In immediate response to last year’s devastating 7.0
earthquake in Haiti, working people donated billions of dollars by way of
private charities and non-governmental organizations. Some were long
established, such as Oxfam America and UNICEF. Others, such as celebrity-hosted
telethons, Internet and texting campaigns, and the Clinton-Bush Haiti
Foundation, sprang up overnight. All supposedly shared the common goal of
assisting Haiti’s earthquake victims.
Three months after the quake, CBS News Investigates
reported, “The $14.9 billion donated so far works out to nearly $10,000 for
each of the estimated 1.5 million Haitians left homeless and displaced by the
disaster. On average, workers there earn just $4 a day.”
Six months after the quake, however, over three-quarters of
the money raised by charities and NGOs had not reached Haitians, according to
statistics collected by the Chronicle of Philanthropy.
Currently, Haitians are dying from cholera because their
basic housing and sanitation needs still have not been met. They are forced to
sleep in the open air or under tarps and defecate in buckets or on the ground.
Internationally, people are demanding to know where the money is and why there
is no oversight or accountability.
Money alone, however, will not solve this crisis. Some
10,000 aid groups—more per capita than in any other nation—has led to a
situation devoid of centralized planning.. The NGOs range from international
giants, such as Save the Children, Catholic Relief Services and Médecins Sans
Frontièrs (known in English as Doctors Without Borders), to a plethora of U.S.
evangelical churches that help just one school or church for their own purposes
of proselytizing. The unwillingness of NGOs to coordinate efforts wastes
valuable time and resources and further adds to the suffering.
Haitians are allowed little participation in the rebuilding
of their own country and do not control how these outside agencies allocate
resources. The NGOs have actually built what the Wall Street Journal calls a
parallel state that maintains the nation’s dependence on foreign aid and
charity. “The system as it is guarantees its failure,” said Laura Zenotti, a
political scientist at Virginia Tech.
Why wouldn’t the United States want Haiti to be strong and
independent? Since 1804, when former slaves founded Haiti as the first
Black-led, independent country in the world, the U.S. has maintained a hostile
policy toward Haiti in order to keep it economically underdeveloped. For over a
century, Washington has interfered in Haiti’s elections, supported dictators
Papa Doc and Baby Doc Duvalier, and led two coups ousting democratically
elected Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
In fact, the first response of the United States to the
earthquake was to send in an occupying army in the form of U.N. “peacekeepers”
who promptly shot Haitians. These troops were followed by NGOs, corporations
and individuals who continue to treat this natural disaster as an opportunity
to exploit people in need. One particularly cynical article heralds the Haitian
earthquake as a benchmark for finally allowing marketers to tap into a
difficult-to-reach, but long sought after, revenue stream—teenagers with cell
phones.
In comparison, Cuba had been training doctors for free in
Haitiyears before the quake, with nearly 400 doctors, EMTs and other medical
personnel working to meet the daily medical needs of the Haitian people. Cuban
medical professionals were the first to respond to the earthquake and set up
two emergency hospitals in Port-au-Prince.
In addition, about 400 Cuban-trained Haitian doctors work in
120 communities around Haiti, assisted by a 370-person Cuban medical mission
that has been in Haiti for several years. Training Haitian doctors serves to
strengthen the local medical infrastructure, because the Haitian doctors will
remain long after the charity providers depart.
Likewise, Venezuela was the first to forgive Haiti’s debt,
sending fuel along with 616 metric tons of food, water-purification systems,
generators and equipment for moving rubble. President Hugo Chávez said his
country continues to provide help while at the same time respecting the
independence and sovereignty of Haiti. He called for reflection on the
situation of poverty in the Caribbean country, for which he said capitalism is
responsible, urging, “Long live the people of Haiti!”
