Banyan: Stormy weather

Nguồn tin: nguontinviet.com

AS EACH day passes the suffering and devastation wreaked on the Philippines by Typhoon Haiyan on November 8th look worse, and the costs of relief, rehabilitation and reconstruction only grow. Some 4,000 people are known to have died. A further 1,200 are still missing, over 18,000 injured and some 11m people directly affected. The United Nations’ initial appeal for $300m in emergency aid has already been declared inadequate. A huge relief operation is under way, but it has faced criticism for its slowness, disorganisation and unfairness.

Natural calamities often have momentous political repercussions. A catastrophic tsunami in 2004 only sharpened hostility between the Sri Lankan government and Tamil Tiger rebels, as they squabbled over reconstruction. But the same tsunami helped end a long-running conflict in the Indonesian province of Aceh. In Myanmar popular revulsion at the military junta’s callous response to Cyclone Nargis in 2008, in which perhaps 130,000 people died, may have helped propel it to reform.

In the Philippines, a country sadly used to disasters, Haiyan—known locally as Yolanda—will have less fundamental but far from negligible effects. At home it has dented the standing of a popular president, Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino. Regionally, it has hardened diplomatic battle-lines, and highlighted the shortcomings of local mechanisms for responding to disasters.

Since being carried into the presidency in 2010 on the back of affection for his late mother, Corazon Aquino, Mr Aquino’s popularity has weathered gibes about his ostensibly laid-back approach. The economy has thrived, and he has seemed serious in tackling corruption. His handling of the typhoon, however, may mark a turning-point. For the rest of his term, until 2016, Mr Aquino will have less public goodwill to rely on when he wants to carry out difficult reforms.

The criticism is unfair. Haiyan’s intensity was unprecedented and the typhoon itself wrecked much of the infrastructure the relief operation needed. But Mr Aquino is under fire for seeming complacent, somewhat unfeeling and for trying to pass the buck. People remember his assurance in a televised speech on the eve of the storm that “help will arrive as soon as the storm passes”. They forget his main thrust, about “the gravity of the calamity our countrymen will face in these coming days”.

Then, after the typhoon had struck, Mr Aquino gave a low and inaccurate estimate of the death toll. On a visit to Tacloban, capital of Leyte, the worst-hit province, he was accused of being dismissive towards the suffering of some victims. Even when he returned a week later, promising to stay until he saw improvements, he seemed to dodge the blame, suggesting critics of the relief operation should ask questions of the local government.

It did not help perceptions that Leyte is the native turf of Imelda Marcos, widow of the dictator whom Mr Aquino’s mother helped topple in 1986. This week Mrs Marcos’s son, “Bongbong”, a senator, was also in Tacloban, where his maternal cousin is the mayor. Some Leyte residents blamed the bad blood between these rival clans for holding up aid. At the local level there were accusations not just of corruption in the distribution of aid, but of some being dished out according to political affiliation. Nearly two weeks after the storm, aid had still not reached some remote settlements. In such desperation, suspicions fester.

Nor could Mr Aquino find unalloyed respite from his troubles at home in the outpouring of international sympathy and generosity the disaster prompted. The initial response from China was niggardly—a mere $100,000. It was hard not to see this as a slap on the wrist for the Philippines’ temerity in standing up to China over disputed shoals in the South China Sea. China denied any such intention, and soon increased its offer of assistance. Online nationalists, however, criticised their government for helping the Philippines at all. Only a minority worried about China’s making itself look mean and petty in the eyes of a region it is trying to reassure about the benevolence of its long-term intentions.

Many drew the contrast between China’s myopic perception of its own interests and an impressive American relief effort. At a time when many regional commentators have charted America’s relative decline, this was soft power delivered with shock and awe. It was also a reminder of the overwhelming hard power America can still bring to bear in the Pacific, including the USS George Washington aircraft-carrier group with its 21 helicopters, and Osprey aircraft normally stationed in Okinawa.

This could hardly be dismissed as America merely helping its friends. It also offered lavish help to Myanmar in 2008, when its relations with the junta then in power were frosty. At the time, the junta’s eventual agreement to accept foreign help was in part a tribute to the diplomacy of the regional club, the Association of South-East Asian Nations, ASEAN. Since then ASEAN has devoted a lot of time to discussing “HADR” (humanitarian and disaster relief). For an organisation normally chary of meddling in its ten members’ internal affairs it is an obvious area of potential co-operation. Haiyan has offered ASEAN a test of the efficacy of its two-year-old Centre for Humanitarian Assistance, known as AHA, designed to co-ordinate and support disaster relief.

Good neighbours

AHA is proud to have stationed personnel in the Philippines before the typhoon struck. And ASEAN members have been generous. Thailand, for example, donated 5,000 tonnes of rice from government stockpiles swollen by an expensive price-support scheme. Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore have sent aircraft and other aid. But ASEAN has been criticised for being invisible. That, too, is unfair. Disaster relief is not a talent show or beauty contest. In fact AHA’s efforts, like those of the Philippine government and the world as a whole, have been swamped by a typhoon more destructive than anyone had thought possible.

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