Myrtle Beach Sun News Logo

Aid doesn't serve Haitian interests | Myrtle Beach Sun News

×
  • E-edition
  • Home
    • Customer Service
    • Subscribe
    • Activate Your Account
    • Account Support
    • Mobile Apps
    • Newsletters
    • The Sun News Store
    • FAQ
    • Cancel SunValues Delivery
    • Plan
    • All Tourist Info
    • Vacation Planner
    • Calendar
    • Where to Stay
    • Ask a Local
    • Festivals Guide
    • Best of the Area
    • Play
    • Nightlife
    • Golf
    • Shopping
    • Shows
    • Myrtle Beach Blog
    • Restaurants

  • Obituaries
    • All News
    • Local News
    • Crime/Courts
    • Business
    • State News
    • Nation/World
    • Weird News
    • More News
    • Politics
    • Myrtle Beach Bike Rallies
    • Submit A News Tip
    • Tourism News
    • Real Estate News
    • All Sports
    • High Schools
    • Coastal Carolina
    • Recreation
    • Golf
    • MB Pelicans
    • Auto Racing
    • More Sports
    • College Sports
    • NFL
    • MLB
    • MB Marathon
    • Toast Of The Coast
    • Green Reading Blog
    • The Roost Blog
    • All Opinion
    • Letters To The Editor
    • Submit A Letter
    • Editorial
    • Cartoons
    • Columns & Blogs
    • Bob Bestler
    • All Living
    • Coasting
    • Neighbors
    • Food
    • Best Of The Beach
    • Announcements
    • Religion
    • Travel
    • Pets
    • Home & Garden
    • All Entertainment
    • Kicks!
    • Best Of The Beach
    • Movies
    • Calendar
    • Contests
    • More Entertainment
    • Comics
    • Puzzles & Games
    • Horoscopes
    • Celebrities
    • Music
    • TV

  • Legals
  • Cars
  • Jobs
  • Moonlighting
  • Homes
  • Classifieds
  • Classified Ads

  • About Us
  • Mobile & Apps

Editorials

Aid doesn't serve Haitian interests

    ORDER REPRINT →

August 01, 2010 12:00 AM

Haiti is suffering from misguided foreign aid.

The rains are coming in Haiti, but there are more homeless people in Haiti today than the day after the earthquake hit in January. More than 1.5 million Haitians are living under tattered tents, tarps and sheets, which will provide little protection during hurricane season.

Immediately after the earthquake, there were 20,000 U.S. troops and 14,000 U.N. troops in Haiti. But these troops didn't help remove the earthquake rubble. Haitians themselves, using their bare hands, did almost all of the search and rescue. Today, 98 percent of the rubble remains, as Haitians have not received machinery needed to remove it.

Only a small fraction of the billions of dollars of international aid for Haiti has actually reached the quake victims. And much of the aid raised by U.N. envoy Bill Clinton is geared to small and medium-size businesses. But the quake victims are not small- and medium-size businesses. They are ordinary people who need a place to live in the city or tools to work their fields.

SIGN UP

Sign Up and Save

Get six months of free digital access to The Sun News

SUBSCRIBE WITH GOOGLE

#ReadLocal

Instead of enabling the millions of small Haitian farmers to become food self-sufficient by growing grains, fruits and vegetables, however, Clinton has announced that Coca-Cola will be running a project to use Haitian fields to grow mangoes for a new drink.

In the past six months, a number of industrial parks have been built by foreign corporations to take advantage of Haiti's $3-a-day minimum wage.

The "new Haiti" after the earthquake is not much different from the old Haiti the United States has been attempting to bring forth for two centuries: a place governed by business-oriented Haitian technocrats who take their marching orders from Washington.

Clinton and others in the international aid community opine that the slow disbursement of funds and rebuilding of the country is the fault of Haiti's weak government. Ironically, it was the Bush administration that rendered Haiti weak by overthrowing in 2004 the elected government of Jean-Bertrand Aristide.

Members of the aid community also say Haiti doesn't have the capacity to absorb the aid. But it was the World Bank and U.S. policies that destroyed Haiti's food sovereignty, forced the government industries to privatize, and left services like education, water, sanitation and health care to the free market, which did not deliver.

The Obama administration and the international community had a choice to make right after the earthquake. They could help empower the Haitian people and the Haitian government to lead the relief and the rebuilding efforts with an eye toward Haitian self-sufficiency. Or they could run the efforts the old-fashioned way: top down, with the U.S. military, the United Nations and the nongovernmental organizations in charge, with an eye toward letting even more foreign corporations cash in on Haiti.

They chose the latter. And Haitians are suffering.

Millions of Haitians seek empowerment with community organizing, community policing, domestic manufacturing, fair-wage jobs and participatory democracy.

But like the relief aid, this is not materializing.

Instead, Haitians are being left more dependent than ever.

Contact Danto, a playwright, poet and human rights attorney, at pmproj@progressive.org.

  Comments  

Videos

North Carolina coach Roy Williams following win over Florida State: ‘We had ten turnovers, I thought we had 103’

Mark Kingston on Noah Campbell’s walk-off homer, impact on Gamecocks’ morale

View More Video

Trending Stories

Did you know about this Myrtle Beach secret? Tunnel stretches beneath Ocean Boulevard

February 22, 2019 01:17 PM

Large fire guts apartment building near Barefoot Landing in Myrtle Beach area

February 22, 2019 10:56 PM

Police charge Myrtle Beach man with arson in connection to Ocean Creek Resort blaze

February 23, 2019 11:15 AM

He forgot to grab his cash back from self checkout. Then, his $100 was taken and spent

February 23, 2019 12:34 PM

She killed her boyfriend then ate a burger. Now, at 72, she wants a new trial or death

February 22, 2019 07:38 AM

things to do

Read Next

Extortion claims and Horry County’s problem with transparency need to be solved — now

Editorials

Extortion claims and Horry County’s problem with transparency need to be solved — now

By The Myrtle Beach Sun News Editorial Board

    ORDER REPRINT →

January 04, 2019 11:00 AM

On the very day he was sworn in as Horry County Council chairman, Johnny Gardner denied any wrongdoing in the claims of extortion in a most unusual case under investigation by the S.C. Law Enforcement Division. The situation has plenty of political intrigue including a leaked, unsubstantiated report of an alleged — particular emphasis, if you will — crime, and elected and appointed public officials refusing to talk on the record.

KEEP READING

Sign Up and Save

#ReadLocal

Get six months of free digital access to The Sun News

SUBSCRIBE WITH GOOGLE

MORE EDITORIALS

Editorials

Voting should be easier than standing in long lines at polling places

November 09, 2018 10:43 AM
Chamber’s bare minimum reporting isn’t enough. City needs to demand more detail.

Editorials

Chamber’s bare minimum reporting isn’t enough. City needs to demand more detail.

September 07, 2018 08:29 AM
President Trump, we’re not ‘enemies of the people.’ End your war on our free press

Editorials

President Trump, we’re not ‘enemies of the people.’ End your war on our free press

August 15, 2018 06:06 PM

Editorials

Task force is a good step, but human trafficking is a problem we must quickly address

August 10, 2018 11:13 AM
International Drive project will seem easy by time we drive on Interstate 73

Editorials

International Drive project will seem easy by time we drive on Interstate 73

August 03, 2018 11:44 AM

Editorials

Horry County administration oversteps in directing elected coroner

June 29, 2018 12:17 PM
Take Us With You

Real-time updates and all local stories you want right in the palm of your hand.

Icon for mobile apps

Myrtle Beach Sun News App

View Newsletters

Subscriptions
  • Start a Subscription
  • Customer Service
  • eEdition
  • Vacation Hold
  • Pay Your Bill
  • Rewards
Learn More
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Newsletters
  • News in Education
Advertising
  • Place a Classified
  • Advertise
  • Rates
  • Contests & Promotions
  • Local Deals
Copyright
Privacy Policy
Terms of Service


Back to Story