Last Wednesday marked the one-year anniversary of the catastrophic, 7.0 magnitude earthquake which hit Haiti at 4:53 p.m. local time, in which an estimated 316,000 people were killed, and 1.5 million Haitians were left homeless.
The unimaginable number of deaths contributed to 75 per cent of the death toll from natural disasters in 2010, and there are still many more dying every day in Haiti due to a cholera outbreak that has claimed 3,759 lives since last October.
Promised aid to rebuild the country came quickly within days of the Jan. 12, 2010 disaster, from individuals, schools, countries, NGOs, and through benefit concerts held around the world featuring celebrities. And in the past year, a reported 42 per cent of the $2.1 billion in donations pledged by 30 countries has been distributed.
Despite that outpouring of support, there are still 800,000 Haitians living in tent cities amongst the rubble – of which only five percent has been cleared, according to a recent report by Oxfam International. So one needs to ask how much, if any, of the aid has actually reached those who need it the most.
Canadians dug deep into their pockets, and raised over $13 million during the Canada for Haiti campaign. However, money alone cannot fix a country of almost 10 million that has been dilapidated by incompetent and corrupt government officials for decades.
So what can be done to solve what seems like an insurmountable problem in what some news commentators went as far as to call a failed state?
Maybe it starts with the reconstruction of what one hopes to be a relatively corruption-free and competent government to replace the soon-to-be-leaving administration led by Haitian President Rene Preval.
What’s needed is a government, to borrow a quote from Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, “of the people, by the people, for the people,” that’s not busy stuffing its own pockets with what’s left remaining of the $2.1 billion pledged for the rebuilding of a nation which went through one of the worst earthquakes in the region in 200 years.
Until then, the Haitian people will continue to live in tents surrounded by what used to be their homes and businesses, with inadequate access to clean water, jobs, and permanent housing.
To view photos of Haiti, a year after the 2010 earthquake, visit http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2011/01/haiti_one_year_later.html
