Archive helps restore documents damaged by floods
Published on: Thursday, February 26, 2015
Kuala Lumpur: The floods in the East Coast at the end of 2014 also destroyed the assets and vital documents of the government agencies including patient records at the hospitals and health clinics. While private property owners had a tough time cleaning up the mess left behind by the floods and salvage whatever they could, the government agencies replaced their damaged assets with new ones.
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Then how about the piles of damaged paper based documents and records, can they be salvaged? This is where the National Archive of Malaysia (ANM) lent a helping hand. Realising the extent of damage to the records at the affected government departments, the Kelantan Agencies and Department Records Restoration Assistance Team was set up. The team was divided into two groups to cover the different districts and they carried out their task from 11-17 Jan visiting a total of 22 government agencies and departments in Kota Baharu, Tumpat, Pasir Mas, Tanah Merah, Jeli, Kuala Krai and Gua Musang.
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ANM's Director-General Azemi Abdul Aziz told Bernama the main mission of the team was to identify the records and documents that could salvaged and those totally ruined re-evaluated before being disposed."We actually have a special section for these tasks. But in the case of Kelantan, which was badly hit by flood, the damage was enormous. That is why a special team was set-up to ensure that salvaging tasks can be carried out smoothly.
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The department did its best to ensure that all the critical and sensitive documents were salvaged. Documents that were to be disposed had to be re-evaluated to ensure it would not interfere with the functions of the respective department. "We are happy for the fact that we have salvaged the documents in three crucial departments," he said adding that the departments were the National Registration Department (NRD) in Tanah Merah, the Kuala Krai District Education Department and the Tanah Merah Magistrate Court. At the Tanah Merah NRD department, 10 files relating to late identity card registrations and another 10 adoption files from 1982 were successfully restored. At the Kuala Krai District Education Department the national archives team restored students' personal records and more than 1,000 service statement books were also successfully restored. At the Tanah Merah Magistrate Court the team restored the court records from 1980s. "If they have not been restored, the records were lost for good as those were the only copies kept by the departments" Azemi said. Meanwhile, the head of the restoration team Mohd Nasser Malim explained the various techniques employed to restore documents. Documents that were identified to be restored would undergo a three stage process - cleaning, drying and rearranging. Three containers of clean water would be used with the cleaning process repeated three times until the documents are totally clean. – BernamaA soft sponge is used to rub gently on the dirty surface and a spatula is used to open and separate the pages the documents. "If fingers are used, the papers will easily get torn. Even with spatula, it has to be done with a lot of patience and very carefully. Rubbing too has to be very gentle to avoid tearing the paper," Nasser explained. The drying process was done using two techniques. The first was by arranging them on the floor. This technique is not suitable for bound papers like books. "Each page will be lined with newspapers in order to speed up the drying process and to avoid the papers from sticking to one another. Using newspapers in this technique is very efficient because of its availability and is much cheaper," Nasser said. Though it appears simple, it has attracted a document restoration agency from Korea to learn the technique from ANM. The second technique is by hanging the paper on a suspension line made of thread or plastic rope."The common mistake is to dry documents under direct sunlight. This action will make the paper crispy and will affect the paper quality. The right way is to air the documents under a roofed area," he explained. Most importantly, he added, each dried documents undergo the third process, rearranging the documents accordingly. However, often the damage could be overwhelming and there is no way the documents could be saved. Thus, Azemi said, those documents that could not be restored would be disposed after undergoing certain steps.The office that owned the documents will have to apply for a special permission from ANM and the documents could only be disposed once checked and verified by ANM. Azemi advised government agencies to re-evaluate their document storage systems to ensure the safety of their records during natural disaster. Those having problems with the storing documents and records are advised to contact ANM for assistance. Stay up-to-date by following Daily Express’s Telegram channel.
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