TWO DAYS after the country was swamped by one of the worst dam disasters in its history, Lao authorities have ordered new safety |procedures for hydropower dam projects.

The collapse of the Xe Pian-Xe Namnoy Dam in the southern Lao province of Attapeu on Monday has left at least 26 people dead and an estimated 100 missing as of yesterday.

Lao Energy and Mine Minister Khammany Inthirath yesterday announced new regulations to ensure safety of all hydropower dams in the country, as well as proper water management to reduce risks from floods damaging people’s lives and properties from water discharge, especially during storms in the monsoon season.

On Monday night, the rapidly rising water level in the reservoir of Xe Pian-Xe Namnoy Dam following continuous heavy rains, damaged the supporting saddle dam, causing devastating floods in the downstream area.

Residents displaced by massive flood waters from the collapsed dam seek shelter in Paksong town in Champasak province on July 25, 2018. The bodies of 17 people have been recovered after a dam collapse led to flash floods in southern Laos, as two South Korean firms involved in the hydropower project said damage was reported at least 24 hours before the disaster. // AFP PHOTO

More than 7,000 people had been displaced as of yesterday after large areas of Attapeu and Champasak provinces were inundated.

The overflowing water from the dam also raised the levels of the Mekong River and caused floods in the nearby Steung Treng province in Cambodia.

Laos’ Energy and Mine Ministry said in a statement that the country has been hit by extraordinarily severe rainy weather due to the impact of tropical storm Son Tinh, triggering floods in many parts of the country. There was also a danger to the stability of other hydropower dams.

The ministry ordered the operators of all hydropower dams to closely monitor the weather and precipitation as well as the water levels in the reservoirs to prevent damage to the dams.

Every dam operator will have to submit a report on the water situation, the electricity generation plan, the condition of the dams’ facilities, and the emergency response plan |to the ministry once every seven days.

The ministry also made it mandatory for all dam operators to collaborate with local authorities to draft an emergency response plan in case of disasters to warn people and evacuate them if necessary.

Also, if the dams needed to change the water outflow rate, they have to notify people downstream at least seven days in advance to allow them to prepare for the impact from the discharge.

A resident is seen in the flooded area in Sanamxai, Attapeu province, on July 25, 2018. Rescuers recovered 19 bodies and hundreds remain missing after a dam collapse swamped several villages in southern Laos, as survivors on July 25 questioned why they got little warning of the deluge. // AFP PHOTO

According to the Lao Energy and Mine Ministry, there are 54 operational hydropower dams across the country.

Laos has heavily invested in hydropower in recent years, as the country is pursuing its national strategy to become the “battery of Asia”, by generating power from its rich water resources and selling the electricity to neighbouring countries.

Meanwhile, Chainarong Setthachua, a lecturer at Maha Sarakham University, said the disaster could have been prevented if the owners of the hydropower project had adhered to safety principles and had been equipped with an emergency response system.

“This dam did not collapse because of the overwhelming water level in the reservoir, as the Lao officials and the project owners tried to explain,” Chainarong stressed.

“The reservoir was not even full when a part of the dam subsided and collapsed. This clearly shows that the true cause of this disaster was improper construction of the |dam and the constructors of this project are fully responsible for all damages.”

He said the project’s partners must provide full compensation to every person affected by the disaster, otherwise they would be violating the principles of business and human rights protection.

The Xe Pian-Xe Namnoy hydropower dam project is a joint venture between four companies from South Korea, Laos and Thailand with a total budget of US$1 billion (Bt33 billion).

The project, with electricity generating capacity of 410 megawatts, was scheduled to start commercial operations next year.

The dam reservoir has a total area of 522 square kilometres with water storage capacity of around 1 billion cubic metres.

The election lead-up and actual campaign has seen legal amendments, oppression of dissident voices and interference in media, paving the way for the sixth election victory for Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen.

Phil Robertson, the deputy Asia director of Human Rights Watch (HRW), dubbed the Cambodian system as “one-party dictatorship disguised as democracy”.

“With his government changing laws to obstruct the opposition from contesting and ignoring bans by international election monitors, Hun Sen has now changed the political paradigm,” he said. “These changes will likely favour him and his rule for the next 10 to 15 years.”

Robertson called for stronger international pressure, possibly bans, from the United States and the European Union as their previous moves to cut aid and suspension of funding had not yielded results. “What we are seeing is Donald Trump abandoning any pretence of an ethical form of foreign policy in the name of realpolitik,” he went on .“The EU, meanwhile, is increasingly divided that they are even failing to come together to put pressure on human rights issues.”

HRW attended Tuesday’s forum together with representatives from other rights monitors as well as Asean Parliamentarians for Human Rights (APHR) at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Thailand in Bangkok.

Chandanie Watawala, executive director of Asian Network for Free Elections (Anfrel), said that Anfrel would be among civil society groups that would not deploy observers in the country.

Anfrel cited the absence of the main opposition party, threats by government and party officials, absence of non-partisan election observers as well as restriction of space for independent coverage as reasons for declining to monitor the election. “Of the nearly 80,000 accredited domestic observers, more than half hail from two groups, the Union of Youth Federation of Cambodia and the Cambodian Women for Peace and Development,” Anfrel said in a press release issued on the day. “Both have close ties to the ruling party, as the first is headed by Hun Many, one of the PM’s sons, and the second by Deputy PM Men Sam An.”

Sam Zafiri, secretary-general of the International Commission of Jurists, pointed out that the situation in the upcoming election was even worse than the 2014 election, which had already been deemed unfair.

The Cambodian government has taken absolute control through legal enforcement of lese majeste, amended constitutional clauses that mandates every Khmer citizen of their “obligation to defend the motherland” as well as the introduction of an anti-fake-news bill, Zafiri said.

“This new legal structure is the opposite of the rule of law, where the judiciary can no longer protect the rights of people in Cambodia and instead oppresses them,” he said. “We’re looking to the international community to press Cambodia to return to the rule of law by not supporting this election.”

Charles Santiago, a Malaysian member of Parliament who chairs the APHR, urged Asean countries not to congratulate the winner of the election. “Democracy leaders in Asean should press Cambodia on this election, as the government there is doing everything possible to win votes,” he said.

“He will return to Malaysia when he has been given a clean bill of health after undergoing ‘reverse shoulder replacement surgery’,” she said after witnessing a signing ceremony for a memorandum of understanding between IJN Foundation and Yayasan MyPrihatin at the National Heart Institute on Wednesday (July 25).

On the status of Anwar’s health, Nurul Izzah, who is also Permatang Pauh MP, said the doctors would issue a statement on that in due time, adding that his family misses him.

When asked about which post she would contest in the party polls, the two-term PKR vice-president said she would make the announcement when the time is right.

“TVET is the future and we want to ensure the value of a TVET certificate is equal to that of a university graduate’s certificate.

“We also want to want to ensure TVET institutions can function as a place to educate children from lower-income groups,” she said.

Two South Korean contractors said they reported damage at least a day before parts of the Xe-Namnoy dam gave way Monday and unleashed a wall of water.

A Thai consular official, Chana Miencharoen, at the scene of the relief effort in Attapeu province told AFP that by Wednesday late afternoon 26 bodies had been recovered.

“Seventeen others are injured and in hospital,” he said, adding roof-level floodwater was hampering rescue efforts in a remote area of the poor, landlocked Southeast Asian country.

In an update on Wednesday afternoon state-run Laos News Agency said hundreds of people remained unaccounted for, with at least 50 missing from the village of Ban Mai alone.

Footage on Laos television showed people huddled on roofs awaiting rescue as muddy water swirled menacingly just below them, with the army and local volunteers leading the relief effort.

Questions began to emerge over the collapse, with some of the displaced saying they were warned to evacuate homes only hours before disaster struck.

“It happened quickly, we had little time to prepare ourselves,” Joo Hinla, 68, from one of the worst-hit villages of Ban Hin Lath, told AFP from a warehouse crammed with over 700 displaced people in a neighbouring province.

“All of the houses in my village are under water. Four of my family are missing, we don’t know about their fate yet.”

Hundreds of other displaced people, including women, children and the elderly, sat on the floor nearby surrounded by plastic bags crammed with meagre belongings.

 – The damming of Laos –

Laos, poor but blessed with abundant natural resources, aims to become the “Battery of Asia” allowing dozens of foreign-funded dam projects across its network of rivers.

But fears over the environmental impact of the projects, which export most of their electricity to neighbouring Thailand and China, go virtually unvoiced inside the tightly controlled communist country.

Villagers across the country have been moved, some several times, to make way for dams whose benefits are mainly enjoyed outside of the country, campaigners say.

Once complete, around 90 percent of the electricity generated by the Xe-Namnoy dam was destined for Thailand.

The remote flooded area is only accessible by helicopter and flat-bottomed boats, with roads badly damaged or completely washed away.

Rescue officials in neighbouring Thailand were reportedly stuck at the border because Laotians were sluggish in allowing access to the country.

South Korea was sending a relief team to the area, President Moon Jae-in’s spokesman said Wednesday in Seoul.

“Although we are still determining the cause of the dam accident, our government must actively take part in on-site relief efforts without delay as our companies were involved in the construction of the dam,” Moon was quoted as saying.

– Questions over warning –

Two South Korean companies involved in the $1.2 billion project said damage was reported a day before the dam collapsed following heavy monsoon rain.

SK Engineering & Construction said it discovered that the upper part of the structure had washed away at around 9:00 pm on Sunday.

“We immediately alerted the authorities and began evacuating villagers downstream,” it said in a statement.

Repair work was hampered by rain which had damaged roads, it said, and early on Monday water was discharged from the Xe-Namnoy dam — one of the two main dams in the project — to try to relieve pressure on the auxiliary structure.

The government was warned about further damage to the dam at around noon, prompting an official evacuation order for villagers downstream, and the structure collapsed a few hours later, it said.

Dam operator Korea Western Power Co. said one of the auxiliary dams — “Saddle D” — broke under heavy rain.

But according to a timeline the firm provided in a report to a South Korean lawmaker and obtained by AFP, it said “11 centimetres of subsidence was found at the centre of the dam ” as early as Friday.

Emergency repair equipment could not be used as the subsidence worsened.

“It remains unclear what caused the dam to subside in some places and develop cracks,” a Korea Western Power spokesman told AFP.

The 410 megawatt capacity plant was supposed to start commercial operations by 2019.

The project consists of a series of dams over the Houay Makchanh, the Xe-Namnoy and the Xe-Pian rivers.

The Ministry of Energy and Mines announced yesterday it ordered that the management of all hydropower dams stay on alert and keep a close eye on weather forecasts and manage rising levels of water in reservoirs.

In addition, hydropower projects must report on their water management to the ministry regularly so that it will be in a position to come up with a plan to respond in case of emergency, the announcement stated.

After examining the safety of the dam nationwide the Ministry had found no major incidents except for Xe Pian Xe Namnoy, a high-ranking official from the ministry who acts a focal point between the government and power project developers told Vientiane Times yesterday.

“We are checking the operation of the dams nationwide. From the reports, we received so far, there are no major incidents except Xe Pian Xe Namnoy. Only three dams informed that they were discharging water, which was considered as per normal practices” the official said.

Dams that are discharging water to maintain water at safety level include 180 MW Nam Gniep 2 in Xiengkhuan province, 86 MW Nam Phay in Xaysomboun province, 168 MW Nam Tha 1 in the border area between Bokeo and Luang Namtha provinces.

Khammuan’s Nam Theun 2 was also among those to announce measures, in the form of a stoppage to power generation in order to release water into a downstream channel Tuesday.

The Power Administration Department confirmed yesterday it had agreed to the request by the management of Nam Tha 1 and Nam Gniep 2 to discharge water as part of efforts to follow safety standards and implementation plans.

Another source described the water discharge as standard practice in such case the water level in the dam reservoir increases.

This practice aims to maintain the safety level of the dam, he said.

The company said its President Ahn Jae-hyun and senior company officials have left for the Southeast Asian country to figure out the scope of the damage caused by the flood, which occurred late Monday, and to support rescue operations there.

The builder said huge amounts of water flooded over the Xepian-Xe Nam Noy hydropower plant dam in San Sai district of Attapeu province in the southeast of the country, sweeping away nearby villages and displacing around 6,600 people. Hundreds of people are reported missing.

Although initial media reports said one of the dams under construction collapsed, the company said it is checking whether the dam actually failed or if water swept over it.

An official from the company said the area had been hit by heavy rainfall three times greater than normal.

“The overflow of water went downstream, which had already been flooded, causing more damage,” he said.

The company is supporting the Laotian government’s rescue operations by bringing in helicopters from Thailand to help rescue stranded people. Villagers in nearby areas have been evacuated, the company said, adding that the affected area is surrounded by dense forest where communication isn’t easy, complicating rescue efforts.

The dam was built by a joint venture comprising SK E&C and Laos and Thai partners beginning in 2013 and was expected to go into full operation next year.

“President Moon instructed the government to come up with strong support measures, including the dispatch of an emergency relief team, to Laos,” Moon’s spokesman, Kim Eui-kyeom, told a press briefing.

The details of Seoul’s government support measures, including the size of the relief mission, will be decided at a meeting to be held later in the day, involving vice ministerial officials from related offices, the spokesman said.

Hundreds of people are said to have gone missing while more than 6,000 others have been displaced, according to earlier reports.

Still, Moon’s order comes amid a dispute over what may have led to the disaster.

Local newspapers have suggested the collapse of part of the dam built by a South Korean consortium, led by SK Engineering & Construction, may have led to the flood while the South Korean builder insists unexpectedly huge amounts of water had flooded over the dam, leading to the partial collapse of the dam.

The South Korean president said identifying who might be at fault can wait.

“They are currently working to identify the cause of the accident, but the government must immediately take part in the emergency relief efforts since our companies are also involved in the construction of the dam,” he was quoted as saying.

SK E&C is known to have a 26-per-cent stake in the auxiliary dam with the state-run Korea Western Power Co., Ltd. owning a 24-percent stake.

The government was willing to send medics, military personnel electricians and equipment upon its neighbour’s request, said Sansern.

Prayut offered his condolences to Laos and sent moral support to the victims as well as any assistance, according to Sansern.

Defence ministry spokesman Kongcheep Tantravanich said defence minister Gen Prawit Wongsuwan had ordered a disaster prevention war room to monitor the flood in Laos. The centre had prepared equipment, such as planes and helicopters, ready to help, he said.

At the event, Theresa May praised the heroism of those involved in the extraordinary cave rescue.

The group of rescuers, who have been cave diving for over 20 years, battled zero visibility conditions and narrow cave passages to reach the trapped boys.

Thai Ambassador to London Pisanu Suvanajata also attended.

Among those attending with their families was John Volanthen, one of the British divers who was part of the team which first discovered the boys.

He was also one of the three divers who went out as the initial team and who helped place guides in the cave to assist others in navigation.

Also at the event was Robert Harper, who was part of the team which pinpointed the boys’ exact location, and Vernon Unsworth, who first alerted cave divers in the UK to the situation in Thailand.

Divers who took part in the final stages of the rescue were also honoured at the reception, including Chris Jewell who successfully guided the second-to-last boy to safety.

May said “It’s a pleasure to welcome you to Downing Street today. This was an amazing rescue mission. On hearing about the boys who were trapped most people would have just stood by but you chose to go out there and do something about it.”

The eyes of the world were on you and I think I can speak for everyone when I say a huge thank you, said May.

“John [Volanthen] you have said that you’re not heroes…well to most of us you are.”

May also said that sadly a Thai diver, Saman Kunan, died during this mission. He lost his life saving the lives of others – a danger you also faced.

Thai Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha has written to May to say thank you for the fantastic job the British divers did and she know that everyone in this country would agree. “We are all very proud of you.”

The Thailand operation was a unique occasion when individual cave divers and cave rescuers from many teams came together and worked as a truly national team under the BCRC banner, said Bill Whitehouse, Vice Chairman of British Cave Rescue Council.

In total eight cave divers and three other cave rescuers travelled out to Thailand to help with the search and then the rescue. They were backed up by a support team in the UK of BCRC officers and members of various teams.

“It has been both gratifying and humbling to experience how cave rescuers, cave divers and the wider caving world worked together during the eighteen day operation to play such a significant part in pulling off what many thought to be an impossible task,” he said.

It has undoubtedly been one of the most incredible cave rescues ever, he added.

John Volanthen, one of the lead cave divers involved in the rescue, said that it was an honour to join the incredible effort to rescue of these boys and their coach, and he would like to personally add particular reference to the skill and dedication of the many military groups and civilians we worked alongside, especially the Thai navy seals.

He would also like to extend my thoughts to the family of Saman Kunan.

A video, which shows Tan in the background trying unsuccessfully to stay awake as Damansara MP Tony Pua speaks during the afternoon Parliamentary session last Thursday (July 19), has been circulating on social media.

Facebook page Tentera Troll Kebangsaan Malaysia posted a video, cropped closely to show Tan nodding off, with the sound of someone snoring dubbed in.

As of 6.30pm on Tuesday (July 24), the video has received over 44,000 views. Many noted that she had also forgotten to bring along her identity card during the 14th General Election nomination day.

Tan said that she is a “normal” person, and cannot function at a “100% level” all the time. “I was having the flu. I didn’t see the doctor and I took some flu medication that day,” she said.

“I didn’t expect the medicine to be so strong and I felt very drowsy. “I might have dozed off for a short time, but I don’t think it is a big thing,” she said.

Tan said she would rather focus on her constituents than bother about the video. “These people have nothing better to do. I am too busy. I just want to focus on my work. I don’t have time to bother,” she said.

Tan said what matters more is how hard she works for her constituency.

“I managed to relocate market traders because the landowners wanted to take back their land. I found another site for these traders to operate in,” she said.

Tan added that she is expediting work for a recreational park for residents to enjoy and also working to get stretches of road in her constituency resurfaced.

“I work day and night – you think I’m lazy? It will be my constituency who judges me, not some keyboard cybertroopers,” she said.

“I have better things to do and lots of things to work on,” she added.