"Based on the letter, the provincial, district, and municipal governments in Bali need to take steps to provide shelters to the evacuees and adequately meet their basic needs," Dewa Gede Mahendra Putra, the Bali provincial governments spokesman, noted here on Monday.
The state of emergency can be extended or reduced based on the need, he explained.
The letter served as a basis for the local apparatuses to disburse funds to meet the evacuees needs, he remarked.
There are several underlying factors behind the issuance of the gubernatorial letter dated September 29, 2017, one of them being a letter from the chief of the Volcanology and Geological Hazard Mitigation Center (PVMBG) of the Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry, he revealed.
In its letter, dated September 29, 2017, the PVMBG has raised the alert status for the volcano from level III, or Watch, to level IV, or Warning.
In response to the boards recommendations, the local authorities have evacuated the residents from the danger zone to safer areas.
"Mr. governor has also inspected camps for evacuees in the districts of Karangasem, Buleleng, and Kabupaten Klungkung," he remarked.
As of Monday afternoon (Oct 2), the number of evacuees accommodated in eight districts and a municipality in Bali had reached 139,945. The figure fell slightly from more than 144 thousand recorded earlier, as some of the evacuees living outside the disaster-prone areas had returned home.(*)
Editor: Heru Purwanto
Copyright © ANTARA 2017
