Nerve Endings Firing Away

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The tsunami has brought around another wave – of relief aid from within the affected areas and around the world. The flow of aid from the rich countries to the poor ones in wake of natural disasters is always under close introspection. Although the aid is often termed as altruistic, the donors have learned to extract their pound of flesh at later times – often on the lines of emotional blackmail. But considering all aid is largely humanitarian and not necessarily directed to the countries where Americans, French or Japanese were lounging at the beach resorts, the world has been a tad slow in responding this time around. Correction – the world is now responding magnificently in raising one of history’s most magnanimous relief donations (I wrote the previous paragraph few days back). The extent of damage was not entirely known but as waters receded and people began picking up the pieces of their lives aided by those honorable relief workers, the tsunami toll kept rising sharply. As the toll rose, the aid first a trickle suddenly almost resembled the very destructive force that it was helping against.

But of course, like everything else, the relief aid wasn’t without any political power play and serious finger pointing. As the countries impacted were still numb from the shock, the developed countries and the so-called protectors of the planet pitched in with initial pittances. US pledged $15 million and in turn, was sharply criticized by their own media for being “stingy”. President Bush literally had to battle charges of tardiness and up the aid figure to $35 million before spiking it nearly tenfold to the current levels of $350 million. Now that is something like that looks like a aid package to several developing countries.

France nearly caused a round of stifled laughter among its peers when they announced a pittance of $100,000 Euros – primarily to Thailand where apparently many of their countrymen were vacationing. The French Ministry has reportedly upped the offer to a modest $20 million. If they aspire to be a future global voice, they better not commit such unintentional publicity disasters. I bet someone in the French Foreign Ministry was fired that day. “Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi raised Japan’s offer to $500 million from $30 million, topping President Bush’s pledge Friday of $350 million.” Topping – that word seemed out of place. It almost seems like a bidding war but as long as they honor their commitment and the money does in fact reach the neediest, we rather sit back and see them outbid each other. The approximate aid figure now stands at $2 billion including help from the governments and global organizations. Some cities even cancelled their New Year’s Eve festivities and pledged that money to the relief efforts (God bless them!!).

The voluntary contributions have been absolutely mind-blowing. Erstwhile pleading non-profits soon found them inundated with contributions. “Oxfam said it had raised $28 million in five days; $9 million flowed into CARE USA; and Save the Children USA reported $6 million in donations in four days.” The most stunning display of contributions can be seen over at Amazon.com. $11.7 million since the waves hit Asian shores!!! This pot of money has been collected with tiny increments of individual donations. If you love to see the better side of charitable giving, visit Amazon and refresh the donations page every couple of minutes and see the donation go up in tiny but continuous increaments (although some people have questioned the choice of American Red Cross as the beneficial organization). Even the local Atlanta FM radio stations managed to collect more than France’s initial offer in between the year’s music countdown.

Where did I give my infinitesimal small contribution? AID India. I have seen them in action and their volunteers have been in the field and I am sure the money donated will reach the people who need it the most. If you haven’t donated yet and your conscience hasn’t been pricked yet after reading this post (not my intention), then visit AID India’s Donation page. I promise not to turn on the emotional blackmail tap again.

PS. To those who found my disaster media coverage post interesting, you may like this interesting play of words on practically the same news.

by Patrix | on Sunday, January 2nd, 2005 at 12:00 am | Current Affairs . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.