初心者のための日韓議論場

　 続き
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Had the officials in charge that morning been working with a clear-cut, well-rehearsed and properly communicated procedure, a tsunami warning would have been sounded. It shouldn?t have mattered to the experts in charge at the bureau on Sunday morning that such a warning might inconvenience hotel owners or tour operators in the South. They shouldn?t have even worried about possible negative feedback from certain quarters that the agency was overreacting or that it was too quick to push the panic button. They have a job to do, and a very important job it is too, one that concerns the safety of every citizen in the country. They are duty bound ? professionally and ethically ? to perform their task honourably. Potential public misunderstandings and undesirable political pressure are but some of the basic occupational hazards.

Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra has promised to overhaul the entire disaster-protection system. He discovered just how deplorable the whole warning, rescue and emergency systems were when he went down South himself to supervise the rescue mission earlier this week. He said he learned first-hand that the country had no adequate warning system in place, no back-up communications, no emergency power supplies, no contingency plan to coordinate relief measures. What?s worse, he said that local officials hadn?t even gone on alert. The tsunami had already smashed six southern provinces when he discovered that these bureaucrats wouldn?t even start to respond to the crisis ?until I ordered them to?. Why were they awaiting orders from the country?s chief executive? The simple answer, drawing from recent examples ? bird flu, Sars, even Bangkok?s horrendous traffic jams ? is: they just wanted to save their own butts. That?s how they?ve been trained to think and taught to act.

The PM complained that the Meteorology Department did issue a vague warning (about the earthquake) that ?hyped up the series of aftershocks, which generated unwarranted fear that further complicated rescue efforts?. Instead of blaming them for ?hyping things up?, the chief executive should have asked them: ?What do you need to carry out your usually little-appreciated but crucial task in a more independent and professional manner?? Not only have bureaucratic inertia, budgetary constraints and political interference contributed to this unprecedented calamity, but also the very attitudes towards danger inherent in our social fabric.

In the end, the solution lies in making a conscientious effort to turn Thailand into a real knowledge-based society, one in which disaster monitoring and danger warnings are an integral part of daily life. Let it not be said after this catastrophe, which has touched everybody, passes that official responses simply returned to business as usual ? immediate interest, instant assistance, but long-term neglect ? because we failed to tackle the ?epicentre? of this earth-shaking issue.

Suthichai Yoon

The Nation
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