Cardinal Keith O'Brien : Take pride Scots are helping those in need long-term too

Published on Tuesday 3 February 2009 21:24

Emergency disaster aid is vital, but Cardinal Keith O'Brien says that emotional wounds take time to heal

WHEN an event such as Cyclone Nargis, which hit Burma in May last year, fades from the news agenda, the story is far from over.

The shock of such an event is obviously traumatic at the time. Who among us can imagine the feelings of being lifted up off your feet by flood waters and swept away from your home in total darkness, possibly clinging on to a tree or loved one for dear life.

Seeing everything you have worked for disappear must be utterly bewildering. But the pain of losing loved ones, your children, parents, brothers, sisters and friends, is not something that passes quickly, if it ever passes at all.

This was brought home to me over the last two weeks as I visited Burma and had the privilege of speaking to survivors of the cyclone. The disaster, which swept across this most beautiful and hospitable country, left 138,000 people dead and countless others homeless. Tens of thousands were left stranded by high water, unable to find food and clean water or receive basic aid in the days and weeks after the storm.

In Rangoon, 70 per cent of the trees were uprooted, blocking roads and damaging buildings. In the predominantly rural areas whole villages and their populations simply disappeared. Two priests I met who visited the Irrawaddy delta region a week after the cyclone to deliver medicines, food and drinking water told me how human and animal corpses were still to floating in the water.

Michael, a villager from the Delta region whom I met, told me how he had put his young son on his shoulders when the water had risen above his head, but that his wife was swept away in the storm water and his son later died in his arms.

Then there was 14-year-old Martin, who along with his family and others took refuge on the roof of a church before the church was washed away, killing both his parents. Martin floated away on a large piece of wood from the church. John, another survivor I met, lost all seven members of his family when they were dispersed by the rising waters and torrential winds.

Each sad story was recounted with obvious pain. Their basic needs such as food and shelter had been provided for in the days and weeks following the cyclone, but the emotional injuries, it was plain to see, will take years to heal.

I was in Burma to see the work of Scotland's international aid and development agency SCIAF and its partners in the country. In the immediate aftermath of Nargis, SCIAF gave 110,000 to help provide clean water, temporary shelters, medicine and hygiene kits to 65,000 people in Rangoon and the Irrawaddy delta region.

A SCIAF appeal raised over 167,000 in donations thanks to the generosity of the Scottish public. The agency had been working in Burma for many years and as a result was in a strong position to provide immediate aid and support when other agencies where struggling to enter the country and spend money they had raised.

Today, SCIAF is continuing to provide long-term support to help communities in the affected areas recover from the cyclone by providing seeds and tools to support agriculture, and training for small businesses so people can start earning a living again.

SCIAF's local partners are also providing trauma counselling to help survivors process the terrible losses they have suffered. There are many who still need this help. Counselling for survivors is just one way of helping individuals and communities overcome the long-term emotional fall-out of living through a natural or man-made disaster.

Time, of course, is the main healer. I have also found that the resilience of people can be strengthened by their religious faith. It can be a way to help people process their trauma. I remember one survivor ending his personal story by saying, "I remember thinking, perhaps God is teaching me that we human beings don't really possess anything for ourselves."

But from an international aid and development perspective it is vital to continue working with communities long after the initial shock has passed. Once emergency aid has been provided it is vital that long-term development assistance such as seeds, tools, vocational training and education is provided so that communities are able to provide for themselves again. This helps both the long-term recovery and normalisation of the situation. It is within this environment, together with counselling and the support of a good community, that emotional recovery can hopefully take place.

In addition to witnessing SCIAF's emergency response to Nargis I was also able to see how the agency has been working with communities across the country to promote sustainable agriculture, clean water supplies to villagers and micro-credit schemes to help families provide food and an income for themselves. I travelled to small villages in northern Burma who had escaped the worst of the cyclone but had been living in poverty for years due to a long-running civil war between an ethnically-based rebel army and the military regime.

Hearing from individuals about how a water supply to their house, small loan to start a business or training in animal husbandry is relieving hardship in their lives and enabling them to support their families is incredibly rewarding when you know the donations for such good work have originated in Scotland.

It is heartening to see how a Scottish agency backed by the Scottish public is really reaching out to help people in countries that are undergoing terrible hardship. I have seen the same on previous trips with SCIAF to southern Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Darfur. These countries have undergone their own terrible disasters. The deep human suffering caused by the loss of loved ones though is felt equally by all. Being able to provide emergency relief and long-term support to those in need is something that Scotland and SCIAF should be proud of.

&#149 Cardinal Keith O'Brien is head of the Catholic Church in Scotland