Politics and a tsunami
The terrible earthquake and tsunami that swept through Samoa and American Samoa this week has rightly swept politics from the news bulletins and the front pages.
The loss of life and the sheer scale of the devastation is heart-breaking, and it's been difficult to know what to write - if anything - on a politics blog such as this.
As most of you know, I was in Samoa only a couple of weeks ago, so I guess I dodged a bullet. I don't know what's happened to the resort I stayed at. But having seen what a poor country Samoa is, I know just how devastating this event will have been.
Plenty of reporters and writers are now on the spot, however, and there's a lot of coverage of the aftermath of the tsunami elsewhere on the Stuff website.
Being a politics blog, then, I thought I'd examine the response of our Government to the crisis.
At the risk of sounding overly cynical, National won't be unhappy the tsunami has swept all other news off the bulletins at the moment. It's got rid of English's housing row, at least for now, which could easily have rumbled on through the recess otherwise.
To start with the ironical, Acting Prime Minister Bill English had no sooner hauled his protesting family back to Dipton for the parliamentary recess to prove that it was still really his home than he had to come straight back to Wellington again.
It neatly illustrated his argument, I thought. You can't run the country - or the economy for that matter - from Dipton. And even though the quake struck early in the morning, it was around 3pm before English finally got back to Wellington.
The early response seemed a bit disjointed, but that could have been because there was so little information coming out of Samoa, and it was difficult to judge just how big a calamity had occurred.
I have to say press conferences aren't English's strong suit, and the double act of English and Foreign Minister Murray McCully in the Beehive Theatrette this week has been almost comical at times.
English has made John Key seem smooth by comparison. Speaking of Key, he must be wondering how to get an even break. First his holiday in Florida is disrupted by the death of Sir Howard Morrison, and then the tsunami. I doubt he got much time on the beach, and now he's flying home early in order to go to Samoa.
The Government was slow off the mark in sending a minister up to Samoa. While Labour quickly dispatched two MPs, Winnie Laban and Chris Carter, as late as Wednesday McCully was still saying he saw no point in going up there.
It took a couple of gentle digs from Labour about promising to brief the Government to get McCully on a plane this morning.
Now the aid and military machine has swung into gear New Zealand is once again proving its worth to small Pacific countries such as Samoa. It's times like this I feel good to be a citizen of a first-world nation, albeit a small one, that can provide technical and medical aid that will save lives and help rebuild Samoa.
We weren't quite so flash with our own tsunami warning system however. Civil Defence didn't seem to know what was going on, and the roasting TVNZ's Paul Henry gave poor old Colin Feslier from Internal Affairs that first morning was painful to watch.
CD didn't seem to know what time the wave would strike New Zealand, where it would strike, or how big it would be. They didn't seem to know whether people by the coast should evacuate or not. And they didn't send out warnings to the media until the wave had almost arrived.
Civil Defence Minister John Carter has now demanded a review of the tsunami warning system, and that's a very good idea. While helping Samoa in its time of need is obviously the first priority, anything we can learn from the disaster would be good, too.
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Marcus Lush made some interesting comments this morning, around Telecom and Vodafone rushing in with communication resource and then crashing Somoa's whole system. Its not about doing something, its about being seen to be doing something. What are Laban and Carter going to actually achieve by going over? If its merely an attempt to make our Govt look bad, and they don't intend to muck in and get their hands dirty, using a tragedy like this for those sorts of purposes is a disgrace. I'll be interested to see what they actually accomplish. McCully too, for that matter.
Is there anywhere Chris Carter won't go at tax payers expense?
He would be best buying/renting a house in Rongotai to give him a quick response time at any sniff of a free trip!
Colin, how quickly do you think a minister/PM should visit a 'disaster area'?....aftershocks are notorious following a larger earthquake, so who get's there first is really not an issue, but safety for the people visiting, surely?...come to think of it, Labour trying to do the 'brothers in arms' theme in sending Laban?.....when will we see Hone going walk abouts in Samoa/Tonga and proclaming that the earthquake was 'racist' for only affecting countries with brown people?!?
ha ha ah....what a complete joke and a cynical ploy of labour sending Chrissy Carter of all people.....has he taken his husband? I can't imagine it being their cup of tea at all now all the resorts are gone....
equally laughable was the labour pansy len brown offering 'all the support' he can provide....what a muppet....
all politics aside my thoughts go out to the people of Samoa.....as someone who was in Sri Lanka when the boxing day tsunami happened and saw the death toll rise over 35,000 i can relate....
Big kudos to Key for setting down in Samoa. I'm sure it will give the locals a much needed boost in the mindst of tragedy. Incidently, how much did it cost the taxpayer to transport the English family to Dipton for the photo-op?
Could you make sure that you get word through in the MSM about the Dipton visit? I don't want my master to have to call your editor like he did for the telly tubbies (Just joking, Dunc!).
Hasn't my master done well out of this tsunami business! Luckily, Kate Wilko was available to give him some pointers for dealing with the media. It seems to have worked a charm! Apparently she put off meeting with some Union people to help him out, so it was a Win/Win situation!
I don't know how you can say that JK doesn't get an even break? He gets to hog all the good stuff; Letterman (even my master has to admit it was worth the appearance fee), the leadership, credibility... He's even told Cabinet to keep quiet about the Maori TV/Rugby deal until he gets back so that he can play peacemaker. Apparently he's bringing a "show of slides" to our next Caucus meeting to show us all the famous people he was in the same country as!! Do you know that he was within 10,000 kms of Justin Timberlake? I don't think he got a photo of him from the plane, but he did get one beside the waxwork of Obama. Even though it wasn't Dubya, I'm still sooo jealous.
Phoebe #1 The piece was written, and clearly stated that it was written, from a political perspective and for that reason is fair and you critique is unjust.
RichardRight You are the bitter one aren't you. Gee. I did think Colin was being a bit cynical but politics is a cynical business (that's why it's so much fun) and I can't help thinking he is right on this one. I know nat folk won't like that but then, judging from these pages, they don't like much.
Colin,
Amazing after the big Asian tsunami a number of years ago the warning systems in NZ are still so poor, what did the last govt do in regards to this? looks like not much successfully if its still so ineffectual.
I'm sure if it was not Samoa the Labour minister of Pacific Island Affairs (Laban) would not be up there at all or Carter. Laban would of gone there anyway for personal reasons.
One must ask if the Minister is up there who is making the big decisions on aid etc here? Someone needs to make the policy decisions on the run and make sure all is going smoothly. With all the world press, ministers, friends and families all flying upto Samoa the pressure on infrastructure must be huge with most of the hotels and accommodation gone, poor water supplies and food shortages etc as reported in the press. Or does the NZ govt need to send up more aid for all the rubber neckers also?
So far the response has been quite measured as I would expect. Firstly assess the damage, then areas of immediate need (medical, food, water, sewerage and shelter), then carry out futher assessment of secondary needs. I have worked with some experts in this area alongside UNHCR in East Timor and helped with infrastructure setting up some temporary camps. The govt so far deserve a 9 out of 10 for their response to date, but this is to be expected as well dusted plans would be sitting around for such disasters in the Asia Pacific areas.
Good move to with the PM to PM talks coming up with Key visiting at a suitable time after the event to allow the assessment process to be well underway so they can work on something worthwhile vice initial response stuff which was going to happen anyway. Things will take months and even upto a year to fully unfold as it is a huge job ahead.
I see the tsunami tragedy has brought the best out in the right wing. I think you will find that Laban was in Samoa to bury a family member who lost their life. Nice one, Tories. And I think you will find Len Brown is the Mayor of the largest Pacific city in the world, so it's not surprising that he would mobilise resources to help. I trust all the Tories have made a donation? Oh, sorry, you guys are all about self reliance and standing on your own two feet. It's character building, right? Can't have all these losers sitting around whimpering with their hands out, can we? Thank God your leader has some humanity.
"it's been difficult to know what to write - if anything - on a politics blog such as this."
Yes. I've just donated to the Red Cross instead.
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Guess you have forgotten how to write with empathy and sympathy.