Haiti's elite eye$ profits as
million$ face disease and hunger
By Bill Van Auken
16 February 2010
'A crisis is a terrible thing to
waste,' Georges Sassine, president of Haiti's manufacturers association, told
the
Washington Post.
'This is what the earthquake is
today---an opportunity, a huge opportunity,' added Reginald Boulos, described
by the
Post Monday as the owner of a 'small empire' of supermarkets, a hotel and a car
dealership. 'I think we need to
give the message that we are open for business. This is really a land of
opportunities.'
Meanwhile, 'US firms have begun
jockeying for a bonanza of cleanup work,' the Miami Herald reported last week,
adding that 'At least two politically connected US firms have enlisted powerful
local allies in Haiti to help compete for the
high-stakes business.' One of them, AshBritt, won a $900 million federal
contract for clean-up in post-Katrina New Orleans, thanks in large part
to its connections with powerful lobbyists, including Haley Barbour, the
Mississippi governor and former Republican Party chairman.
I don't need some
900 million dollar contractor coming in here from the USA. Give me the job!
Just give me a
barrow a dumpster and a salary.
Now these companies are sealing
deals with Haitian businessmen and wooing the country's politicians to win
contracts that
will no doubt soak up much of the international aid that has been offered to
rebuild Haiti.
Even before the earthquake, Haiti
was the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, as well as one of the most
unequal, with 80 percent of the population living in poverty, 70 percent
unemployed and fully half somehow surviving on $1 or less a day. Now, the
catastrophe seems certain to widen the already immense gap between wealth and
poverty that is the central
characteristic of Haitian society.
Haiti's wealthy ruling
elite---together with US-based corporations---are salivating over the prospects
for increased riches
and big profits off of post-earthquake reconstruction as millions of working
class and poor people are facing the threat of
starvation and infectious epidemics that could easily push an already
horrendous death toll up by hundreds of thousands more.
Rain fell again on Port-au-Prince
Sunday, creating even more hellish conditions for the more than half a million
people crowded
into the capital's makeshift camps, most with little more than a sheet to
shield them from the elements. Across the country,
there are an estimated 1.5 million people who have been made homeless.
The most recent report from the
United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) warns
that
hundreds of thousands of the homeless are at risk with the approach of the rainy season. Among them
are the 25,000
encamped on a golf course in Petionville, the largest such settlement. The UN
agency described the densely populated camp as 'one of the most vulnerable
sites for epidemics and flooding,' warning that 'A large number of shelters are
on unstable slopes and heavy rains will cause them to slide.' Someone
should tell Clooney's foundation to get a million yards of tent fabric to the
people fast.
Distribution of emergency shelter materials has been agonizingly slow. 'As of 11 February, over 49,000 tarps have been distributed along with 23,000 family size tents,' OCHA reported. The Haitian government has insisted that its most urgent need is 200,000 tents---nearly 10 times the number distributed thus far. Given these conditions, the prospect that many more will die is growing. The biggest cause of death in the camps now is acute respiratory infection, according to the report. Many who suffered traumatic injuries in the quake are recovering in the camps, where the lack of sanitation and shelter pose the danger that they will fall victim to deadly infections. There is the wider threat that malaria and dengue, which are normally widespread in Haiti during the rainy season, will become rampant along with other infectious illnesses, under the miserable conditions to which millions have been condemned.
While aid agencies have established a more regularized system for food distribution, adequate supplies are still not reaching those affected. 'The food security situation, which was already precarious prior to the earthquake, is getting worse,' said an OCHA spokeswoman
There is growing frustration among the Haitians over the continued failure to deliver sufficient aid of any kind to the vast majority of the people. Within the past several days this has broken out into angry protests, aimed at Haitian government officials as well as foreign agencies and leaders, including former US President Bill Clinton, designated as the UN's special envoy to the country.
Also frustrated are many of the
relief workers, who continue to point to the failure to swiftly move large
amounts of supplies
that have piled up at the Port-au-Prince airport, which has been under the control
of the US military since the day after the
January 12 earthquake Can you imagine all those soldiers cooking food and the
million, milling around starving people smelling it? . http://www.dawesfineart.com/0012-1aa-Haiti.htm
An article published in the
Miami Herald Monday provided a graphic indication of this situation.
'A United Nations tally showed
aid groups had distributed some 20,000 mats to Haiti earthquake survivors on a
recent
day---but more than 35 times as many sat in a warehouse,' the Herald reported.
'Some 32,000 tarps had been
delivered by last Sunday, but 104,132 more sat in storage while tens of
thousands of quake
victims strung up sheets to create makeshift housing.'
Eric Klein, founder of the relief
group CAN-DO, which is active in Haiti, told the Herald, 'There's no excuse for
medical supplies sitting in a warehouse five minutes from a hospital where they
are doing amputations and giving people
ibuprofen for the pain.'
A correspondent for the
Venezuelan television network teleSur reported that food being distributed from
the airport is reaching
the Haitian population already spoiled for being kept so long in the heat.
Doctors, relief workers and
officials of a number of governments have blamed the militarization of the
response to the
earthquake by the US government for delaying aid, particularly in the crucial
first two weeks after the disaster struck.
Some 22,000 US soldiers, sailors
and Marines were dispatched to the Caribbean nation, with combat-equipped
troops taking
control of the airport, port facilities and presidential palace. Meanwhile,
naval warships and Coast Guard cutters set up a
blockade of the country's coast to block the earthquake's victims from trying
to flee to the US. Last week, the Coast
Guard brought 78 Haitians intercepted on a boat in the waters off the Bahamas
backed to their ravaged homeland.
General Douglas Fraser, chief of
the US Southern Command, announced on Saturday that the Pentagon has scaled
back the
military presence to 13,000 troops. Many of those leaving are to be redeployed
to Iraq or Afghanistan. The general refused to
say how long the remaining force would stay in Haiti, stating only that they
would be there as long as 'necessary.'
The necessity driving this
military occupation is that of defending the interests of Haiti's wealthy
ruling elite as well as those
of US corporations seeking to profit off cheap labor and devastation against
the threat that the crisis will trigger a social revolt
by Haiti's impoverished population.