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(PALU, Indonesia) – Christians dressed in their most skimpy clothes stormed Sunday sermons during the earthquake and tsunami that swept the Indonesian city of Palu in search of answers as the balance sheet victims of the double disaster had risen to 1,700 and those responsible feared more than 5,000 others missing.
The Indonesian Disaster Agency said the death toll had risen to 1,763, mainly in Palu. Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, spokesman for the agency, said that many more people could be buried, especially in the Palu neighborhoods in Petobo and Balaroa, where more than 3,000 homes were damaged or aspired into the mud when the earthquake of September 28th caused the liquefaction of the soil.
"According to reports from the village chiefs of Balaroa and Petobo, some 5,000 people have not been found. Our field workers are trying to confirm this, "he told a news briefing in Jakarta, capital of Indonesia.
Nugroho said efforts to recover decomposed bodies in deep, soft mud became increasingly difficult and that some people may have fled or been rescued and evacuated. More than 8,000 wounded or vulnerable residents were taken or shipped from Palu, while others could have left by land, he said.
Nugroho officially announced that only 265 people were missing and that 152 others were still buried in mud and rubble, nine days after the magnitude 7.5 earthquake and the powerful tsunami that struck Palu and his surroundings.
The government aims to end search operations by Thursday, nearly two weeks after the disaster, when the missing will be declared missing and considered dead, Nugroho said.
At Palu Sunday, at least 200 people, including soldiers, filled the gray benches of the Protestant Church of Manunggal for a service.
They sang as a young girl in a black and white dress with a red bow danced down the aisle, praying and listening to Pastor Lucky Malonda's 30-minute sermon. A woman at the front of the bench cried.
Min Kapala, a 49-year-old teacher, said she came to the city of more than 25 churches in a remote area because her usual place of worship had been destroyed and liquefaction had moved a different terrain to her place. location.
"I am here in this church especially because my own church is no longer; it is leveled and on its site is a corn plant, "she said. "It was very strange to me."
Outside the church, Malonda said that the intensity of the disaster had surprised even scientists and called it God's will. Two people from his congregation have disappeared, he said.
"This is certainly part of God's intervention, and not outside the power of Almighty God, which can not be predicted or planned by anything," Malonda said.
He said that religious leaders are discussing the organization of interreligious prayers but nothing has been agreed yet.
Protestants, Catholics and Charismatics make up about 10% of the population of Palu, the capital of central Sulawesi province. The province has long had violent conflicts between Muslims and Christians, although tensions have eased over the past decade. Indonesia is the most populous Muslim country in the world.
Loki Djanggola, governor of central Sulawesi, said the local authorities were meeting with religious groups and families of victims to obtain their consent and try to turn the destroyed neighborhoods into liquefaction into mass graves.
He told local TV that survivors from Petobo, Balaroa and Jono Oge neighborhoods could be displaced and monuments would be built in the areas, which now look like uncultivated land, to remember the victims buried in the area. . Officials said it was not safe to operate heavy equipment in these areas and feared the risk of spreading diseases caused by decomposed bodies.
While facing immediate relief needs, the government is also developing plans to help more than 70,000 people, including tens of thousands of children displaced by disasters, rebuild their lives.
Social welfare officials have set up cribs in makeshift tents to protect children and help them heal trauma.
Market vendors have resumed their activities and roadside restaurants have been opened in Palu, but long lines of cars and motorcycles have always come out of the service stations.
In Jakarta, volunteers surveyed the empty streets of cars collecting donations for the victims of the earthquake during the car-free weekly morning in the city center.
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Ng reported in Jakarta, Indonesia.
