Vol. 71/No. 36      October 1, 2007

The destruction of life and infrastructure was magnified by the underdevelopment of Indonesia stemming from centuries of direct colonial rule, followed by decades of imperialist exploitation and misrule by local capitalist regimes. The economy of Indonesia is dominated by Australia, Japan, the United States, and other imperialist powers.

“Almost 75 percent of houses on the coastline along a 10-kilometer stretch are badly damaged and collapsed,” Frans Karal, a local official, told the press. An estimated 15,000 buildings have collapsed or been seriously damaged. Agence France-Presse reported September 15 that rescue workers are still scouring the rubble to search for victims feared trapped.

The official death toll is 23. Another 88 are reported injured. Both figures are expected to increase. Hundreds of thousands of people living along the coasts have fled to the higher ground.

The island has 1,100 miles of coast along the Indian Ocean. In December 2004, an undersea earthquake near the northwestern coast sent a massive tsunami rippling across the Indian Ocean. More than two-thirds of the 230,000 people killed in that disaster were in northern Sumatra.

As in 2004, the impact of this most recent disaster is amplified by centuries of imperialist domination. Indonesia, and Sumatra in particular, are rich in natural resources—oil, gas, palm oil, rubber, lumber, gold, and numerous other minerals. Much of the country’s wealth is today siphoned off by monopolies and giant banks in the imperialist centers. This system is propped up locally by Indonesia’s ruling class of landlords and capitalists.

The country’s debt to international banks equals 45 percent of its gross domestic product. The imperialists use this unpayable debt as a mechanism to further extract the country’s wealth.

The majority of Indonesia’s 235 million people survive on less than $2 a day, and 18 percent on $1 a day or less. The 80 million-plus people in the latter category “spend a quarter of their earnings on rice, which has risen in price by more than a third in the past year,” the Economist reported in September 2006.

Indonesia’s government began efforts to build a network of tsunami warning systems along the coast following the 2004 disaster. Government officials claim the system will be fully functional by 2008.

But the warning systems that have been installed so far played little or no role in minimizing the social catastrophe this time.

The fundamental problem is the lack of electricity and infrastructure, including for modern communications.

In one village the warning siren did not work due to a power outage. The village was hit by a small tsunami. A radio and Internet early warning system in Padang, one of the hardest-hit cities, also failed.

According to official government statistics, more than one-fifth of Sumatra’s population has no access to electricity. More than half live in villages without a telephone.  
 
 
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