Friend at NGO is there building a shelter for volunteers. collected donations and supplies in three containers.
Haitian ‘authorities’ are looking for a $60K bribe or else they won’t let containers in.
***
As so many of us said at the time, the purpose of aid and assistance is to aid and assist those in need, not to prove to ourselves that we are charitable.
Haiti is totally corrupt. It’s run by a small set of about 30 isolate families, French speaking, who are the government. They control all the key aspects of the economy – the ports, industrial aspects, govt. They live in isolate gated communities.
The rest of the population, who are Creole, are on their own. They are uneducated, illiterate, without an infrastructure of roads, hydro, water, schools, work. Services for them, such as health care, schools etc, are provided by external foreign charity organizations. Again, the Haitian govt does not do a thing for this population.
The earthquake primarily devastated the shacks of this population. Since the govt had never provided for them before, then, nothing would change. And nothing has changed. Where has the money donated by the world gone? To those 30 families. It certainly hasn’t gone to the Haitian population who remain in a worse situation than before…with their refugee tents now becoming permanent domains..and still lacking water, hydro, health care, education, jobs..and still dependent totally on those foreign charities.
What do I predict will happen? Nothing. The ‘new Haiti’ will be exactly as the old. The isolate 30 families living in their wealth; the rest of the population living in tents and supported by foreign aid.
