post-hurricane. As we have organised a system of shelters in public facilities, could we not go on to arrange for storage of emergency water supplies as securely as is humanly possible in facilities across the country so that no one would be more than say a couple of miles away from a short-term supply of clean drinking water after a disruption of supplies in a disaster? Think about it NWC, ODPEM and ONR.
As we assist Grenada, let us remember too poor Haiti devastated by 'Jeanne', a disaster compounded by environmental degradation and sheer poverty. More than 1,500 dead, and survivors starving and facing disease. Even the biblical cup of cold water for our brothers and sisters there.
Martin Henry is a
communication specialist.
