Haïti/Post-séisme : La reconstruction n’est pas viable sans une décentralisation véritable
samedi 24 juillet 2010
par Ronald Colbert
(Read the original article here)
Jean Rabel (Haïti), 24 juillet 2010 [AlterPresse] --- Les paysans, qui ont accueilli avec beaucoup de solidarité de nombreuses personnes en provenance de Port-au-Prince, après le séisme du 12 janvier 2010, ont leur mot à dire et leurs propres propositions sur le processus de reconstruction nationale annoncé.
C’est l’un des points forts d’une conférence-débat, déroulée sur la cour de l’école Dominique Savio à Jean Rabel dans l’après-midi du jeudi 22 juillet 2010, à la veille du 23 e anniversaire du massacre des paysans dans cette ville, située à environ 250 kilomètres au nord-ouest de la capitale Port-au-Prince, selon les informations obtenues par l’agence en ligne AlterPresse.
Des centaines de participantes et participants à la conférence-débat ont exprimé des desiderata en faveur du remembrement et d’une relance effective de l’agriculture régionale et nationale, notamment à partir des sections communales.
Se référant à l’article 36 de la Constitution du 29 mars 1987, ils demandent aux autorités nationales de légaliser l’occupation, par les paysans, de plus de 3 mille carreaux de terre de l’Etat, qui se trouvaient entre les mains de grandons (potentats) qui détiennent encore des propriétés de l’Etat, inexploitées à Jean Rabel.
C’est dans ce contexte que l’organisation Tèt Kole ti peyizan ayisyen (union des petits paysans haïtiens) a fait choix, de concert avec la municipalité de Jean Rabel, d’une portion de terre qui devra être appropriée pour l’implantation d’une forêt communale et d’une exploitation agricole (modèle) dans la zone, en attendant la formalisation de conditions administratives avec la direction générale des impôts (Dgi).
En plus de tracteurs et de semences locales, ils exigent des dispositions techniques pour l’utilisation des eaux des Trois rivières dans l’irrigation, principalement des terres du Bas Nord-Ouest (Jean Rabel, Baie de Henne, etc.). Tout en préconisant une réforme agraire pertinente, ils se prononcent contre la poursuite de la distribution des semences hybrides (fournies au ministère haïtien de l’agriculture par la transnationale américaine) qu’ils qualifient de “cadeau empoisonné pour l’agriculture nationale”.
Les participantes et participants à la conférnce-débat, à l’occasion du 23 e anniversaire du massacre de paysans à Jean Rabel, réclament également la mise en place de structures scolaires adéquates (avec un corps professoral adapté), de struc tures universitaires régionales, de structures sanitaires valables (avec une disponibilité de médicaments non expirés).
A leur avis, la construction de certains édifices scolaires ainsi que le lancement (le 10 juin 2010) des travaux d’érection d’un pont stratégique à jeter sur les Trois Rivières durant 11 mois (jusqu’en mai 2011) ne sont que des gouttes d’eau dans l’ensemble des actions concrètes à entreprendre dans le département géographique du Nord-Ouest, spécialement à Jean Rabel.
Interrogés par AlterPresse, plusieurs participants estiment n’avoir encore rien constaté de concret dans le processus de reconstruction déclaré, malgré les ressources financières importantes déjà engagées en ce sens.
Les intervenants à la conférence-débat du 22 juillet 2010, en prélude au 23 e anniversaire du massacre de paysans de Jean Rabel, étaient Ollery Saint-Louis du groupe d’appui technique et d’action pédagogique (Gatap), Klébert Duval, ancien membre de l’équipe missionnaire de Jean Rabel et Patrick Saintil, secrétaire général du Fonds international pour le développement économique et social (Fides-Haïti).
« Nous allons œuvrer en vue d’entamer les actions de reconstruction nationale à partir des sections communales (par des initiatives dans les bassins versants) », a promis, le 23 juillet 2010, Raynald Clérismé (ex-fondateur de l’organisation Tèt Kole ti peyizan ayisyen durant les années 1980), membre d’une commission de reconstruction gouvernementale, qui a été ministre des affaires étrangères (2006 – 2008) au début du deuxième mandat du président René Garcia Préval.
Sunday, July 25, 2010
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
Haïti : Après six mois, la situation ne s’est pas encore améliorée
Haïti : Après six mois, la situation ne s’est pas encore améliorée
lundi 12 juillet 2010
Déclaration du Service Jésuite aux Réfugiés/Haïti
Soumis à AlterPresse le 12 juillet 2010
(Read the original article here)
Près de 6 mois après le tremblement de terre qui a dévasté Haïti le 12 janvier 2010, la situation du pays, plus spécialement celle d’environ 3 millions de sinistrés, demeure préoccupante, surtout face à la saison cyclonique initiée depuis le 1er juin qui s’annonce mouvementée pour le bassin des Caraïbes. En dépit des efforts déployés par les agences de l’ONU, les organisations internationales, les autorités haïtiennes et autres acteurs locaux en termes de préparation et de prévention face à une éventuelle crise humanitaire en cas de cyclones ou d’autres désastres naturels, la saison cyclonique continue de représenter un danger pour les populations en situation de vulnérabilité, pour les 1.7 millions de déplacés et pour les sans abris en général.
D’autre part, l’insécurité alimentaire touche de plus en plus la population haïtienne, dont deux millions de sinistrés suite au séisme, malgré les résultats que le Programme Alimentaire Mondial (World Food Programme, en anglais) dit avoir atteints avec ses programmes « Food for Work » et « Cash for Work ». Cette situation affecte principalement les déplacés qui, en plus, ne sont pas encore relocalisés par le gouvernement haïtien et sont obligés de vivre dans la rue, sur les places publiques ou dans l’enfer des abris provisoires sous la menace constante d’être expulsés des camps par les propriétaires fonciers. Dans certains camps, la faim a même poussé des adolescentes à se prostituer pour un plat chaud. De plus en plus de cas de viols et d’agressions sexuelles contre les fillettes et les femmes sont également enregistrés et dénoncés dans les camps. Les populations déplacées, principalement les groupes vulnérables, ne parviennent pas encore à avoir accès à l’éducation, aux soins de santé, à l’eau potable et à d’autres droits fondamentaux.
Outre les préoccupations liées à la situation humanitaire en Haïti, le constat sur le processus de reconstruction du pays est alarmant à cause de la lenteur de l’état d’avancement des activités et des retards mis par les bailleurs de fonds pour matérialiser les promesses d’aide faites au pays lors du Sommet international des bailleurs de fonds tenu à New York le 31 mars. « Les promesses ne nourriront pas le peuple d’Haïti et les engagements non concrétisés ne lui donneront pas les abris dont il a besoin », a déclaré le 4 juillet le secrétaire général de l’Organisation des Nations Unies, Ban Ki Moon, devant la 31e Assemblée Générale de la CARICOM (Communauté de la Caraïbe).
Entretemps, les dirigeants et autres acteurs politiques haïtiens se montrent plus intéressés à la lutte pour le pouvoir qu’à la situation humanitaire et au processus de reconstruction du pays. Le régime au pouvoir dirigé par le président René Préval et les partis de l’opposition sont en train d’enfoncer le pays dans une crise politique, en raison des conflits liés à l’organisation des prochaines élections présidentielles, législatives et locales prévues pour le 28 novembre prochain. Pour leur part, les organisations et autres groupes de la société civile haïtienne continuent à exiger leur inclusion et leur participation dans le processus de reconstruction de leur pays, tout en faisant pression sur les acteurs politiques haïtiens de manière à ce qu’ils cherchent la voie du dialogue et du consensus pour résoudre l’actuelle crise politique et pour poser les vrais problèmes du pays en vue d’apporter des réponses urgentes, concrètes et adéquates.
lundi 12 juillet 2010
Déclaration du Service Jésuite aux Réfugiés/Haïti
Soumis à AlterPresse le 12 juillet 2010
(Read the original article here)
Près de 6 mois après le tremblement de terre qui a dévasté Haïti le 12 janvier 2010, la situation du pays, plus spécialement celle d’environ 3 millions de sinistrés, demeure préoccupante, surtout face à la saison cyclonique initiée depuis le 1er juin qui s’annonce mouvementée pour le bassin des Caraïbes. En dépit des efforts déployés par les agences de l’ONU, les organisations internationales, les autorités haïtiennes et autres acteurs locaux en termes de préparation et de prévention face à une éventuelle crise humanitaire en cas de cyclones ou d’autres désastres naturels, la saison cyclonique continue de représenter un danger pour les populations en situation de vulnérabilité, pour les 1.7 millions de déplacés et pour les sans abris en général.
D’autre part, l’insécurité alimentaire touche de plus en plus la population haïtienne, dont deux millions de sinistrés suite au séisme, malgré les résultats que le Programme Alimentaire Mondial (World Food Programme, en anglais) dit avoir atteints avec ses programmes « Food for Work » et « Cash for Work ». Cette situation affecte principalement les déplacés qui, en plus, ne sont pas encore relocalisés par le gouvernement haïtien et sont obligés de vivre dans la rue, sur les places publiques ou dans l’enfer des abris provisoires sous la menace constante d’être expulsés des camps par les propriétaires fonciers. Dans certains camps, la faim a même poussé des adolescentes à se prostituer pour un plat chaud. De plus en plus de cas de viols et d’agressions sexuelles contre les fillettes et les femmes sont également enregistrés et dénoncés dans les camps. Les populations déplacées, principalement les groupes vulnérables, ne parviennent pas encore à avoir accès à l’éducation, aux soins de santé, à l’eau potable et à d’autres droits fondamentaux.
Outre les préoccupations liées à la situation humanitaire en Haïti, le constat sur le processus de reconstruction du pays est alarmant à cause de la lenteur de l’état d’avancement des activités et des retards mis par les bailleurs de fonds pour matérialiser les promesses d’aide faites au pays lors du Sommet international des bailleurs de fonds tenu à New York le 31 mars. « Les promesses ne nourriront pas le peuple d’Haïti et les engagements non concrétisés ne lui donneront pas les abris dont il a besoin », a déclaré le 4 juillet le secrétaire général de l’Organisation des Nations Unies, Ban Ki Moon, devant la 31e Assemblée Générale de la CARICOM (Communauté de la Caraïbe).
Entretemps, les dirigeants et autres acteurs politiques haïtiens se montrent plus intéressés à la lutte pour le pouvoir qu’à la situation humanitaire et au processus de reconstruction du pays. Le régime au pouvoir dirigé par le président René Préval et les partis de l’opposition sont en train d’enfoncer le pays dans une crise politique, en raison des conflits liés à l’organisation des prochaines élections présidentielles, législatives et locales prévues pour le 28 novembre prochain. Pour leur part, les organisations et autres groupes de la société civile haïtienne continuent à exiger leur inclusion et leur participation dans le processus de reconstruction de leur pays, tout en faisant pression sur les acteurs politiques haïtiens de manière à ce qu’ils cherchent la voie du dialogue et du consensus pour résoudre l’actuelle crise politique et pour poser les vrais problèmes du pays en vue d’apporter des réponses urgentes, concrètes et adéquates.
Monday, July 12, 2010
The international community's responsibility to Haiti
The international community's responsibility to Haiti
By Michael Deibert
The Guardian
12 July 2010
(Please read the original article here)
It is a gloomy anniversary: the six-month mark since the earthquake that levelled vast swaths of Haiti's capital, Port-au-Prince, and surrounding towns, killing well over 200,000 people.
Though the earthquake was promiscuously destructive, killing the good and the bad, the rich and the poor, those who still remain encamped in sprawling tent cities lashed by tropical rains in and around the capital now represent the lowest and most disempowered strata of Haitian society. They are the Haitians who, for generations, have fled the poverty of the countryside to its largest city in search of jobs that were not there and where only further struggle awaited them.
At a time when only 2% of a promised $5.3bn (£3.5bn) in reconstruction aid has materialised and an equally small amount of rubble has been removed, it is worth pausing to remember how economic policy in a very real way helped drive Haitians off their land and into the labyrinthine slums of Port-au-Prince, where so many of them died.
From the 1940s, when the United States sponsored a half-baked attempt to cultivate rubber in Haiti, to the early 1980s, when 1.2m creole pigs were destroyed in a US-Canadian funded programme to prevent the spread of swine fever, the results were largely the same. Life for Haiti's rural poor got worse.
In 1995, an economic adjustment plan mandated by the International Monetary Fund implemented by the government of then-President Jean-Bertrand Aristide cut tariffs on rice imports to Haiti from 35% to 3%. Haiti, which for many years had produced low-cost, inexpensive rice for domestic consumption, effectively lost the ability to do so.
And so the heirs of patriotic leaders such as Toussaint L'Ouverture and Charlemagne Péralte ("Les enfants du héros", as the Haitian writer Lyonel Trouillot called them) continued to flood into Port-au-Prince. And six months ago, on a Tuesday afternoon, more of them died there than the mind can really grasp.
Almost surreally, with an estimated 1.5 million Haitians still homeless, presidential and legislative elections are set to be held on 28 November. They will be presided over by an electoral council faced with conducting a legitimate ballot in a country where hundreds of thousands of voters have either been killed or displaced, and during which its own headquarters were destroyed.
Before the earthquake, Haiti had seen a steady, if gradual, improvement in its fortunes. Attracting modest levels of foreign investment and maintaining robust diplomatic relations with neighbours as divergent as the United States, Cuba and Venezuela, the county also enjoyed a more or less extended period of political calm, reinforced by a 10,000-strong United Nations peacekeeping mission (a mission that also suffered grievously that January day).
The wantonly murderous security services and armed civilian bands of regimes past dissipated as, whatever his other faults, President René Préval marked a change in at least this aspect from the litany of rancid despots who have actively victimised the Haitian populace without cease since colonial times.
With no clear successor to Préval, and a series of badly factionalised micro-parties with little popular support, Haitians now face yawning uncertainty. While elections are a favoured means of the international community to point to progress in countries as wracked by poverty and political unrest as Haiti, most Haitians will tell a visitor that such exercises will count for little if not matched by a commitment to changing the destructive dynamic of rural disintegration and urban migration that has taken hold in recent years.
After the earthquake, the Haitian government produced a preliminary damage and needs assessment that envisioned a decentralisation of the Haitian state. To this date, little has come of this promise. A body set up to manage reconstruction funds chaired by Préval's prime minister, Jean-Max Bellerive, and former US president Bill Clinton – a man with a sometimes worrisomely shaky grasp of Haiti's history – has succeeded in drawing pledges of aid but little in concrete results.
It is important on this date, with so many of Haiti's citizens to mourn and so many still waiting for assistance in conditions that can only be characterised as an affront to humanity, that we in the international community not forget our past follies in Haiti.
Before another six months pass, foreign governments, international agencies and non-governmental organisations must quickly and decisively work with Haitians, both urban and rural, on issues such as resettlement, reforestation and agrarian reform, to help them build a decent country out of the rubble of the broken state that came before.
Among all the Haitians I've met in my travels around Haiti, since my first visit there in 1997, a decent country is all most have ever asked for.
Michael Deibert is a visiting fellow at the Centre for Peace and Reconciliation Studies at Coventry University and the author of Notes from the Last Testament: The Struggle for Haiti. His blog can be read at www.michaeldeibert.blogspot.com.
By Michael Deibert
The Guardian
12 July 2010
(Please read the original article here)
It is a gloomy anniversary: the six-month mark since the earthquake that levelled vast swaths of Haiti's capital, Port-au-Prince, and surrounding towns, killing well over 200,000 people.
Though the earthquake was promiscuously destructive, killing the good and the bad, the rich and the poor, those who still remain encamped in sprawling tent cities lashed by tropical rains in and around the capital now represent the lowest and most disempowered strata of Haitian society. They are the Haitians who, for generations, have fled the poverty of the countryside to its largest city in search of jobs that were not there and where only further struggle awaited them.
At a time when only 2% of a promised $5.3bn (£3.5bn) in reconstruction aid has materialised and an equally small amount of rubble has been removed, it is worth pausing to remember how economic policy in a very real way helped drive Haitians off their land and into the labyrinthine slums of Port-au-Prince, where so many of them died.
From the 1940s, when the United States sponsored a half-baked attempt to cultivate rubber in Haiti, to the early 1980s, when 1.2m creole pigs were destroyed in a US-Canadian funded programme to prevent the spread of swine fever, the results were largely the same. Life for Haiti's rural poor got worse.
In 1995, an economic adjustment plan mandated by the International Monetary Fund implemented by the government of then-President Jean-Bertrand Aristide cut tariffs on rice imports to Haiti from 35% to 3%. Haiti, which for many years had produced low-cost, inexpensive rice for domestic consumption, effectively lost the ability to do so.
And so the heirs of patriotic leaders such as Toussaint L'Ouverture and Charlemagne Péralte ("Les enfants du héros", as the Haitian writer Lyonel Trouillot called them) continued to flood into Port-au-Prince. And six months ago, on a Tuesday afternoon, more of them died there than the mind can really grasp.
Almost surreally, with an estimated 1.5 million Haitians still homeless, presidential and legislative elections are set to be held on 28 November. They will be presided over by an electoral council faced with conducting a legitimate ballot in a country where hundreds of thousands of voters have either been killed or displaced, and during which its own headquarters were destroyed.
Before the earthquake, Haiti had seen a steady, if gradual, improvement in its fortunes. Attracting modest levels of foreign investment and maintaining robust diplomatic relations with neighbours as divergent as the United States, Cuba and Venezuela, the county also enjoyed a more or less extended period of political calm, reinforced by a 10,000-strong United Nations peacekeeping mission (a mission that also suffered grievously that January day).
The wantonly murderous security services and armed civilian bands of regimes past dissipated as, whatever his other faults, President René Préval marked a change in at least this aspect from the litany of rancid despots who have actively victimised the Haitian populace without cease since colonial times.
With no clear successor to Préval, and a series of badly factionalised micro-parties with little popular support, Haitians now face yawning uncertainty. While elections are a favoured means of the international community to point to progress in countries as wracked by poverty and political unrest as Haiti, most Haitians will tell a visitor that such exercises will count for little if not matched by a commitment to changing the destructive dynamic of rural disintegration and urban migration that has taken hold in recent years.
After the earthquake, the Haitian government produced a preliminary damage and needs assessment that envisioned a decentralisation of the Haitian state. To this date, little has come of this promise. A body set up to manage reconstruction funds chaired by Préval's prime minister, Jean-Max Bellerive, and former US president Bill Clinton – a man with a sometimes worrisomely shaky grasp of Haiti's history – has succeeded in drawing pledges of aid but little in concrete results.
It is important on this date, with so many of Haiti's citizens to mourn and so many still waiting for assistance in conditions that can only be characterised as an affront to humanity, that we in the international community not forget our past follies in Haiti.
Before another six months pass, foreign governments, international agencies and non-governmental organisations must quickly and decisively work with Haitians, both urban and rural, on issues such as resettlement, reforestation and agrarian reform, to help them build a decent country out of the rubble of the broken state that came before.
Among all the Haitians I've met in my travels around Haiti, since my first visit there in 1997, a decent country is all most have ever asked for.
Michael Deibert is a visiting fellow at the Centre for Peace and Reconciliation Studies at Coventry University and the author of Notes from the Last Testament: The Struggle for Haiti. His blog can be read at www.michaeldeibert.blogspot.com.
Saturday, July 3, 2010
On the Ground in Haiti
Friday, July 02, 2010
On the Ground in Haiti
By John A. Carroll, M.D.
(Read the original posting here)
My wife Maria and I worked in Haiti during part of the months of May and June. We stayed in a guesthouse-orphanage just outside of Port-au-Prince.
A lady named Yolande lived right across the street from us.
Yolande is 78 years old and lives under a blue tarpaulin which encloses a small pup tent inside.
During the earthquake on January 12 her shack, which was located several miles away, was so damaged that she had to move out. Yolande suffered some leg injuries at the time of the quake and still has one lower leg wrapped in a rag. But Yolande smiled and told me that her legs were "much better".
One afternoon shortly after we arrived, I entered an opening in Yolande's blue tarp. The stifling heat, humidity, mosquitoes, and flies were overwhelming.
The tarp was fastened to thin wooden poles and tied above with shoe laces and other fragments of cloth.
Yolande's family brings her rice and vegetables when they can and she cooks in a metal bowl over pieces of charcoal.
I found Yolande to be a practical and pleasant woman. She did not complain about her living arrangements and even said that Americans are the most charitable people in the world. I sure did not feel that way right then as I hurried out from under the tarp so I could get a breath of cooler air in the street.
During this time of the year in Haiti, the rain comes in torrents in the late afternoon or evening, and now this rain seeps through Yolande's tarp and leaks into her tent. So on top of roasting, Yolande and her family are wet much of the time too.
These hardships are not isolated to Yolande.
Haiti has an estimated 9 million people with one third of the population living in the capital, Port-au-Prince. In this city there are over one thousand tent cities, and an estimated 1.5 million people are still homeless five months after the quake. Many people told me that they are simply too afraid to move back inside of their houses. If their houses are still standing, the walls may have been fissure (cracked) and people fear they will collapse on top of them.
Several miles from us downtown Port-au-Prince looks like a nuclear bomb struck it. The once beautiful Haitian National Palace is collapsed and the majority of nearby Haitian government ministry buildings downtown were destroyed in the 47 second earthquake. Haiti's tax building is pancaked just across from the Palace with its director's body and many employees still inside under tons of concrete.
A densely populated tent city now sits in front of the vacant Palace in Port-au-Prince's largest square called Champs de Mars. A young man who identified himself as Carlos told me some of their problems after I walked through his section of the tent city. Carlos seemed fatalistic and did not see any end in sight to their misery.
Rape is common in Port-au-Prince's tent cities and seldom gets reported. Poor women in tent cities have no rights.
Fountains and small decorative pools in Champs de Mar have turned into large toilets filled with stagnant sewage. Kids play nearby with their family's tent abutting these toxic cesspools. Sewage drainage and treatment facilities are more or less nonexistent.
In the chaotic months following the quake, millions of dollars flowed into Haiti from generous people all over the world. (One out of two American households gave to the Haitian relief efforts.)
And five billion more dollars from the international community has been pledged to Haiti over the next two years. Bill Clinton who is UN Special Envoy to Haiti. Recently Mr. Clinton along with Haitian officials have been in charge of the Interim Haiti Reconstruction Commission. One of the objectives of this Commission is to allocate these funds to ensure that the money is used in a transparent fashion for Haiti's post earthquake reconstruction.
Mr. Clinton and Haiti's Prime Minister Bellerive announced the Commission's first approved spending projects:
- $45 million from Brazil and Norway in direct funds for the Haitian government, closing a quarter of its estimated $170 million budget shortfall.
- $1 million from the Clinton Foundation for buildings that can be used as storm shelters in the quake-ravaged towns of Leogane and Jacmel, which are often in the path of Atlantic hurricanes.
- A $20 million fund to provide loans to small- and medium-sized Haitian businesses.
But despite international pledges of some $5 billion over two years at the United Nations donors' conference for Haiti in March, only a fraction has actually been delivered - just $40 million from Brazil.
Even though other pledges are supposed to be delivered soon, I spoke to no Haitians during our entire time in Haiti who trusts that the money will be spent properly. People that I spoke with don't really trust Mr. Clinton any more than they do their own fragmented and dysfunctional government. Many are very angry with Haitian President Preval for his perceived lack of leadership and poor communication through Haiti's largest crisis in its history. They also feel he is cuddling up to international powers for business interests that will exclude the majority of poor Haitians.
And why should 9 million poor Haitians trust any one? They and their ancestors have been on the short end of the stick since Haiti was founded as a Republic more than 200 years ago. The corrupt Haitian state is considered to be a fact of life... not unlike corrupt Illinois politics.
So what do "we" do with hundreds of thousands of displaced and homeless Haitian people? Although Haitians are a tough lot, they are not as resilient as our defense mechanisms would like us to believe. And on top of this earthquake which was "biblical" in size, the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has predicted a terrible tropical storm season coming Haiti's way in several months.
But so far (as of this writing) the Haitian government has relocated only about 7,000vulnerable people to two safer camps. The relocation is slow because the crippled government doesn't have enough money to complete a job that includes not just setting up new tents, but providing work, schools and services.
First of all, should the tent cities continue to exist? Are they good enough?
No. These places are inhuman and horrible. Lack of food and water, lack of security, and the rain are a few reasons.
And the rain is quickly bringing more problems.
Malaria and typhoid fever were everyday occurrences in the area of the city where I was working. Stagnant dirty puddles of water are everywhere and are good breeding grounds for mosquitoes who will carry disease. I saw a teen-aged boy scooping up water in his hands drinking from a puddle in the road. Medical and public health interventions will not help the majority of Haitians unless their dangerous living environment is changed.
Also, heavy rains tempt unstable hillsides to unleash their mud. And serious flooding and mudslides could endanger not only Haitians but relief workers also.
Port-au-Prince, before the earthquake could have accommodated 300,000 people, not three million people. There has been decades of urban decay. This city is doomed right now unless a paradigm shift in thinking takes place.
We need to be honest and understand that many people are dying now and are still going to die no matter what is done. I saw children starving in front of me. I often wondered what good was my stethoscope in times like this.
So what needs to happen? What interventions will minimize the final death count? How can Haiti's problems be prioritized and triaged appropriately? What can be done to give some dignity to the life of over one million displaced Haitians? How do we stop the violence aimed at Haitian society's unfortunate losers?
Haitians tell me they want jobs. Who would have thought?
Jobs earn them money to repair their lives and their family's lives. Jobs allow one parent to stay at home during the day and take care of their babies and toddlers. Kids suffer alot mentally and physically when they are alone or being watched by a neighbor who is already swamped with problems. Children are literally down in the dirt and sewage and their chances for survival diminish without a parent home.
Mother's can breastfeed if they are home. And when mother's breastfeed, they save money because they do not need to purchase milk. And if they purchase powdered milk, they may accidentally prepare it with dirty water which can sicken their children.
With the billions of dollars that hopefully will come to Haiti, big firms with heavy equipment should be hired. Skillful urban planners from all over the world need to work with the Haitian government.
And most importantly poor Haitians need to be hired.
Hundreds of thousands of young, strong Haitian men and women that live in the capital would jump at the chance for a job. Hire them and pay them fairly so they can feed their families while they make a new and better Haiti. The billions of dollars of international pledges need to go for displaced Haitians while they perform the back breaking reconstruction of Haiti.
Pay Haitians in tent cities to repair or rebuild their own homes--the structures where they were living pre earthquake. Or pay the man that rents the home to these people. And these homes need to be earthquake proof homes using Western building codes. Earthquakes don't kill people, bad buildings do.
The huge mounds of rubble on the Port-au-Prince streets needs to be cleared so the streets can be navigated by cars and big equipment.
The traffic jams in the capital now slow progress for everyone.
Many people have returned to their neighborhoods after inspections found their homes safe, but often return to the tent camps when word of aid distribution spreads. So food and water distribution needs to be local--- brought to people in their neighborhoods as their homes are rebuilt.
Port-au-Prince needs to be decentralized. The earthquake negatively influenced 80% of Haiti's economy because PAP was and is the hub of the country. Now the hub is critically ill. The capital is built over fault lines and this all could happen again. Three million miserable people living on top of each other need to be spread back out to Haiti's provinces.
But for people to move to the Haitian countryside or smaller cities outside of PAP, there has to be jobs, family members with adequate housing that can accept their homeless relatives, and some basic services like schools, roads, water, electricity, and medical care.
Trees need to be planted and gardens started in these communities. Listening to Haitian grass roots organizations and the Haitian farmer is very important. These people know what they need to stay alive.
The local Haitian community in the province needs to be involved in all decision points.
Foreign aid that flowed into Haiti after the quake has hurt the Haitian farmers. Most of the people in Haiti's central plateau (L'Artibonite) earn their living by growing and selling rice, Haiti’s staple food. But the influx of foreign food aid has meant that many Haitians can now get rice for free. As a result, the price of rice grown in Haiti has plummeted and the Haitian farmer finds himself in more trouble.
Several months ago even Mr. Clinton was quoted as saying, "...we made a devil's bargain" when he was President. He publicly apologized for forcing Haiti to drop tariffs on imported, subsidized US rice. His policy hurt Haitian rice farming and, as reported by Kim Ives, "seriously damaged Haiti's ability to be self sufficient".
And let us not forget that Haiti, believe it or not, is in the digital age. The Haitian people in the countryside have cell phones and access to the Internet. Many Haitians are adept at using both. This means that they still communicate with Haitian relatives, the diaspora, overseas.
Haiti's diaspora has sent back billions of dollars over the past few decades to needy Haitian relatives, but this obviously has not been enough. The diaspora need to physically come back to Haiti and revitalize Haiti's industrial sector. But they won't come back and invest in Haiti unless than can do so safely. Most diaspora tell me they fear for their personal safety in Haiti. Security everywhere needs to be improved. And the economic climate for joint business ventures, to stimulate Haiti's diaspora to invest in Haiti, has to be improved by the Haitian government.
In conclusion, Haiti was a severely damaged country before the January earthquake and is even more damaged now.
Haitians are a beautiful and wonderful people, but they are not as "resilient" as we would like to believe.
Yolande, the little old tent lady who lived near us, should not be living like this. If Yolande were your grandmother, you wouldn't refer to her as "resilient" as she suffers the Haitian heat and mosquitoes, would you?
The huge international monetary pledges need to be allocated in a transparent fashion to help these neediest Haitians.
On the Ground in Haiti
By John A. Carroll, M.D.
(Read the original posting here)
My wife Maria and I worked in Haiti during part of the months of May and June. We stayed in a guesthouse-orphanage just outside of Port-au-Prince.
A lady named Yolande lived right across the street from us.
Yolande is 78 years old and lives under a blue tarpaulin which encloses a small pup tent inside.
During the earthquake on January 12 her shack, which was located several miles away, was so damaged that she had to move out. Yolande suffered some leg injuries at the time of the quake and still has one lower leg wrapped in a rag. But Yolande smiled and told me that her legs were "much better".
One afternoon shortly after we arrived, I entered an opening in Yolande's blue tarp. The stifling heat, humidity, mosquitoes, and flies were overwhelming.
The tarp was fastened to thin wooden poles and tied above with shoe laces and other fragments of cloth.
Yolande's family brings her rice and vegetables when they can and she cooks in a metal bowl over pieces of charcoal.
I found Yolande to be a practical and pleasant woman. She did not complain about her living arrangements and even said that Americans are the most charitable people in the world. I sure did not feel that way right then as I hurried out from under the tarp so I could get a breath of cooler air in the street.
During this time of the year in Haiti, the rain comes in torrents in the late afternoon or evening, and now this rain seeps through Yolande's tarp and leaks into her tent. So on top of roasting, Yolande and her family are wet much of the time too.
These hardships are not isolated to Yolande.
Haiti has an estimated 9 million people with one third of the population living in the capital, Port-au-Prince. In this city there are over one thousand tent cities, and an estimated 1.5 million people are still homeless five months after the quake. Many people told me that they are simply too afraid to move back inside of their houses. If their houses are still standing, the walls may have been fissure (cracked) and people fear they will collapse on top of them.
Several miles from us downtown Port-au-Prince looks like a nuclear bomb struck it. The once beautiful Haitian National Palace is collapsed and the majority of nearby Haitian government ministry buildings downtown were destroyed in the 47 second earthquake. Haiti's tax building is pancaked just across from the Palace with its director's body and many employees still inside under tons of concrete.
A densely populated tent city now sits in front of the vacant Palace in Port-au-Prince's largest square called Champs de Mars. A young man who identified himself as Carlos told me some of their problems after I walked through his section of the tent city. Carlos seemed fatalistic and did not see any end in sight to their misery.
Rape is common in Port-au-Prince's tent cities and seldom gets reported. Poor women in tent cities have no rights.
Fountains and small decorative pools in Champs de Mar have turned into large toilets filled with stagnant sewage. Kids play nearby with their family's tent abutting these toxic cesspools. Sewage drainage and treatment facilities are more or less nonexistent.
In the chaotic months following the quake, millions of dollars flowed into Haiti from generous people all over the world. (One out of two American households gave to the Haitian relief efforts.)
And five billion more dollars from the international community has been pledged to Haiti over the next two years. Bill Clinton who is UN Special Envoy to Haiti. Recently Mr. Clinton along with Haitian officials have been in charge of the Interim Haiti Reconstruction Commission. One of the objectives of this Commission is to allocate these funds to ensure that the money is used in a transparent fashion for Haiti's post earthquake reconstruction.
Mr. Clinton and Haiti's Prime Minister Bellerive announced the Commission's first approved spending projects:
- $45 million from Brazil and Norway in direct funds for the Haitian government, closing a quarter of its estimated $170 million budget shortfall.
- $1 million from the Clinton Foundation for buildings that can be used as storm shelters in the quake-ravaged towns of Leogane and Jacmel, which are often in the path of Atlantic hurricanes.
- A $20 million fund to provide loans to small- and medium-sized Haitian businesses.
But despite international pledges of some $5 billion over two years at the United Nations donors' conference for Haiti in March, only a fraction has actually been delivered - just $40 million from Brazil.
Even though other pledges are supposed to be delivered soon, I spoke to no Haitians during our entire time in Haiti who trusts that the money will be spent properly. People that I spoke with don't really trust Mr. Clinton any more than they do their own fragmented and dysfunctional government. Many are very angry with Haitian President Preval for his perceived lack of leadership and poor communication through Haiti's largest crisis in its history. They also feel he is cuddling up to international powers for business interests that will exclude the majority of poor Haitians.
And why should 9 million poor Haitians trust any one? They and their ancestors have been on the short end of the stick since Haiti was founded as a Republic more than 200 years ago. The corrupt Haitian state is considered to be a fact of life... not unlike corrupt Illinois politics.
So what do "we" do with hundreds of thousands of displaced and homeless Haitian people? Although Haitians are a tough lot, they are not as resilient as our defense mechanisms would like us to believe. And on top of this earthquake which was "biblical" in size, the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has predicted a terrible tropical storm season coming Haiti's way in several months.
But so far (as of this writing) the Haitian government has relocated only about 7,000vulnerable people to two safer camps. The relocation is slow because the crippled government doesn't have enough money to complete a job that includes not just setting up new tents, but providing work, schools and services.
First of all, should the tent cities continue to exist? Are they good enough?
No. These places are inhuman and horrible. Lack of food and water, lack of security, and the rain are a few reasons.
And the rain is quickly bringing more problems.
Malaria and typhoid fever were everyday occurrences in the area of the city where I was working. Stagnant dirty puddles of water are everywhere and are good breeding grounds for mosquitoes who will carry disease. I saw a teen-aged boy scooping up water in his hands drinking from a puddle in the road. Medical and public health interventions will not help the majority of Haitians unless their dangerous living environment is changed.
Also, heavy rains tempt unstable hillsides to unleash their mud. And serious flooding and mudslides could endanger not only Haitians but relief workers also.
Port-au-Prince, before the earthquake could have accommodated 300,000 people, not three million people. There has been decades of urban decay. This city is doomed right now unless a paradigm shift in thinking takes place.
We need to be honest and understand that many people are dying now and are still going to die no matter what is done. I saw children starving in front of me. I often wondered what good was my stethoscope in times like this.
So what needs to happen? What interventions will minimize the final death count? How can Haiti's problems be prioritized and triaged appropriately? What can be done to give some dignity to the life of over one million displaced Haitians? How do we stop the violence aimed at Haitian society's unfortunate losers?
Haitians tell me they want jobs. Who would have thought?
Jobs earn them money to repair their lives and their family's lives. Jobs allow one parent to stay at home during the day and take care of their babies and toddlers. Kids suffer alot mentally and physically when they are alone or being watched by a neighbor who is already swamped with problems. Children are literally down in the dirt and sewage and their chances for survival diminish without a parent home.
Mother's can breastfeed if they are home. And when mother's breastfeed, they save money because they do not need to purchase milk. And if they purchase powdered milk, they may accidentally prepare it with dirty water which can sicken their children.
With the billions of dollars that hopefully will come to Haiti, big firms with heavy equipment should be hired. Skillful urban planners from all over the world need to work with the Haitian government.
And most importantly poor Haitians need to be hired.
Hundreds of thousands of young, strong Haitian men and women that live in the capital would jump at the chance for a job. Hire them and pay them fairly so they can feed their families while they make a new and better Haiti. The billions of dollars of international pledges need to go for displaced Haitians while they perform the back breaking reconstruction of Haiti.
Pay Haitians in tent cities to repair or rebuild their own homes--the structures where they were living pre earthquake. Or pay the man that rents the home to these people. And these homes need to be earthquake proof homes using Western building codes. Earthquakes don't kill people, bad buildings do.
The huge mounds of rubble on the Port-au-Prince streets needs to be cleared so the streets can be navigated by cars and big equipment.
The traffic jams in the capital now slow progress for everyone.
Many people have returned to their neighborhoods after inspections found their homes safe, but often return to the tent camps when word of aid distribution spreads. So food and water distribution needs to be local--- brought to people in their neighborhoods as their homes are rebuilt.
Port-au-Prince needs to be decentralized. The earthquake negatively influenced 80% of Haiti's economy because PAP was and is the hub of the country. Now the hub is critically ill. The capital is built over fault lines and this all could happen again. Three million miserable people living on top of each other need to be spread back out to Haiti's provinces.
But for people to move to the Haitian countryside or smaller cities outside of PAP, there has to be jobs, family members with adequate housing that can accept their homeless relatives, and some basic services like schools, roads, water, electricity, and medical care.
Trees need to be planted and gardens started in these communities. Listening to Haitian grass roots organizations and the Haitian farmer is very important. These people know what they need to stay alive.
The local Haitian community in the province needs to be involved in all decision points.
Foreign aid that flowed into Haiti after the quake has hurt the Haitian farmers. Most of the people in Haiti's central plateau (L'Artibonite) earn their living by growing and selling rice, Haiti’s staple food. But the influx of foreign food aid has meant that many Haitians can now get rice for free. As a result, the price of rice grown in Haiti has plummeted and the Haitian farmer finds himself in more trouble.
Several months ago even Mr. Clinton was quoted as saying, "...we made a devil's bargain" when he was President. He publicly apologized for forcing Haiti to drop tariffs on imported, subsidized US rice. His policy hurt Haitian rice farming and, as reported by Kim Ives, "seriously damaged Haiti's ability to be self sufficient".
And let us not forget that Haiti, believe it or not, is in the digital age. The Haitian people in the countryside have cell phones and access to the Internet. Many Haitians are adept at using both. This means that they still communicate with Haitian relatives, the diaspora, overseas.
Haiti's diaspora has sent back billions of dollars over the past few decades to needy Haitian relatives, but this obviously has not been enough. The diaspora need to physically come back to Haiti and revitalize Haiti's industrial sector. But they won't come back and invest in Haiti unless than can do so safely. Most diaspora tell me they fear for their personal safety in Haiti. Security everywhere needs to be improved. And the economic climate for joint business ventures, to stimulate Haiti's diaspora to invest in Haiti, has to be improved by the Haitian government.
In conclusion, Haiti was a severely damaged country before the January earthquake and is even more damaged now.
Haitians are a beautiful and wonderful people, but they are not as "resilient" as we would like to believe.
Yolande, the little old tent lady who lived near us, should not be living like this. If Yolande were your grandmother, you wouldn't refer to her as "resilient" as she suffers the Haitian heat and mosquitoes, would you?
The huge international monetary pledges need to be allocated in a transparent fashion to help these neediest Haitians.
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