A partly repaired house in the historic Bungamati district of the Kathmandu Valley
By Denis McClean
KATHMANDU, 25 April 2019 - An estimated 612,000 families are living in transitional shelter four years after the devastating earthquake which struck Nepal on April 25, 2015, killing 9,000 people, injuring 22,000 and destroying or damaging almost one million houses.
As though heralding the anniversary, three strong tremors were felt throughout the Kathmandu Valley yesterday but no major damage was reported.
Reconstruction is the focus of today’s local media coverage on the 4th anniversary of the Gorkha earthquake which was followed by another deadly tremor on May 12.
The Kathmandu Post leads with “Four years after Nepal’s deadly earthquakes, survivors continue to live in disarray” and the main headline in The Himalayan newspaper is “Pace of reconstruction taking forever to pick up.”
The Nepali Times has a striking photograph on its front page of a nine-floor high rise apartment building which clearly exceeds the height recommendations in the country’s seismic building code, underlining the challenge of enforcing implementation.
Economic losses from the earthquake were estimated at US$10 billion almost one-third of Nepal’s GDP.
The National Reconstruction Authority housing grant of US$3,000 to each affected family has still not been taken up by all those entitled to it and the Authority’s chairman, Mr. Sushil Gyewali, told the media that a further US$ 4.29 billion is needed “to complete reconstruction of structures devastated by the earthquake.”
The government’s Post-Disaster Needs Assessment estimated a need of US$ 9.38 billion for the five-year reconstruction and rehabilitation plan.
More than 1,000 health facilities and 5,000 schools were completely destroyed in 2015 and, but for the fact that the earthquake occurred on a Saturday, many thousands of children could have been killed.
UNESCO is involved with the government in a major campaign to restore the damage done to 700 temples, palaces and museums at seven world heritage sites, including 137 which totally collapsed.