Citation
Wilson, H.C. (2005), "Lest we forget", Disaster Prevention and Management, Vol. 14 No. 3. https://doi.org/10.1108/dpm.2005.07314caa.001
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2005, Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Lest we forget
Shortly after the tsunami disaster I gave a talk on the topic to a local school in West Yorkshire and I summed up the talk by saying that although the disaster was headline news at that time that it would fade quite rapidly as other news events unfolded and occurred. The students were quite shocked at that statement but, for those of us involved in disaster management, we appreciate that this is normal.
I have done a very unscientific study of news items (paper and electronic) in the UK and in the past ten days (13-23 March 2005) there has been one short television news item and 16 column inches in the four newspapers that I read.
This dropping out from the news has been fairly rapid for a disaster of this magnitude.
However, on the other hand there has been quite extensive coverage of the plight of the under-developed nations in Africa. The long-time suffering of these peoples has largely been ignored by the media, and it has taken some very high-level political intervention and visits to bring the matter to the front pages and major news stations.
The situations that has brought about the suffering in some of these African countries is complex to say the very least, and bringing resolution to the situation will be just as complex.
Here we have politics at its worst and most shady with governments and commercial sectors trying to protect vested interests within various African countries. This a knot of gargantuan proportions which, if totally unravelled, may lead to the downfall of important people. The issue of bribery has been a topic of major discussion within the west but there is little acceptance of the simple fact that in a bribery scenario there are two major players – the briber and the bribed. In the west we have been quick to condemn those who take the bribes but have tended to ignore the fact that if bribes are not offered then the question of mal-practice does not exist.
H.C. Wilson