Ten days after the quake, tents, food and other relief supplies are still in great shortage. In many places, supplies are available but have not been handed out or only haphazardly, often without due regard for the elderly and the wounded. Locals talk about the situation. Monks play a crucial role in the rescue and relief efforts.

Beijing (AsiaNews/Agencies) – Ten days after the devastating earthquake that rocked Yushu, relief efforts are still ill organised and often inadequate. Many of the homeless are forced to sleep overnight in makeshift shelters in frigid temperatures, at altitudes that average 4,000 metres.

In the city of Jiegu, seat of the Yushu Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, many victims are still waiting for tents. Among the “lucky” ones who received them, some say they are like decorations.

Vegetable farmer Chen Longgang is one of them. Even though he got a tent from the government (pictured), he told the South China Morning Post, “The tent cannot be assembled at all because the steel joints, which are essential to erect tents, are missing”.

His is not an isolated case—many of the homeless got tents that could not be assembled for lack of parts.

Han Yusheng, the leader of a vegetable farmer co-op in the village, complained about the lack of management skills and co-ordination among various departments involved in disaster relief.

"It is chaotic,” he said. "We have to go to temporary government offices for steel joints”.

By contrast, Beijing stressed its great organisational effort, noting how its truck convoys brought tents, food and other relief supplies over damaged roads. However, many quake survivors complain about the government’s failure to hand out relief supplies fairly, as authorities had promised. Instead, local officials often told survivors “to come back again the next day because they are too busy”.

In Yushu, the distribution of supplies remains chaotic, with people fighting in the streets for rice, flour, instant noodles and yogurt. As one might expect, the young tend to get what they want, whilst the elderly and the injured are often with little or nothing. Indeed, some have complained that many of the homeless got nothing, whilst others were able to stockpile relief supplies in their own homes.

In the village of Burang (Anchong), 110 kilometres south of Jiegu, it was the same story. Baiga, the local village chief, said that more than 800 people had not yet received any relief supplies, whether tents or food, from the government, despite losing everything, including their homes.

Local authorities admitted that they had been overwhelmed by the quake, and that poor management had made matters worse. In some cases, supply trucks were sent to the wrong place, and some areas had not yet received any relief.

The quake was quite devastating for the region’s religious community. About 90 Buddhist monasteries have been damaged, some so badly that they have become unfit for use.

The authorities said that about 8,000 Tibetan monks have become homeless and that repairing the monasteries would be a priority. In the meantime, they are preventing monks from helping in organising relief efforts.

Yushu Prefecture is home to more than 23,000 monks and lamas, living in hundreds of monasteries. Despite obstacles, their action has been crucial in rescue operations, relief distribution and body cremation.

In March 2008, the same area was rocked by anti-Chinese unrest, which was quickly crushed in bloodshed.

• china
• tibet
• qinghai
• yushu
• quake
• relief
• rescue
• tibetan
• monks
• lamas
• mismanagement