In Mulliva Lane, Banda Aceh, families affected by the tsunami are struggling with insufficient food supplies as aid has not yet reached them. Despite donations from countries like Canada, the aid distribution has been slow and many needy families have been overlooked due to the scattered nature of survivors. Local officials' corruption and inadequate systems have exacerbated the situation, leaving many, including the desperate family of Teuku Salami, waiting for much-needed assistance.

1. At No. 3 Mulliva Lane, they wait
Andrew Mills
Toronto Star
January 12, 2005
The Toronto Star
Copyright 2005 Toronto Star Newspapers, Ltd.
Section: NEWS; Pg. A06
Length: 806 words
BANDA ACEH, Indonesia – There isn't enough food at No. 3 Mulliva Lane.
Aid has barely arrived in this neighbourhood, though families along this garbage-strewn
alley with the big white mosque at the corner are putting up dozens of family members
left homeless by the tsunami.
After the disaster, 15 people showed up at No. 3, which already had 13 people living in
three tiny rooms. The guests are now splayed out on dirty concrete floors that flood in
the afternoon rains.
A few kilometres out of town a padlocked rice packing plant holds crates and crates of
the very things the folks at No. 3 need: ItalPasta macaroni to augment their meagre
portion of rice, iodine tablets to treat the putrid well-water and Zest soap to wash after
using the backyard toilet.
It has been nearly eight days since two Air Canada flights left Pearson International
Airport full of these goods, yet all aid workers have given out from that largesse are a
few hundred tarps. The rest of these supplies sit, either in the rice plant, or in the hold of
a ship somewhere in the Straits of Malacca, steaming its way here.
With the homeless survivors at No. 3 - who live in the part of the city World Vision has
agreed to feed - going hungry, why is all this aid just sitting?
Some have suggested that the unprecedented response to this disaster by people in
countries like Canada means that more supplies than will ever be needed have ended
up in this part of the world, which was hit harder by the Dec. 26 earthquake and
tsunamis than anywhere else on Earth.
But Rich Moseanko, the relief team leader here for World Vision, the organization that
arranged for the Canadian shipment, says the waiting stockpiles are all part of the "aid
pipeline."

2. "Immediately when the disaster struck, (World Vision's Indonesian staff) responded by
purchasing relief supplies for 5,000 families," Moseanko said. "The Canadian goods
came after that, so there's a queue."
But that explanation was of no comfort to 43-year-old Teuku Salami, a motorbike taxi
driver who lives with his wife and three children at No. 3 Mulliva Lane. He stood in front
of a shabby mosque in a nearby neighbourhood yesterday afternoon, watching
residents there receive supplies. World Vision workers handed out things like
flashlights, pots and pans, and 12 kilograms of rice per person.
The World Food Program supplied the food, and everything else was part of the
Indonesian-bought shipment at the front of World Vision's pipeline.
"Where do I register for this luxury relief?" Salami asked.
Those trying to deliver aid admit that thousands of families like Salami's have been
missed.
"If there's a war, refugees usually all go to one place," Moseanko said. But the
homeless survivors of the tsunami are scattered all over Aceh province, staying with
relatives or friends, in vacant lots or in small camps. It's been hard to find out who needs
what kind of help. Along Mulliva Lane, which was too far from the coast for the waves to
strike, the neighbourhood chief, who tells aid agencies what the neighbourhoods needs,
has left town. Like many who could, he's gone to the mountains, far from any more
tsunamis. This means anyone seeking aid must go to the sub-district social office which,
Salami says, has been stingy.
Since the disaster, they've given the 28 people at No. 3 what the World Food Program
considers enough for one person for a month: 12 kilograms. Yesterday, Salami's sister-
in-law Ratna Dewi, 24, came home from the social office with her biggest score yet: an
old sardine box filled with 18 cups of water, a tube of toothpaste, mosquito repellent, a
tin of milk and a can of sardines.
"There are certain people who are taking advantage of this and aren't distributing to the
people," said Salami, who knows from past experience that the sub-district is full of
corrupt local officials. He could understand if aid missed him in a remote village, with no
road access, but in the city, he said, there is no excuse.
Today, the goods from Canada will get closer to the front of World Vision's pipeline, as
the organization plans to distribute the Indonesian-bought goods to 1,400 more families.
And the Canadian goods travelling by ship - mostly family survival kits - are not likely to
end up in the city because the basic needs of most survivors have been met in
Banda Acehand the surrounding region, Moseanko said. They'll likely go to the west
coast of Sumatra, where destroyed roads mean only a spotty supply of aid has been
getting through.

3. But back at Mulliva Lane, Salami and 27 others are still waiting. His cousin Ridwan, 14,
is among the traumatized survivors: his parents, brothers and sisters are all dead.
"He's lost everything," Dewi said. "Is this all we're going to get now?"
Probably not, but the people of Mulliva Lane will simply have to wait a bit longer, until
the aid pipeline reaches them.