Thousands of residents of this working-class town in the Urals saw their homes flooded when a dam burst. In a Russia where all dissent is muzzled, they shared their exasperation with the authorities on franceinfo.
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After a sudden rise in temperatures, record floods flooded entire regions in Kazakhstan and Russia, in the south of the Urals and in eastern Siberia. The level of several rivers has risen extremely quickly since Friday April 5, breaking 80-year-old records such as on the Ural River, which notably flooded Orsk, on the geographical border between Europe and Asia. In this town of 200,000 inhabitants, nearly 2,000 homes were flooded and 8,000 people evacuated and affected. But something rare in Russia, this working-class city is screaming its anger, as Franceinfo’s special correspondent was able to observe.
For a week, hundreds of residents have been queuing every day in front of the theater to collect a food aid package like Serguei, whose house is under two meters of water. “I built it 12 years ago, everything was well renovated and now everything is under water. I don’t know how to get home anymore, I’m staying with friends. But when will the water will go down? Where will I sleep?”asks this disaster victim.
Sergei is angry and distraught, like Elena, one of his neighbors. “We are in great difficulty and our authorities are silentenrages this widow who lives with her mother and her three children. They don’t tell us anything at all. I made a request to the state services, but I got nothing.” Elena shows us her clothes. That’s all she has left, she explains. With her mother, they receive around 30,000 rubles (300 euros) in pensions which are supplemented by a few odd jobs.
With its rickety trams, its factories spewing ocher smoke and its portraits of deserving workers displayed on Lenin Square, Orsk has not emerged unscathed from the Soviet era. “It’s a poor town, explains Anton, a local journalist, it is a large industrial center but unfortunately in the 1990s many factories closed. The first flooded districts, the old town, the Nickel district, are very poor”.
“Residents have lost their belongings, they are shocked and afraid.”
Anton, a local journalist
The Nickel district – so nicknamed because it was created by a metallurgical conglomerate in the 1930s to house workers – was submerged on the evening of April 5 when a dam burst. Two days earlier, however, the authorities wanted to be reassuring.“I went to see the dam twice a day, I was very worried, remembers Natalia, a resident of the neighborhood. Our mayor came to tell us that everything was under control, that the dam will hold. When the dam burst, the water covered everything in a second. I left in slippers”she says.
The dam in question is rather a large earth dike. Some say that everything was put there during construction, old boards, waste. The mayor of Orsk claimed during a public meeting that beavers had weakened this dam, but residents replied that poor workmanship and corruption were to blame. Here, everyone remembers the price of this dam when it was built 10 years ago: “A billion rubles!”, chokes Serguei (around 10 million euros). A colossal sum.
The residents of the Nickel district are convinced that part of this money has been embezzled. True or not, this explanation says a lot about their level of trust in the authorities. Elena adds: “It’s like all these clothes, these furniture, that we get sent from everywhere. How much will the administration put into its pocket? What will we collect upon arrival?“During a meeting, the region’s governor demanded that residents stop filming with their mobile phones. “And how can we prove that you said anything?” they replied.
As is often the case in Russia, the announcement of the natural disaster triggered a great outpouring of solidarity. Volunteers from across the region flocked to help residents evacuate. Batyr, a tall guy in fishing waders, says that with his association of rescuers they have been carrying out evacuations for a week. “I had to evacuate 200 people personally, says this engineer, who works in the Orenburg sector, the regional capital. We had to take out bedridden, sick people who were sheltering in the attic.” Natacha collects animals abandoned in flooded houses. “People left, leaving the animals behindexplains this young woman. The state is not present, even for the few volunteers who try to take care of the animals. There is no shelter in Orsk and there are a lot of stray animals”.
System D remains in place, assures Natalia, who affirms that the State’s resources are non-existent. “We managed on our own, the men worked the first two days in our neighborhood with a rowing boat. It’s very difficult when water comes from the dam with a strong current. All the residents therefore chipped in for their buy a motorboat. It says a lot when modest people bring money and help,” she sighs. However, the Minister of Emergency Situations, Alexander Kourenkov, went there. But above all he castigated the attitude of “people who did not evacuate even though the alert had been given a week ago.“ Comments moderately appreciated in Orsk.
Natalia, like her neighbors, does not have insurance. “I don’t trust themexplains Sergei. There is always a good reason for them not to pay.“Last week, the victims cried out “Putin help” on Lenin Square. But the president has not blinked and will not come to Orsk, said the Kremlin, specifying that he “keeps informed of the situation“. As is often the case, Moscow lets the local authorities manage the anger of the residents. They have just announced emergency aid of 100,000 rubles per person (1,000 euros) and promised that there will be compensation for the houses But without further details.
Polina clings to these promises. “Hope gives life, breathes this woman at the edge of the immense lake that her neighborhood has become, and I really want to believe it. My husband, who is a realist, doesn’t believe they will pay. I would very much like the president (Poutine) gets involved in this matter, because now they will all forget what happened to us. We will be handed over to the mayor who promised us that the dam would not break.”she fears.
Off the microphone, many residents tell us they don’t trust anyone, neither in Orsk nor in Moscow. The image of a united Russia, entirely behind power, has taken a hit. It crashed into the wall of water of the Ural River.