Sherry for ensuring countrywide seismic-resistant schools, hospitals

ISLAMABAD: Minister for Information and Broadcasting, Sherry Rehman Thursday called for further strengthening government and civil society partnership in ensuring the safer construction and building for schools as well as hospitals in the country. “There is a scope to improve as long as we can all forge partnerships and work together. It is also our mandate to provide shelter to the people and we now add the new terminology of safer shelters or safer buildings,” she said while addressing a two-day international conference on School Safety. Sherry Rehman said in the years to come we will see smiles in the eyes of the children going to school, a sense of security and confidence in their future, as their future is the future of Pakistan.
The Conference was organized by Agha Khan Planning and Building Service,Pakistan in collaboration with Focus Humanitarian Assistance and Agha Khan Development Network (AKDN) against the backdrop of October 2005 earthquake that claimed lives of 17,000 school children due to destruction of school buildings in affected areas.
She said the building of a hospital or a school where there is a larger congregation of people, precise information historical data on intensity of earthquakes that have occurred within a radius of 300 km has to be collected.
In developed countries, this is a normal practice, she said and added but in this part of the globe, safety of school buildings and hospitals is perhaps the last priority.
“We need to take concrete steps to ensure this does not happen again, our children are safe in the school and our rural women are safe in their homes,” Sherry Rehman said.
Emphasizing the importance of a massive awareness drive, Sherry Rehman said it is required to enlighten the masses across the country.
“It is high time that big builders are brought under a confederation which keeps updating their knowledge about the advantages of earthquake resistant buildings,” she added.
Regarding the conference, the Minister said it is indeed a momentous occasion to see so many people gathered here to share best practices and advocate the concept of ‘School Safety’ for the future generations of Pakistan and the region.
She said no one knows exactly how many people died in the earthquake that rocked the nation in the morning on October 8, 2005.
However, estimates show that many of the 70,000 or more who were killed were women at home and children in school and it is estimated that at least 17,000 school children died when 6,700 schools were destroyed in NWFP and 1,300 in Azad Kashmir while millions were left homeless.
She said soon after the earthquake, teams after teams of experts visited the affected areas, adding that each expert had his own notions of safety and plans for future safety. The government accepted some recommendations and did implement some of them. However, the masses remained deprived of the provisions made by the government, because there is hardly any awareness amongst them.
The Minister said people of NWFP and Azad Kashmir have become quite aware about the significance of earthquake-resistant construction of houses.
She also commended AKDN for its efforts undertaken on the subject of school safety and a safely-built environment.
She expressed the hope the consolidation of best practices and knowledge will result in a firm set of recommendations for the government, private sector and other stakeholders.
In his introductory remarks, President of Agha Khan National Council for Pakistan, Iqbal Walji highlighted the objectives of the conference and said it would provide an opportunity for collaboration between important stakeholders to develop a proactive approach in designing integral policies for safer, seismic-resistant schools.