Two years later, what has happened to the money?

KEEBLE McFARLANE

Saturday, January 14, 2012

It began with a shock, as these occurrences do, and the aftermath has been even more shocking. Just over two years ago, an earthquake of 7.0 magnitude unleashed a new series of disasters on the long-suffering people of Haiti. Accompanied by a characteristic loud rumbling, the ground under the town of Léogâne shook vigorously and the seismic waves radiated out, reducing most of it and the nearby city of Port-au-Prince to rubble.

Those 35 seconds set the already dysfunctional nation into a whirlwind of hopes for a bright new future fuelled by outpourings of generosity from near and far, commingled with disappointment, political games and external machinations. The earthquake initially killed between 200,000 and 300,000 Haitians — no one can give a definitive number — and left more than one-and-a-half million homeless.

Within hours of the quake, UN agencies, non-governmental organisations and countries large and small mobilised relief efforts. The US sent in military forces, which took over the Toussaint l'Ouverture airport as well as the harbour operations of the capital city. So much stuff came in so quickly that transport crews had difficulty getting the food, drugs, dressings, tents and other relief supplies to those who needed them most urgently.

City streets were blocked by mounds of rubble and those which were open were clogged with traffic funnelled from the blockages. To avoid spreading disease, dead bodies were unceremoniously shovelled into huge pits and buried summarily. Informal settlements went up in any available open space. In addition to proper tents donated by benefactors, people fashioned makeshift shelters out of scraps of wood scavenged from the rubble and covered with plastic sheeting.

In addition to the crowding, lack of privacy and the menace of marauding gangs preying on the bewildered survivors, there was the same lack of clean water and proper waste disposal as was the case before the quake. But crews attacked the piles of rubble and moved half of it within months.

For a while people were able to endure the inadequate arrangements without suffering any serious new threats to their health. Then they were hit with another serious calamity which continues to this day. In all their generations of misfortune and suffering, Haitians have never had to cope with the scourge of cholera for more than a century. Cholera is a simple bacterial infection of the gastro-intestinal tract in which, if untreated, people defecate themselves to death. It is a water-borne illness which first flared up 10 months after the earthquake, causing at least 7,000 deaths and making more than half-a-million people seriously ill.

Fingers were quickly pointed to a camp occupied by UN peace-keepers from Nepal. Investigations found that independent contractors dumped waste from the camp into an unsecured pit which flooded during heavy rainfall. The runoff leached into nearby rivers used by rural Haitians for bathing, laundry and cooking. The disease moved through the quake survivors like wildfire through dry grass and has been the subject of increased bad blood and even lawsuits between Haitians and the international community working there.

Haiti has the least developed facilities for water and sewage treatment in the western hemisphere, and according to figures from four years ago, only 17 per cent of Haitians had access to sanitation the rest of us take for granted -- flush toilets, septic tanks or ventilated pit latrines. Clean drinking water was available to only 63 per cent of Haitians. These statistics point to the systemic problems which have plagued Haiti for generations.

The UN played host to a large group of countries, UN-specialised agencies and NGOs two months after the quake, and passed a hat around which quickly accumulated US$5.3 billion in pledges. In that meeting and subsequent gatherings, we heard high-sounding pronouncements about taking advantage of this catastrophe to rebuild the country properly, to "build back better". Yet, for all the pledges of assistance and the work of many foreign workers, more than 600,000 people remain in displacement camps.

We heard echoes of those pledges again on Thursday as Haitians paused to remember the countless thousands claimed by the quake and its serious after-shocks — not only the seismic ones, but the ones of human omission and commission.

Many people dressed themselves in white to observe a national day of mourning by attending church services and mass grave sites across the deeply religious country. President Michel Martelly proclaimed: "This year is a year when we will really start rebuilding physically, but also re-building the hope and the future of the Haitian people".

Martelly, his head shaved clean, is a former music star who went by the name 'Sweet Mickey'. He was joined in the commemorations by former US President Bill Clinton, who has promoted job creation as central to efforts to lift Haiti out of its historical plight of misery and corruption.

One plausible announcement was an effort supported by the Government of Canada to the tune of C$20 million to relocate about 20,000 people from tent settlements only a few blocks away from the still shattered presidential palace. Officials also point optimistically to projects such as an industrial park being built for about US$257 million on the northwestern coast to help stimulate agricultural production.

Agriculture is certainly an area of focus for the reconstruction efforts.

A kind of dependency syndrome has developed over decades of donor activity by international aid organisations, and anything but the most basic of subsistence agriculture has been stifled. Ten years ago, farming was responsible for 40 per cent of the economy; it has declined to 25 per cent. Half-a-century ago, Haiti used to import about one-fifth of its food; today more than half of what Haitians eat comes from abroad.

Reviving agriculture would achieve two important things — making Haitians less reliant on imported food even as it creates jobs in the countryside, in the process relieving population pressure on the already overburdened capital city. Almost a quarter of the nation's population lived in Port-au-Prince before the quake, making a major contribution to the staggering death toll. There are some hopeful signs apart from that big industrial park which is expected to open its gates this year. Last month the World Bank approved US$50 million for agricultural projects and there appears to be renewed interest abroad for traditional Haitian products like coffee, cocoa, sugar and mangoes.

But Haitians chafing under stagnation still ask, "What has happened to all that aid money?" According to the UN office of the special envoy to Haiti, only about half of it has actually been disbursed. There are several explanations for this.

Many agencies just do their own thing without sharing information with anybody else. A good chunk of the money often ends up right back in the pockets of the donor country. For example, the US pledged $379 million in aid and sent 5,000 troops immediately after the quake. Last year an investigation by the Associated Press news agency found that one-third of that money went right back to the US to cover the cost of the military deployment. And all of the donors completely side-step the Haitian Government or local NGOs. The Government gets less than one penny of each dollar of US aid.

Michaëlle Jean, a Haitian-born former governor-general of Canada and now UNESCO's special envoy to Haiti, urges all aid efforts to change their focus to development — development of education, of infrastructure and of investment. "If reconstruction is not about creating infrastructure or jobs, what's the point?" she asks. "How can you build an economy that is sustainable on charity?"

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Two years later, what has happened to the money?