20638: (hermantin)Miami-Herald-Haiti paying dearly for revolt (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: leonie hermantin <lhermantin@hotmail.com>

Posted on Sun, Mar. 21, 2004

CRISIS IN HAITI


Haiti paying dearly for revolt

Haiti's social systems and infrastructure have suffered for decades, but the
violent chaos of the anti-Aristide revolt has increased an already desperate
people's pain.

BY JOE MOZINGO

jmozingo@herald.com


PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti -- Cratered roads, open sewers, blackouts, denuded
hills, appalling healthcare, a scarcity of jobs and a whole class of society
condemned to shanties made of other people's trash.

This was Haiti before it convulsed into violence last month.

Before the government collapsed, looters ransacked businesses, and banks,
hospitals and police stations closed.

Before nearly every criminal in the country was set loose and still-untold
numbers of people were murdered for their politics, whichever way they
leaned.

A transition government, backed by the United States, is trying to gain
control of the nation of 8.2 million, which is awash in weapons, many of
them handed out by both sides during the February revolt that forced former
President Jean-Bertrand Aristide to resign.

Picked by a ''council of sages,'' Prime Minister Gerard Latortue took office
last week and appointed a Cabinet of 13 ministers on Wednesday. But with
neither Aristide loyalists nor his political opponents included in the new
Cabinet, many have doubts about its viability.

TARGETING THE BASICS

Leaders of Haiti and the international community are also just beginning to
assess what needs to be done to get the most basic kinds of services --
hospitals, electricity, law enforcement -- up and running. Even if just
running on fumes.

The United Nations sent out an emergency appeal last week for $35 million to
help provide food, clean water, healthcare and security.

''Disarmament and nonviolence is the top priority,'' said Alain Grimard,
technical advisor to the United Nations in Haiti.

Because of armed attacks, humanitarian agencies have not been able to reach
most of the country. The U.S. Marines who landed at the beginning of the
month secured the capital, and only Thursday did French peacekeeping troops
begin to extend their reach into parts of northern Haiti.

In the north, armed rebels still patrol the streets of major cities. And in
the south, while civic leaders have managed to fend off a bloodbath, armed
gangs still control many neighborhoods and villages.

''Until we can get out in the countryside and have some security, we won't
know exactly what we need,'' said Françoise Gruloos-Ackermans, UNICEF's
Haiti representative.

U.N. officials, Haitian business leaders and humanitarian organizations say
the $35 million would be the bare beginning of rebuilding this ravaged
nation.

''It will ultimately take billions and billions of dollars,'' Grimard said.

Estimates of the physical damage from looting range from $100 million to
$300 million. But the reverberations throughout the economy are beyond
estimation.

DIRE RISK

''The main concern right now is how to get money to the private sector,''
said Kesner Pharel, an economist and chairman of the consulting firm Group
Croissance.

With interest rates above 30 percent and prices climbing 40 percent in the
last six months, the already rickety backbone of the Haitian economy is at
risk of snapping, Pharel said.

The light industrial zone in Port-au-Prince, one of the biggest generators
of foreign capital in Haiti, was racked by looting. The area once supported
some 30,000 jobs, Pharel said.

Further, because the capital was cut off from the countryside for weeks, a
food shortage sent prices skyward.

HAITIANS OVERSEAS

Pharel hopes the international community will create a secure atmosphere in
the country and that Haitians living abroad will step in to invest in
businesses.

One of the biggest obstacles will be the scant infrastructure, which is so
poor that some of the best roads and bridges date back to the first American
occupation of Haiti between 1915 and 1934. The potholes and washouts on
highways between major cities make a 50-mile drive an all-day journey.

Electricity is just as bad.

Charles Albert Jacques, director of Electrité d'Hati, said it will cost $200
million to upgrade the system to generate the amount of power the country
needs.

''We are about 25 years behind, technologically speaking,'' he said.

On top of that, scofflaws illegally tap into the electricity grid and suck
away 40 percent of what the department does produce -- without paying for
the service.

And since the government's collapse, the department's bank accounts have
been frozen, and Jacques can't buy fuel. He managed to get a minimal level
of credit, but only enough to provide power for a few hours at a time -- and
only in Port-au-Prince.

''We give a few hours of electricity to the morgue to keep it sanitary,'' he
said.

Pharel, a prominent Haitian economist, says the only hope is private
enterprise.

''The best thing would be to privatize electricity, telecommunications and
the airport and try to get some money from the diaspora,'' he said.

The lack of electricity in the last few weeks brought UNICEF's vaccination
program to a halt.

''We haven't been able to give vaccines because the [refrigeration] was
interrupted,'' UNICEF representative Gruloos-Ackermans said.

Grimard said the United Nations probably will not allocate emergency funds
for shoring up infrastructure such as electricity. That is likely to be done
with loans from the World Bank or the International Monetary Fund.

One of UNICEF's main goals is to get hospitals working at full speed again,
particularly maternity wards and pediatric units. In February, gangs
ransacked many hospitals and terrorized patients and doctors.

''With the crisis, the health infrastructure has been looted,''
Gruloos-Ackermans said. ``The mothers are still afraid to go there.''

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