HAITI: Local Leaders Shut Out Of Military-Run Relief Efforts

HAITI: Local Leaders Shut Out Of Military-Run Relief Efforts

By Ansel Herz

GRAND GOAVE Jan 28 (IPS) - Two gray 23-million-dollar

hovercrafts sitting in the middle of a sandy tropical beach look

like they are from another world. A pair of 15-foot-wide

propeller fans sticks out from the back of each behemoth.

Along the narrow dirt road to this seaside towns centre

families live under blankets stretched over sticks.

A tent city occupies the towns main square surrounded by

crumbling buildings. Joseph Jean-Pierre Salam the mayor of

Grand Goave about 15 kilometres west of Port-au-Prince

estimated that some 70 percent of the citys important structures

fell during the 7.0 earthquake that struck Haiti on Jan. 12.

They have made many promises but we dont see the action

yet Salam said referring to the international community. We

have a lot of people suffering. There is an expectation that help

will come.

Little food and water has been distributed by the dozens U.S.

troops milling about the beach since the earthquake according

to local leaders.

I went there to talk to them said Jean-Jacob Renee an

English teacher. They said they are there to set up some tents

for themselves but they did not come with food or water -

anything for the people.

He said the only aid the military brought to Grand Goave was

distributed by Catholic Relief Services an international NGO.

When they are in the town we dont know. We dont have their

phone number he said. Nobody has helped us.

U.S. military personnel on the beach were busy unloading

construction material and heavy equipment from cargo boats.

Senior Chief Petty Officer Steve Krutky told IPS his disaster

recovery team cleared a rockslide out of the road and worked to

repair local orphanages run by evangelical missions.

The U.S. military did not respond to IPS requests for further

clarification of the Navys role in Grand Goave.

An analysis by the Associated Press on Wednesday found that 33

cents of every dollar towards emergency aid in Haiti goes to

military aid more than three times the nine cents spent on food.

Residents of Grand Goave said there is a network of seven

neighbourhood leaders for each section of the city that has not

been tapped in the relief effort. Friends are pooling resources

to purchase rice when possible but family after family living

outside the rubble of their homes told IPS they have received no

assistance.

The roof of Rinvil Jean Weldys modest one-story brick house is

broken off resting at an angle on top of a kitchen table

covered in dust. The rear wall crumbled spilling onto the

cracked ground. His wife remains at a nearby hospital nursing an

injury from the quake.

We need a tent we need food and water all the normal

things Weldy said pointing at his sons who were hammering

together scraps of wood to build the frame of a tent. To the

U.N. I say I need help now.

Weldy has been expecting compensation from the U.N. since Nov.

10 when he and numerous witnesses say part of a bullet fired by

U.N. peacekeeping troops hit his shoulder. Four days before the

earthquake the U.N. said an internal investigation into the

incident cleared the soldiers of any wrongdoing.

Witnesses told IPS the troops fired into the ground in an

attempt to control a curious crowd not into the air as the

U.N. maintains.

The U.N. peacekeepers are roundly dismissed by many Haitians as

a source for relief in the country. We have been living with

the U.N. for many years but now we see them very little Mayor

Salam said matter-of-factly.

In Leogane on the route back from Grand Goave to

Port-Au-Prince 500 families from a tent city in a field lined

up in an orderly queue to receive food packages in contrast to

chaotic aid dispersals seen in Port-Au-Prince. Individuals walked

into a clearing to grab a box each time a young Haitian man

called out numbers through a megaphone.

For us it was very important to do this without military

said Dolores Rescheleit an aid worker with a German NGO called

Arche Nova that provided the food. Because the people in the

camp are very strong. When you give the responsibility to the

people in the camp they will do it better than we will with the

military.

A committee of Haitians with sub-committees to handle

security hygiene and aid distribution is governing the camp

without problems Rescheleit said. Women smiled as they walked

back to their tents balancing boxes of food on their heads.

(FIN/2010)