SIDON, Lebanon: Civil Defense volunteers throughout south Lebanon fear that they no longer have the manpower necessary to carry out their missions, which include fighting fires and attending to victims of car accidents.

Many volunteers have stopped working after growing tired of an unfulfilled promise, made by successive governments over the last two decades, to make their jobs permanent, according to the supervisor of a Civil Defense team in Sidon.

The supervisor, who used to be in charge of a full force of volunteers, warned that fires could no longer be confronted. He told the story of a volunteer on duty at the regional center, which includes centers in the qada of Sidon, who had to go by himself to extinguish a fire that had erupted in a warehouse in the basement of a residential building.

Residents nearby left their jobs to help the lone civil defense volunteer, as he clearly could not fight the fire alone.

“This incident will be repeated, and the situation is further complicated because there are no more than 10 permanent employees in the entire South,” said the supervisor, who added that the Civil Defense had adequate equipment, including ambulances, fire trucks, and bulldozers, and that the volunteers had unparalleled courage and experience.

Civil Defense volunteers in Sidon said that they saved more than 10 people from drowning, using ropes and life rings since the beginning of June alone, even though Sidon’s beach did not have a maritime center and volunteers had to wait for rescue boats to arrive from Jieh, 12 kilometers away.

“Without us, they would have died,” the volunteers said.

A Civil Defense volunteer who works at a blacksmith factory said “I’ve served for a long time and I used to leave my job at the factory to go and save lives.”

“They made promises to us and lied to us … let them employ us permanently. My friends left the Civil Defense and gave up volunteering,” the volunteer added.

There are 46 Civil Defense centers in villages and areas in the south of Lebanon, including in Sidon, Tyre, Nabatieh, Marjayoun and Jezzine.

Hundreds of volunteers work at the frontline, having rescued the wounded in the summer 2006 war, extinguishing fires in the summer, and opening roads in the winter season, as well as other relief work.

Dozens of volunteers in their 40s said that even though they served with dedication, they had found themselves without a profession and are now begging employers to give them jobs.

One volunteer, who works as a barber, said he had been with the Civil Defense for 17 years but held no hope of becoming permanently employed.

“I learned how to cut hair and opened a shop, but I still volunteer and I know how to drive a fire truck and an ambulance,” said the volunteer.

“I often get beeped by the center, and I leave the client, telling him to take care of himself as someone else needs saving.”

Civil Defense volunteers undertake thousands of these missions but few municipalities offer enough financial aid to make volunteering a livelihood.

“The municipality offers us financial aid for the missions we undertake, but the amount is insignificant” a volunteer said, adding that “the center used to be crowded with volunteers day and night, but the situation has changed and we now fear suffering injuries [because there aren’t enough volunteers].”

In a center in the villages of Jezzine, the hope of becoming permanent employees has become a joke for the volunteers: “I volunteer today so that my grandchild can become permanently employed here.”