Government scores low on quake aid

Disappointment with government relief and reconstruction efforts in the wake of the 921 earthquake last year is on the rise and quake victims still have to face unreasonable hardship a year after the event, a survey unveiled yesterday claimed.

The survey came on the heels of a massive camp-out by more than 1,000 quake victims, led by the 921 Earthquake Disaster Victims' Coalition (九二一大地震受災戶聯盟) in the area of the Taiwan Provincial Government headquarters at Chung Hsing New Village (中興新村) in Nantou County.

The coalition was protesting the tardiness of the recovery program.

The survey was released by the National Alliance of Post-Earthquake Reconstruction (全國民間災後重建聯盟) which is composed of various non-governmental organizations and which has carried out a regular series of surveys on earthquake reconstruction efforts in the last six months.

The results unveiled yesterday were from a survey carried out early this month.

According to the survey, the widespread hopes that the new government would perform better than its KMT predecessor have been dashed and people see little difference between the two governments' performances.

According to the survey, 28.5 percent of quake victims thought the present government had not handled reconstruction any better than the former KMT regime. This rate was a threefold increase compared with June, when only 10.8 percent thought the new government no better then its predecessor.

The same disillusionment was also to be found among those who lived in quake-hit areas but were not themselves victims of the quake, according to the survey.

Hsieh Kuo-hsin (謝國興), executive director of the alliance, said similar findings from other polls showed that the government ought to re-examine its performance.

"There is still a lot of relief work that the government could push forward," he said.

Some 10.8 percent of poll respondents even thought the government's effectiveness even worse than its predecessor.

In an evaluation of the government's performance by polled quake victims, the government scored a failing grade -- only 59.12 out of 100.

Quake victims at the coalition sleepout on Saturday night blasted the government for not providing enough help to overcome the myriad problems they face in reconstruction of their homes and lives.

The coalition criticized government policy, saying that its new reconstruction programs were merely "castles in the air," while government decision-makers "did not truly understand the existing problems in the affected areas."

The protesters also criticized President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) for breaking his promise to accelerate reconstruction efforts.

Wu Yi-ling (吳以玲), a representative of the protesters, said quake victims had constantly been rejected by banks for housing finance because they were regarded as a high-risk group with little collateral -- that which they had owned often having been destroyed in the quake -- even though the government had promised that each quake victim household could obtain a mortgage of up to NT$3.5 million at preferential interest rates for rebuilding.

"We've already had a rough year dwelling in temporary housings that are just as hot as ovens in summer and as cold as fridges in winter," one Nantou County quake victim said.

Only 38 percent of quake victims are optimistic about their living conditions in the near future, while 26.1 percent are "very confident" of seeing their living conditions recover from the impact of the earthquake, the survey released yesterday showed.