Erdogan: We’ll start building 30,000 housing in early March for those affected by the earthquake
The Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced that the country’s government will start building 30,000 housing units for those affected by the earthquake in early March.
This came in a press conference on Tuesday, following a meeting of the Turkish government at the Turkish Disaster and Emergency Management Center (AFAD).
“The process of dealing with 15,000 destroyed buildings out of 19,000 in the earthquake zones has been completed,” the Turkish president said.
Erdogan added, “We’ll build every house and workplace that was destroyed or became unfit for use because of the earthquake, and we will hand it over to its owner”.
He explained that the coming months will gradually witness the construction of all apartments away from the fault lines.
A 47,000 buildings, comprising 211,000 housing units, were classified as collapsed, urgent demolition, or severely damaged in the states affected by the earthquake, according to the Turkish president.
Erdogan explained that construction work will take place directly in every place where the assessment of the extent of damage is completed.
He announced that the number of earthquake deaths had risen to 35,418, while 13,208 people injured in the earthquake were receiving hospital treatment.
The Turkish President indicated that all world experts agree that the Kahramanmaras earthquake is an exceptional natural disaster in terms of its strength and extent of destruction.
According to the Turkish president, 250,000 government employees are participating in efforts to combat the effects of the earthquake.
He emphasized that search and rescue work is continuing in full swing until the last victim has been recovered from under the rubble.
He pointed out that 28 thousand soldiers of the Turkish army are performing their duties in the areas affected by the earthquake.
He stated that the number of tents erected in the earthquake zones exceeded 175,000, and 5,400 pre-fabricated houses.
Erdogan also pointed out that the Turkish banking sector allocated part of its profits for the year 2022, which currently amounts to 50 billion liras (about 2.64 billion dollars), to avoid the effects of the earthquake.
He added, “We’ll announce new support packages for our citizens in light of the emerging needs in the coming days”.
The Turkish president revealed that the government provided assistance in the amount of 100 thousand liras (about 5 thousand dollars) to the relatives of the deceased in the earthquake in order to meet their needs.
The volume of donations that reached the Turkish Disaster and Emergency Management Department from inside and outside the country amounted to 8.3 billion liras (about 436 million dollars), which will be spent entirely on the earthquake areas.
At the government meeting, the Turkish president and all ministers, especially businessmen and senior government officials, pledged to donate 136,589,000 Turkish liras (about $7.15 million) to AFAD.
