EDITORIAL COMMENT: Government must equip towns for emergencies

But as a nation, is Zimbabwe prepared for natural disasters?
The answer is a resounding no if comment by Civil Protection Unit (CPU) national director Mr Madzudzo Pawadyira are anything to go by.
According to Mr Pawadyira, the country’s emergency services were not working effectively because of operational constraints.
A total of $82 million is required to capacitate the country’s emergency services amid reports that many people are dying because of inefficiency in rendering rescue services.
“Our emergency services countrywide need about $82 million in order to get things going. Of this amount the Civil Protection Unit needs $23 million while $4 million is needed for the sub-aqua unit to  operate efficiently,” Mr Pawadyira told delegates attending a Fire Safety, Emergency Response and Training Programme in Bulawayo on Monday.
He said efforts were under way to solicit for funding from development partners in order to revamp the emergency services sector.
This lack of preparedness means most of the country’s towns and cities, as well as rural areas where the majority of our people live, are sitting on a time bomb in the event major natural disasters like earthquakes, cyclones or floods were to hit us.
Most of the country’s towns and cities, including the capital Harare and the second largest city of Bulawayo, do not have adequate fire-fighting equipment and in most cases, the equipment is antiquated and fit for  museums.
Harare’s lack of preparedness was even exposed last August when fire tenders drove all the way from the city to Beatrice, a distance of more than 40 kilometres, to put out a fire that killed the late General Solomon Mujuru without water.
If big cities like Bulawayo and Harare do not have adequate fire-fighting equipment, then small towns are obviously in a worse off situation.  
The same goes for equipment meant to rescue people marooned by floods.
It is a pity that as a country, we seem not to worry too much about emergencies and disasters until they strike. We seem to treat disaster and emergency preparedness in the same way we treat insurance policies, that is something which we all wished we had after a disaster has struck.
Granted, Government is resource-strained and where it is faced with a choice of either acquiring food for drought-prone areas, medicine for hospitals or equipment for disaster preparedness, we have no doubt that it would opt for food and medicine for the people.
But the same Government would                        take the flak if a disaster of catastrophic proportions were to hit any part of the country. A case in point is Cyclone Eline which ravaged most parts of the country in 2000.
This therefore means the Government has to adequately equip the CPU and ensure that all towns and cities are always ready for emergencies and well-equipped to attend to disasters to save its citizens.
The $82 million that Mr Pawadyira says is needed to capacitate his unit for emergencies pales into insignificance when a major disaster strikes.