Aceh flood survivors still displaced months later

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Residents walk across a log amid flash flood damage to a residential area in Meurah Dua, Aceh province's Pidie Jaya district on Saturday after devastating floods and landslides struck Indonesia's Sumatra late last year. japantimes.co.jp

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Indonesian flood survivors in Aceh are still living in tents nearly three months after last year’s monsoon deluge, with about 26,000 people remaining displaced, according to AFP reporting carried by The Japan Times. Aceh accounted for most of the more than 1,000 deaths from the floods and landslides, and residents say assistance has slowed as the emergency phase faded. In Meurah Dua and surrounding areas, families describe Ramadan preparations reduced to what can be cooked and stored in temporary shelters.

The delay is not only about rebuilding houses. It is about how responsibility moves through a chain of agencies, contractors and local officials once the cameras leave. Emergency aid is easiest to distribute when the task is visible—food packs, tents, water—but harder when it becomes a procurement problem: land clearance, permits, compensation, and deciding who is eligible for what kind of housing. Each step creates a veto point, and the cheapest option for the bureaucracy is often to extend “temporary” arrangements rather than commit to a timetable it can be held to.

The incentives also change for everyone else. Donors tend to give early, when the disaster is a headline, and then stop when the story becomes administrative. Families without insurance or savings become long-term claimants on state capacity, while local elites who control access to land, materials and paperwork can wait out public scrutiny. A tent city becomes a holding pen: people are kept safe enough to avoid scandal, but not resettled fast enough to end dependence.

What looks like a slow response is, in practice, a rationing system. When relocation is delayed, households pay in lost income, disrupted schooling, and informal fees for transport, documents, or a place on a list. The government can announce plans and inspections at low cost; the expensive part is execution, which requires clear lines of authority and a budget that survives the next crisis.

In Aceh, residents say they are still waiting for durable housing and basic services to return to normal. The tents remain in place, the debris is not fully cleared, and the displaced are still counting time in weeks rather than in construction milestones.

On Saturday, survivors in Meurah Dua crossed flood damage on makeshift logs to reach what is left of their neighbourhoods, while their official status remains “temporary shelter.”