The post tsunami factor

Tsunami became a lifeline of sorts for the United Nations, writes Binay Kumar.

Two weeks have now passed since the Indian ocean tsunami first cast its spell of devastation across South & South East Asia; more than one hundred and fifty thousand people are dead with tens of thousands still missing; and entire villages and generations of families are no more. But for all the sorrowful stories and the morose tidings there is also a silver lining.

Two weeks were all it took for deeply entrenched differences to pale away; people who were hitherto reluctant to look each other in the eyes are now offering help and consoling each other; politics, religious strife and sectarian tensions have ended, at least momentarily, and stand suspended in a sudden flux of aching despair, desperate need and distraught hope of the kind that arises out only of such complete destruction.

Politically, the post tsunami goodwill stretches from the ‘gentleman’s agreement’ between the Indonesian Government and the Ache rebels, to the less formal co-operation between the LTTE and the Sri Lankan Government, and further to the sudden solidarity that is being so keenly expressed by the rich nations of the west for their poor eastern brethren.

But still one has to ask, as others have elsewhere, what will be left when the international gaze shifts to another problem in another part of the world and when this tide of goodwill subsides? Will the world forget as it has often forgotten the pledges made in the initial aftermath of other disasters past? Can we really expect disaster relief to become long term reconstruction?

I hate to posture as some prophet of doom, but a cursory look back to some recent highly publicized pledges doesn’t arouse great hope. Take President Bush’s much vaunted crusade against the African Aids epidemic. Following a flurry of press activity and rhetoric laden speeches we now know that of the $15 billion promised only $350 million has been delivered, and, if recent reports are to be believed, the final sum is unlikely to reach even $1 billion.

Already western prejudices have begun clouding the story of the tsunami disaster. For the past two weeks I have seen more stories on white tourists in Thailand than all of the stories about the rest of the region put together. The tsunami struck resorts where westerners were on holiday. London’s Guardian was perhaps the only newspaper that noticed the problem with the image being drawn up by the international media. As Jeremy Seabrook wrote: “This is not to diminish the trauma of loss of life, whether of tourist or fisherman. But when we distinguish between ‘locals’ who have died and westerners, ‘locals’ all too easily becomes a euphemism for what were once referred to as natives. Whatever tourism's merits, it risks reinforcing the imperial sensibility.”

At the other end of the spectrum, the rising tide of India’s emergence– as an economic power to reckon with- is perhaps the most startling political positive to come into focus in the aftermath of the disaster. The Indian government’s polite though firm refusal to accept foreign aid underlines India’s growing confidence on the world stage as it also establishes India’s might as having no equal in the region. The broader consequence is the value of India’s cache in the international community as a country that can hold its own in the face of such devastation. All of these make India’s case for a Security Council seat all the more plausible, deserving and strong.