Email 13 May 2005

An interesting article was printed in the Jakarta Post today (unlucky for some Friday 13th May). It claimed that an International charity, Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), was returning huge amounts of tsunami money to the original donors as it had received more than it could use. The charity itself denied this. According to the Sydney Morning Herald, the charity had sent out more than 4,000 letters telling donors it could not use their money for tsunami victims, and was therefore proposing to refund them if the donors did not want their money channelled into other causes. The newspaper said the charity had 172 requests for refunds totalling 93,000 Australian dollars (US$ 72,540) while about 1,700 donors specified other appeals and the rest left the matter up to the charity's discretion. A total of 105 million Euros (US$ 134 million) were collected by the 19 sections of the association across the world – so said the Paris-based charity.

By the end of March 2005, US$ 20.5 million had been spent on operations in the region and total spending should reach more than US$ 28 million for 2005 – so said the Paris-based charity. MSF want to redirect the 'gifts' that it is unable to use in Southeast Asia towards 'forgotten' crises, such as those ravaging the Democratic Republic of Congo, Darfur in Sudan, Niger, or AIDS victims in poor countries – so said the Paris-based charity. They went on to say that less than 1 per cent of the amount collected (920,000 Euros) has had to be paid back.

In Aceh, with 129,000 confirmed dead, the recently appointed head of the agency overseeing the province reconstruction said that reconstruction is close to zero because of red tape.

Would someone please tell me why it is that this charity can make such a decision when in fact the tsunami victims in Aceh have not progressed at all since the 26th December 2004? The article did not say why the charity was unable to spend this donated money on tsunami victims; neither did it say whether the charity had any idea at all about the situation in Indonesia. Although I would go along with the need to support other world tragedies, it is extremely disappointing when a charity ducks out of the intended purpose for no given reason at all. I wonder what the people in the campsites would think about this, and I wonder who it was that made the decision to pull the plug.

This is following two more trips to Banda Aceh and recent local meetings. We are at least beginning to focus on one worthwhile project, as opposed to the many we had on board in the early days.

There is a meeting at Chatsworth in England soon that is a reunion of all the ex-pats that were in Aceh over the years and hopefully this will generate some funds. I think what we have now is the right people, the right idea, a 'Heath Robinson' set-up but a willingness to push forward. Anyway, the following is a bit of a write-up on what we are thinking about. After many discussions among a number of very good people who have a personal interest in Aceh, there is an area that is likely forgotten in the wake of the entire reconstruction of Aceh province.

We have looked at individuals in the various campsites and the great loss that they have personally suffered, in the way of family losses and of livelihoods that will be difficult to restart. Each and every case carries great merit for support – but here we are talking of thousands of people. Available finance to our small operation will not be able to take care of all these people and therefore it becomes difficult to select who should be helped. It also causes local jealousies and bad feeling which is understandable in these circumstances.

There is of course the US$ 4.5 billion available and that will be spent on a huge amount of projects over the next five years. Hopefully, the spending of this money will be focused on two things – one would be the humanitarian reconstruction of Aceh (the people/community building and livelihoods) and the other will be the profit orientated schemes that concentrate on the building of schools, houses, roads and whatever else is deemed necessary. I don't wish to get too far down that particular avenue, as I believe we have a few people on the ground that can and will make a difference to the lives of those that have lost limbs in this tsunami disaster.

You really need to be here to understand that entire villages were lifted by the wave and then smashed against a mountain, and in doing so, most perished. As an example, Leupung village was once a community of 12,000 and is now 731, and Lhoknga has 860 survivors out of over 4,000 people. Some of those survivors are without a leg or arms. The majority of large organizations seem to spend an amount of time competing against each other for the supply of artificial limbs (one presumes that is fairly big business) and also rehabilitation – both aspects extremely important. We feel that what is missing is the long-term commitment to people who (through no fault of their own) are severely handicapped. Finding employment for these people may not be easy, but with care and a small team concentrating on this requirement, then jobs can be found and lives made better – long term.

I have a friend in Australia who is trying to gather up a number of local business people who in turn would be prepared to sponsor individuals who are handicapped – the cost to each sponsor would be minimum R 100,000 per week (Australian dollars approx 15 or US $11 or UK £6). This money would go directly to the families of handicapped people on (let's say) a monthly basis and would buy essentials like food and schooling fees. It may be difficult as I said earlier to find jobs for these people, at least for a while – perhaps not until the major rebuilding projects get started.

With that underway, jobs will come along, but we need a small team of people fighting for the handicapped. Initially, setting up an office in Banda Aceh will only cost Rp14 million (US $150) and we have that in our funds already. What concerns us is the continuation of this project, as wages will need to be paid and an office maintained. Finding all these handicapped people will take a while and we will need reliable transport for this.

We have already set up this small team that will consist of less than ten people, a computer base, a one-room office as a starter, and a reasonable number of donors. The idea is not to compete with the big organizations but to complement them in an area that is often pushed to the side and eventually forgotten. If any one is interested in supporting this proposal, then I would be happy to hear from them. Another good thing is that the state of emergency is now being lifted in Aceh by the Indonesian government and so travelling within Aceh will hopefully become easier and safer - time will tell.