Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-03-01-Speech-3-117"
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"en.20000301.7.3-117"2
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"Could I thank Commissioner Patten for coming here at short notice to respond to our wish to debate this very critical issue and as others have said, the television pictures that we have seen of the stricken Limpopo valley in Mozambique are absolutely heartbreaking. Children have lost parents, families are bereft, hopeless, helpless and they have lost absolutely everything.
But of course, as others have said, this whole thing was predicted and predictable and the slow and very inadequate, woefully slow and woefully inadequate response is something that should dictate now that we actually do invest seriously in disaster preparedness. There is a case as the Commissioner mentioned for the implementation of a rapid response facility and rapid response force in situations like this to deal with crises such as we have there because we simply did not have the strategies or the logistical preparations in place.
This morning there were seven helicopters and of course those helicopters are only working in the Gaza region. The Save river has huge flooding problems as well but no one has even been there yet. 85% of the work is within an hour of Maputo so we really have no idea what the extent of the problem is. Also I would like to say Commissioner that European citizens want to know exactly what ECHO is doing. Most of us here would not wish to boast about EUR 3 million. We need far more and I hope that the Commissioner will come back with those promises and also with an initiative to coordinate some of the efforts there.
Clearly also we need to see a massive airlift. As you say tons of food, water purification equipment, tents, blankets. Are we really prepared for the next relief and rehabilitation stage which you mention because that again will demand massive resources. Are we ready to pay for those resources? Mozambique is, of course, one of the poorest countries in the world, but one of Africa’s great success stories with its work on economic growth, on poverty reduction, on democracy in spite, of course, of massive debt pressures.
Mozambique is a wonderful example but now likely to suffer enormous hardship as a result of what they have endured. How badly the disaster sets Mozambique back is what we should be looking at now and that depends on the sheer quality and quantity of international relief for that stricken country."@en1
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