On Wednesday, September 30, 2009, a strong earthquake of 7.6 struck the Island of Sumatra in Indonesia . The hardest hit is central part of the island, in the Province of West Sumatra . The capital, Padang , saw a big destruction, but it’s two districts in the province, namely District of Pariaman and District of Agam that experienced devastating effect.
In all, about 240,000 buildings of various kind collapsed, severely damaged, or minor damage that make them inhabitable. The total death toll is close to 1,000 people. Ten of thousands of people were made homeless, although some of them have been accommodated by their relatives.
Alhamdulillah, IHSAN, with your wholehearted support and donation, has delivered a small scale relief aid –a truck load of basic needs like rice, cooking oil, sugar, instant noodle, canned fish, milk, lanterns, tents, and blankets.
The chairman of IHSAN himself roamed rural areas in Agam dan Pariaman with the lorry of food. With the help of four local volunteers, our lorry reached out to four villages on the western side of Lake Maninjau where big landslide hit them the next morning after the late afternoon powerful earthquake. This landslide was triggered by the quake itself.
We didn’t give relief aid to urban areas because many agencies have already there with a lot of food and other supply.
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Then our lorry of food arrived in the hard to reach villages by the Lake Maninjau in darkness because electricity was not back yet to normality after being cut off by the earthquake.
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Now, the emergency situation is fading away slowly. But many people are still living under the tents relying on aid supply. We believe people’s basic needs are now supplied regularly and sufficiently by the authorities, even though complaints about the quality of the daily needs and the delivery are heard everyday.
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Look at the house thoroughly. The mud slide almost reaches the edge of the roof.
To help build urgently needed class rooms
Because of our “financial size” and the fact that daily needs for the victims have been covered by other sources, we decided not to send more relief aid. Instead, we are concentrating ourselves on helping a madrasah boarding school that was hit by landslide in Lake Maninjau .
This madrasah is the home and hope of 80 plus orphans, young converts, and dhuafas who were brought there from outside the area –some of them came from an isolated small island whose population are mainly non-Muslims. The young converts are from this island, the Island of Mentawai about 200 miles west of Sumatra .
The whole compound of the boarding school is now declared by the local authority as prohibited areas because landslide could happen any time in the future.
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| This is how the landslide on the wall of mountain surrounding Lake Maninjau hit the Prof Hamka Madrasa |
Since the landslide, the students and the madrasah officials took refuge at the local grand mosque. Initially they were given one month stay but after the period passed and temporary accommodation was not found, the mosque then extended their stay.
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| The mud of the landslide was infiltrating students’ bedrooms. | This is the local Grand Mosque in Maninjau where the pupils have to live for a long temporary stay. |
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| Some of the students of Prof Hamka Madrasah before the landslide hit their compound. | This picture was also captured before the landslide triggered by the powerful earthquake. |
So, unless outside help was coming to these children, then they normal learning activities would not be able to resume. We at IHSAN are trying to help build three class-room premises and small mosque inside the compound. They have secured a piece of land (pictured below). It’s safe, it’s far from threatening mountain walls.
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| The director of the Hamka Foundation, Mr Zainul Arifin (left), visited the land granted by a local family for the new compound. |
Let’s raise £11,665.10
The construction of two premises for the madrasah will cost us £21,000.oo (twenty one thousands pounds). At this stage, IHSAN has in its bank account the balance of earthquake donation of £9,334.90. So, in order to proceed with the construction of a three-class-room building for them, we need to raise £11,665.10.
Insya Allah, with your support, this sum can be secured and a new compound for those children will soon become a reality. It’s unlikely that we could help build the whole compound given the size of job financially, but IHSAN is determined to take a front line position by starting this bit of the project. Ameen ya Rabb.
Jazakumullah khayran katseeran and thank you very much for your generous donation.
Wassalam alaykum warahmatullah wabarakatuh.
On behalf of IHSAN Trustees
Asyari Usman
Chairman
M: 07871215133
