Opposition stoops to profit

TRUE to form, the opposition is backtracking on earlier, exaggerated claims that it was approaching post-tsunami challenges in a constructive spirit.

Rather than cooperate with the Government in getting the country re-building process under way, the UNP is gearing-up to fish in our troubled coastal waters by orchestrating anti-Government demonstrations by bogus tsunami victims.

As indicated by our lead story yesterday, such fake victims have already been planted by the opposition in camps for the displaced, dotting our southern coast.

How does the UNP expect the Government to make any headway in meeting current challenges if its one intention is to swoop vulture-like on the Government's initiatives with the aim of fishing out any political capital in its greedy talons?

Apparently, the country is well and truly back at Square One, in terms of opposition parties sinking short-term political gain and working unitedly with the Government for the larger good of the country.

When will they ever learn? While the writing is clearly on the wall that we wouldn't be getting anywhere on the country re-building front, without a spirit of cooperation between the Government and the opposition, the latter has already got back to its bad old ways, confirming the worst fears of the public that the opposition would sooner rather than later revert to the power games with which Lankans are so familiar.

Before the country gets down to rebuilding, apparently, there would need to be a moratorium on power politics. If the cruel death of nearly 30,000 persons cannot jolt the opposition out of its mesmeric fixation with power, what could?

For the sake of the larger good of the country and the well being of the unborn generations, we call on Lanka's political parties to work unitedly, at least until the reconstruction process gets well underway.

In fact, the country needs the calmness of spirit to confront the great challenges on its hands. We are, quite understandably, a shocked and deeply troubled country but we need to cultivate an inner toughness and resilience if we are to come through this crisis. Being on edge and nervous would do more harm than good.

For instance, a false alarm sounded in the East over another earthquake recently, has sent hundreds scampering for safety. In fact the region was temporarily plunged into a state of chaos, starkly suggestive of the dark events of December last year.

This state of affairs could have been avoided if sanity prevailed. However, it is amid such jitters that the opposition is hoping to make a bid for power.

The panic that thus broke out on our eastern shores should have reminded the UNP of the need to defend the 100 meter buffer zone proposal of the Government. After all, the population groups that took to their heels were living close to the sea.

As long as a buffer zone is not maintained these groups would prove vulnerable. The opposition needs to pause awhile and think on these things.

The second wave

NEARLY three months have passed since the usually placid Indian Ocean turned into a raging monster that brought death to more than 273,000 people in 11 countries including Sri Lanka.

The word 'tsunami' is now entrenched in our vocabulary - and in our psyche. Now we know that we live in an area which is prone to earthquakes - the undersea quake that triggered the tsunami was one of the biggest in recent times.

But that is certainly not the end. Seismologists say there is a heightened risk of a major earthquake in the western coast of Sumatra as a result of the monster quake that generated the December 26 tsunami.

The Indonesian city of Banda Aceh, badly hit by the killer wave, could be at risk from a quake measuring up to 7.5 on the Richter Scale and there is a potential for a tsunami-making 8.5 quake offshore, they warn in a study published on Thursday in the British weekly science journal Nature.

Their calculations show a very significant increase on stress on two major active faults in the Sumatra region. An earthquake can be swiftly followed by another one if certain geological conditions are met.

However, scientists cannot predict exactly when a follow-up earthquake would happen. Data on previous earthquakes indicate that the interval could be as short as three months or as long as five years.

This is indeed bad news for the Indian Ocean rim countries which had never experienced disasters of this magnitude earlier. But one thing is very clear: the heightened risk underscores the need to swiftly set up a tsunami early-warning system for the Indian Ocean.

There are signs that the world is moving in this direction. The latest findings ought to expedite these efforts. The first high level meeting towards the establishment of an Indian Ocean Tsunami warning System was held in Paris early this month.

The Sri Lankan delegation comprised the heads of the Met Department, Geological Survey and Mines Bureau, NARA, as well as the Head of the Hydraulics Department of the Moratuwa University - all institutions which have a vital role to play in case of a tsunami/earthquake.

It was agreed that a warning system should address all aspects of disaster mitigation. The member states were tasked with establishing a National Tsunami Warning Center in their countries.

Sri Lanka is getting help from Japan for a national tsunami warning centre which would be able to receive and disseminate warning information 24 hours a day, seven days a week. In the light of the latest findings, the sooner it is established, the better.