Land grab 'isn't fiction for tsunami victims'

ActionAid UK

ActionAid, London - On Tuesday night, the BBC will air a major new film [Tsunami, The Aftermath, 9pm, BBC2] set in the days after the devastating Asian tsunami of 2004, starring Tim Roth as a journalist who uncovers a plot to steal land from tsunami victims for the construction of a new hotel. But for thousands of tsunami victims, the theft of their land is anything but fiction.

With coastal land at a premium for tourism and sea areas coveted by industrial fishing companies, governments across tsunami-affected areas have discouraged and sometimes actually prevented people returning to their land.

In Thailand, tsunami survivors returning to their homes just days after the tsunami found that developers had already moved in. "I came to the village the day after the tsunami to look for my children but the guards had already put a fence up," one survivor told ActionAid researchers. "I begged them to let me in but they said it was their land and they would be building a hotel. We have lost our families, now we are losing our land"

Land grab is not just a problem in Thailand. In India, survivors from Manginpudi Beach in Andhra Pradesh were forcibly relocated two kilometres away from their original village to make way for new tourist resorts.

And just last week, twelve tsunami survivors were seriously beaten by police in the Andaman Islands while protesting against Government decisions to rehouse them far from their land.

"Over and over again, we have seen communities prevented from returning to their land, relocated to unsuitable areas without being consulted and left in the dark about housing policy" said Jack Campbell, Emergencies Officer. "As we approach two years since the disaster, it is incredible that this abuse of human rights is still happening."

* ActionAid stands alongside marginalised communities, ensuring that they know their rights and helping them to demand that their voices are heard.