Being
a volunteer for the Pakistan earthquake relief and recovery
operation isn’t an easy job. The hours are long and the
work is sometimes back-breaking but for Asif Alisiddiqua, the
knowledge that he is helping to improve the lives of vulnerable
people makes it all worth it.
Asif joined the Pakistan Red Crescent Society (PRCS) in 2003
and was helping to raise funds for the victims of the Asian
tsunami before a massive earthquake, measuring 7.6 on the Richter
scale, struck the north of his country in October 2005, killing
more than 73,000 people and making over 3.5 million homeless.
Asif immediately offered to help with the emergency relief efforts
and he’s been distributing essential aid items, such as
blankets, winterized tents and shelter repair kits, to survivors
ever since.
“I saw pictures of innocent people in the newspapers and
on TV,” says Asif. “They were so vulnerable and
right away, I knew I wanted to help… after all, they are
my people and this is my country.”
Soon after the disaster struck, Asif started working in the
town of Mansehra, in the North West Frontier Province (NWFP),
where he collected money and relief goods from donors and distributed
them through the PRCS.
Over the past seven months, he has helped deliver supplies to
tens of thousands of people, while carrying out needs assessments
in remote areas like the Kaghan Valley, which is often cut off
to road traffic due to bad weather and rockslides.
Taking time out from helping with a helicopter airlift of relief
supplies in the valley, Asif sits down on a rock and explains
what volunteering means to him.
“I love this work,” he says. “Despite the
difficulties, I love it and I know that what I’m doing
is very important, so this also gives me a lot of satisfaction
and makes me very proud.
“For me, the best part of being a volunteer is that my
sense of compassion has increased… my heart has definitely
grown bigger because of what I’ve seen,” he adds.
Asif says he sometimes had to walk for several kilometres at
very high altitudes in order to reach people living in the most
remote areas. Throughout the relief operation, he has been sleeping
in a tent in Balakot, the area hardest-hit by the earthquake
in the NWFP.
Syed Ali Hassan, the head of operations for the Pakistan Red
Crescent’s provincial branch in the NWFP, agrees that
volunteers have lent both tremendous courage and stamina to
the relief efforts.
“The volunteers are the backbone of this operation,”
Syed Ali says. “Without them, the Red Cross Red Crescent
would not have been able to reach out to the hundreds of thousands
of people we’ve helped since the earthquake occurred.”
Syed Ali points out that volunteers will also be instrumental
in assisting more than one million people in rebuilding their
lives and their communities over the next three years as part
of the International Federation’s three-year recovery
plan.
“Because the volunteers come from local communities, they
are well-placed to understand and address the future needs of
the population,” he says.
“This is important because we want the quake survivors
to take the lead in deciding for themselves what their reconstructed
communities will look like.
“What’s more, people also place a lot of trust in
volunteers because they speak the language and know the local
customs,” Syed Ali adds.
Asif agrees that being close to the country and its people gives
him a distinct advantage in reaching out to isolated groups
but he believes that Red Cross and Red Crescent volunteers also
speak a “universal language” that helps unite the
Movement.
“We all have a soft spot in our hearts for people,”
he says. “I think we also all try to be polite and considerate
no matter what the circumstances… sometimes there are
difficulties but there’s nothing we can’t handle
because our ultimate goal is to help.”
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Asif
Alisiddiqua organises the distribution of relief supplies
in Khagan Valley, where villagers have lined up to receive
blankets, shelter repair kits an corrugated iron sheeting.
(p13949)
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Asif
Alisiddiqua has been a volunteer with the Red Crescent
since 2003. (p13948)
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Two
volunteers from the Pakistan Red Crescent Society, including
Asif (left), help villagers in Khagan register to pick
up relief supplies. (p13947)
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