The entire country and the world have once again reacted with solidarity following another natural disaster here, this time the magnitude 5.9 earthquake that devastated Indonesia's densely populated Yogyakarta and parts of Central Java last Saturday.

Humanitarian assistance from Indonesians of all walks of life, foreign countries and institutions continues to pour in for the survivors of the deadly quake.

While praising the global response to the disaster, we question the coordination among institutions involved in the humanitarian mission. There have been continuing reports of aid failing to reach survivors days after the disaster struck.

A displaced man who was sharing a tent with dozens of other people was shown on TV complaining to visiting President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono about food shortages. Other survivors interviewed on radio and TV said their flattened village had remained unnoticed.

Coordination is the key to a successful disaster response operation, as the massive efforts in tsunami-devastated Aceh and Nias taught us. Poor coordination, lengthy bureaucratic procedures, poor management and incompetent human resources are common barriers to a relief mission, and add to the plight of disaster victims.

In the case of the Yogyakarta quake, apparently a lack of coordination has slowed the distribution of humanitarian assistance for an estimated 600,000 people made homeless by the disaster. The President has dismissed reports of looting and theft, but such crimes could happen if no improvements are made to ensure survivors get the help they need.

It is difficult to understand why there are such problems in aid distribution, given that Yogyakarta and Klaten, the areas hardest hit by the quake, enjoy the kind of quality infrastructure that Aceh and other islands outside Java generally do not have.

Perhaps some of these problems could have been prevented had the President declared the earthquake a national disaster as soon as the scale of the destruction became apparent.

National disaster status allows the President to appoint a person to handle relief operations. With clear authority, this person is responsible for aid delivery, medical treatment for the injured and, if necessary, the reconstruction of destroyed properties.

By declaring a national disaster the government also is able to deploy all possible resources to help the survivors, including allocating emergency funds and disbursing the money without having to wait for approval from the House of Representatives.

With one person clearly in command, the President would not have to stay in Yogyakarta to directly oversee disaster handling, a move this paper sees as unnecessary.

Telecommunications infrastructure in Yogyakarta, except for the first day after the quake struck, is sophisticated enough to enable video conferences between the President and government officials in the field.

It was certainly a morale booster for Yudhoyono to make a trip to the disaster area in the immediate aftermath of the quake and show solidarity with survivors, but that was enough. His absence from Jakarta, where most of the Cabinet members and top government officials work, for several days could affect his administration.

Furthermore, his stay in Yogyakarta could raise the eyebrows, if not jealousy, of other disaster victims, like those in Aceh and Nias, where over 130,000 people were killed and thousands of others went missing when the tsunami struck in 2004.

There is still much work to be done to help quake survivors. The compassion for the survivors is certainly there, now all that is needed is teamwork to speed up relief efforts. We do not expect the people to suffer any longer.