Nearly quarter of a million people who fled war-torn Shan State and Sagaing Region for Mandalay city are now struggling for food and shelter, having been denied regime earthquake relief, according to locals and aid volunteers.
Local junta administrators reportedly excluded Mandalay’s huge population of internally displaced people (IDPs) when they registered quake victims for relief aid.
A displaced woman from Sagaing’s Kawlin Township told The Irrawaddy: “My house back in the village was burnt. [In Mandalay], I have now lost my shelter. I don’t know what to do. We are temporary rather than permanent residents, so we haven’t received any assistance except five packets of rice and curry that we got from donors recently.”
Most IDPs rented houses or apartments, which suffered severe damage during the March 28 earthquake. Many lost their livelihoods and incomes to the quake.
Volunteers estimate that at least 300 IDPs were killed during the natural disaster in Mandalay. Earthquake relief camps are only accepting locals, forcing IDPs to take refuge in monasteries or makeshift tents.
A volunteer from Amarapura, adjoining Mandalay city, said relief supplies are being distributed based on household registration certificates, and in cases where more than one family is living in a house, supplies are only given to those named in the certificates.
“Additionally, some local administrators are only registering heavy damage to property while ignoring minor damage,” he said.
Rescue operations in Mandalay were called off 10 days after the earthquake, and the regime is doing little to assist locals clearing the debris. Quake victims are only receiving assistance from civil society organizations, charities, and individual donors, according to locals.
More than 50 IDP families who received cash donations last week said it was the first help they had received since the quake, according to the donor.
Many Mandalay residents dare not sleep in their homes for fear of aftershocks, instead seeking shelter with relatives whose houses were unaffected, in schools, makeshift camps, football pitches and fields. Quake-displaced residents are still sleeping on the roadside in some wards.
A total of 142 aftershocks had been recorded, the Department of Meteorology and Hydrology reported on Friday.
The quake death toll climbed to 3,725, with 5,106 injured and 129 missing, according to the regime as of April 16.
The earthquake destroyed over 60,000 houses, 2,366 schools, 167 hospitals and clinics, 3,678 government buildings, 155 bridges, 3,514 monasteries and nunneries, and 5,620 pagodas across Mandalay, Sagaing, Naypyitaw and southern Shan State, according to official data.
