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Sixteen Years in Railway Vans

July 4, 2007

“I will never forget that day in my life. I was at school when earthquake struck. Everybody rushed to the door and gathered in one corner of the yard in several seconds. Then it stopped and children ran home without saying goodbye to each other.  Arriving home we saw terrible situation. Our houses were destroyed or cracked and the domestic animals and poultry were running around,” a resident of the village of Sairkhe in the Sachkhere district, Mariam Feradze, recalled the earthquake which happened sixteen years ago.

At that time the disaster damaged many villages in Sachkhere district. The earthquake resulted into the death of several people. The village of Khakhieti, close to the Ossetian border, completely disappeared under the earth. Only two children survived from the village. They were in the next village.

“We are still afraid to go there. Foresters still find horns and bones of domestic animals which were buried alive. It was a terrible tragedy for us and we cannot go over it yet,” said residents of Sachkhere.
Villagers live in railway vans now and receive their quests there. Sixteen years ago they were lodged in those “temporary accommodations” and could not imagine that they would remain there for ever; they could not imagine that only their relatives would pay attention to them.

“The government abandoned us. We hardly brought these vans here and moved into them without any complaints. There was not enough place for beds and elders slept on the floor.  Many of us could not get even this van and still live in cracked walls. Their houses might pull down any time and they will die under ruins,” complained villagers.

It is fact that pre-revolution government could not assist the people in Imereti region. As for the “Rose Government”, their first attempt to assist the damaged people failed. We were told in Sachkhere that in 2004 the list of 223 families from the district was prepared. Each family should have received allowance of 5 000 lari from the state budget. However the government soon forgot about the initiative. The list turned out fraudulent and it was reason for delay.

“They said that only those families should have been inserted on the list, who lived in vans. Nobody mentioned those people who lived at their relatives or those people who lived in their cracked houses under constant danger. We were expecting the allowances when they stated the lists were fraudulent. New lists must have been prepared. People became cruel. Neighbors started to envy each other. Others envied those who lived in vans,” said Mariam Feradze.

She finished the school in the van. There she heard her school bell ring for the last time. After the earthquake several red vans were brought in the school yard where classes were held. It was businessman Bidzina Ivanishvili’s present for children. However, people who did not have vans, got hold of those red vans (they hoped that if they occupied vans they would be inserted on the new list) and children lost their presents.

The list is ready and according to officials from the Imereti Regional Administration, it is sent to the Prime-Minister in Tbilisi. “Initially 84 were registered. New lists were prepared for one reason. Only those families should receive allowances who lived in vans. However, there are people who could not lodge in the van because they could not take one to the high place they lived. Thus, the government should pay attention to those families too. Consequently the lists are sent to Zurab Nogaideli for further consideration,” said Eliso Kiladze, the head of the Public Relations Department of the Imereti Gubernator.

Supposedly, sixteen-year-inhabitance in the van will finish next autumn. Local authority promised that victim families will receive money enough to build forty-square-meter-accommodation from the state budget by that time.

Shorena Kakabadze, Kutaisi

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