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YANGON: Myanmar residents awoke Sunday to devastation after tropical
cyclone Nargis tore through swathes of the country, battering
buildings, sinking boats and causing unknown casualties, officials
said.
The cyclone also ripped down power and phone
lines, cutting off the military-run nation just a week before a
crucial referendum on its new constitution, the first polling in
Myanmar since general elections in 1990.
Five central and southern regions, Yangon,
Ayeyawaddy, Bago, Mon and Karen States, have been declared disaster
areas, an official at the information ministry told Agence France-Presse.
The main city of Yangon was hard hit, with
traffic lights, billboards and street lamps littering the roads
after being blown over by the strong winds that swept through on
Saturday, an Agence France-Presse reporter on the scene said.
Trees have been uprooted, crushing buildings and
cars, while the water pipes were also cut, forcing people out onto
the streets with buckets to try and buy water from the few shops
that remained open.
“So far we know there were casualties
[deaths], but we cannot release the details yet as we are still
collecting information,” said the official.
“We also deployed military units for rescue
and rehabilitation projects. Now the military and police have
started to clean the city,” he added.
On the streets of Yangon, rumors circulated that
two women had been crushed to death by trees, but there was no
official confirmation.
Roofs of houses have been torn away, while only
a few taxis and buses, which tripled their prices, braved the
debris-clogged streets on Sunday.
The information ministry official said that
seven empty boats had sunk in the country’s main port, while
Yangon’s international airport was closed until further notice
with flights diverted to the city of Mandalay.
“We are trying to get back to the normal
situation as soon as possible,” he said, adding that the prime
minister and other officials had left the isolated administrative
capital Naypyidaw and headed to Yangon for rescue efforts.
Electricity supplies and telecommunications in
Yangon have been cut since late Friday night as the storm bore down
from the Bay of Bengal, packing winds of 190 to 240 kilometers (120
to 150 miles) per hour.
Nargis made landfall around the mouth of the
Ayeyawaddy (Irrawaddy) River, about 220 kilometers (137 miles)
southwest of Yangon, before hitting the country’s economic hub
of Yangon.
With most communication down in impoverished
Myanmar, no one yet knows what kind of damage or deaths the storm
caused along the coast in Ayeyawaddy.
The number of people injured throughout the
country also remains a mystery.
“I heard many people were injured, but I
don’t know how many,” said one hospital worker in Yangon.
There were fears that the poorer outlying
areas of Yangon with their flimsy houses might have been hard hit.
“A tea shop owner told me that many people in
a Yangon suburb need urgent help for food and accommodation,” one
vendor said. “Some children are not even wearing clothes… They
are now staying at a monastery.”
Myanmar’s infrastructure has been run into the
ground by decades of mismanagement by the military, which has ruled
since 1962.
It was not immediately known whether damage from
the storm would affect the referendum next Saturday on a new
constitution, which the ruling junta says will pave the way for
democratic elections in 2010.
Critics, however, say the charter will simply
enshrine the military’s power.
Residents in Yangon said they had heard
speculation that the referendum might be postponed, but the
information ministry official refused to comment.
“We cannot say anything, it is up to the
senior authorities,” he said.
Thailand’s meteorological department on Sunday
downgraded Nargis to a depression, but warned of flash floods and
heavy rains in northern, central and eastern Thai provinces, as the
storm crept over the border from Myanmar.
-- AFP
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