Have we forgotten Haiti?

[JCMach1]

An excellent new series of articles from The National. There will be more from Haiti all week.

====================

...Disappointment typifies the mood in Haiti’s battered capital, with camp-dwellers, peacekeepers and charity workers all expressing frustration at the slow progress being made.

About 1.6 million people, almost equivalent to the population of Manhattan, still live in the 1,342 makeshift camps that sprang up after the earthquake.

Camp-dwellers trudge through puddles at the start of the rainy and potentially deadly hurricane season, sharing each latrine with an average of 144 other people.

An estimated 101,000 people are living in camps considered in perilous condition and susceptible to being wiped out in a storm.

Only 7,000 have been relocated to safer ground as government officials struggle to find new homes...


Last month’s report from the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee warned that reconstruction has stalled and questioned whether western donors should take over some leadership and decision-making from Haiti’s floundering government.

The Interim Haiti Recovery Commission (IHRC), co-chaired by Bill Clinton and Jean-Max Bellerive, Haiti’s prime minister, has spent only US$260 million (Dh955m) of the $700m it has received – a figure far short of the $5.3 billion donors promised for the initial two-year recovery phase.

However, the foreign billions being overseen by the IHRC, jointly run by the government and foreign donors, is unlikely to yield results in the short term for Ms Caneus or her family in one of Champs-de-Mars’s sprawling camps.

“This is the money they gave to the government … it’s just for the government people to put in their pockets,” she said. “It’s not for the Haitian people. I’ve been here for six months and they have not helped, so why should I believe in them?”

Despite moderate gains in recent years, Haiti’s government was widely seen as corrupt and inefficient even before the earthquake flattened the National Palace and 28 of 29 government ministries and killed almost one-third of its 60,000-strong civil service.
... http://www.thenational.ae/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20100709/FOREIGN/707089866/1042

[edbermac]

1. How can we think about Haiti with Lindsay Lohan in jail?

:sarcasm::sarcasm::sarcasm::sarcasm::sarcasm::sarcasm:

[ixion]

2. Heh... you beat me to it...

[malaise]

3. We are just hoping that a hurricane does not hit

poor Haiti. Most of the rubble from the earthquake is still lying where it fell.

Women are being attacked nightly as they use bathrooms in the camps. Thankfully may kids are back in schools.
Haiti has been forgotten by most people.

[JCMach1]

4. And seriously... this series of articles is from the UAE!

Where is the American media...

Oh yeah, LeBron James...

[SunnySong]

7. I missed 24 hour news today because

A: I don't live in a nursing home

B: I found the remote.


So the news is covering basketball... seriously.

[malaise]

13. ABC is back in Haiti this week

:hi:

[JCMach1]

5. There is also an audio slideshow with the article

http://www.thenational.ae/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20100709/MULTIMEDIA/100705873/1319/FOREIGN

[SunnySong]

6. Yes. nt

[OJones]

8. Ansel Herz

is the only reporter I know of who has been consistently reporting from Haiti.

Most of his stories can be found here, if anyone is interested.

[emilyg]

9. Just heard on ABC that

assault on women has gone up 30%. A 5 year old was raped.

[stray cat]

10. Have you sent any donations recently?

[nadinbrzezinski]

11. Yes why we know we have to give money

to charities not only when it hit but now.

Having run disaster services 99% of all donations came in the first two weeks.

Cameras leave, it's over.

[Mike 03]

12. Maybe So

In my town we cannot even afford law enforcement or teachers anymore.

You can judge and judge all fucking day long for all I care. The U.S. is insolvent. We cannot plug a leak in the Gulf of Mexico or pay for food stamps for the ten percent of our population who is out of work. How can we fucking help every other nation?

[Greyhound]

14. Yes. We've never cared about Haiti, it was a media event that served its purpose.

We've allowed our parasites to rape that nation forever, and even after the brief mentions the media gave it after the earthquake, I'll bet you can't find more than 1 in 100 Americans that has even the slightest idea of how badly we ruined her.

Are you surprised?

[WolverineDG]

15. Given the US-bashing that went on in the foreign & anti-US American MSM outlets

I'm surprised we're now being told to send money. Funny, with all the pissing, moaning, & blaming the US for everything that went wrong & silence when something went right, I would have thought our help (& money) wasn't wanted.

dg