23923: Arthur (net) Haiti: Hopes for the future (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Tttnhm@aol.com

8 December 2004 - Haiti: Hopes for the future

http://www.ciir.org/Templates/Internal.asp?NodeID=91258

'Another Haiti is possible' was the message sent out loud and clear last
weekend when three delegates representing 53 NGOs in Haiti visited London as part
of a tour sponsored by the Catholic Institute for International Relations
(CIIR), Christian Aid and the Haiti Support Group.

Inette Durandis, Sony Esteus and Jean Jerome Charles arrived in London last
Friday (3 December) to represent a coalition of partner NGOs in Haiti calling
on the international community for help after the tragedies that beset the
country this year. Over the weekend they met with Government officials,
journalists and partner NGOs in London to urge the European Union to put Haiti on the
map in terms of international support, aid and solidarity.

Inette Durandis is director general of the National Council of Popular
Finance and was previously general secretary of the Methodist Church in Haiti's
Development Committee, which worked in the promotion of rural development and the
provision of credit to small farmers. Jean Jerome is an agricultural advisor,
a teacher, a professor in rural sociology and is also a director of Gadru, a
Jesuit rural development centre. Sony is a journalist specialising in adult
education and community communications and is also programmes and training
director for SAKs, an NGO providing support and training to community radio stations
in Haiti.

Inette told CIIR that she believes wholeheartedly that another Haiti is
possible but said the country's future is largely dependent on whether the
international community can provide the much-needed help and support at this critical
time.

She talked about the environmental destruction of the country and how
deforestation has exacerbated the impact of hurricanes and other extreme climatic
phenomena, saying that Haiti needs a national policy of tree-planting in order
for their to be any kind of reversal of the damage caused by the uprooting and
selling of trees for charcoal revenue. And she said Haiti's infrastructure,
such as the ruling government and the police force, would need a complete
overhaul, alongside widespread disarmament of the violent military groups that
terrorise parts of the country.

She added: 'With clear participation of the population at all levels and with
transparency fighting against corruption, we cannot say Haiti can become a
developed country but we can make a lot of changes in five years.'

Lobbying the British Government

On Monday (6 December), Inette and Sony met Diane Abbott, Labour MP for
Hackney North and Stoke Newington and Chair of the All Party Parliamentary
British-Caribbean Group, to discuss how Ms Abbott has been calling on the British
Government to open a bilateral aid programme in Haiti and do all it can to address
the problems that cause poverty, rather than just supporting emergency
measures to relieve the symptoms.

The meeting came hot on the heels of the recent launch by CIIR of a postcard
campaign which asks members to sign and send a card urging Gareth Thomas,
Undersecretary of State for International Development, to open a bilateral aid
programme in the country.

Inette and Sony met Gareth Thomas and handed him a blown-up version of the
postcard, while telling him how they need the British Government to do more than
just provide emergeny relief after a disaster.

Mr Thomas said: ' Britain is backing civil society to help resolve conflict
and rebuild Haiti. DFID is funding British NGOs who are working with Haitian
civil society organisations. This comes on top of £4 million we spent on
humanitarian aid this year and the £20 million we are putting into reconstruction
through multilateral organisations. One of the great contributions of civil
society is in helping us to improve the effectiveness of our assistance.'

Inette said: 'I would like to tell the decision-makers in Britain that just
sending troops into a country is not a solution to our problems in the South.
They have to help us work on the causes of poverty, not just on the
consequences.'

Inette, Sony and Jean Jerome also spent the weekend publicising the difficult
and dramatic situation in Haiti that has befallen Haiti this year - the year
of its 200th year of independence from slavery. Haiti was devastated by
hurricanes and flooding in May and September; there was violence and civil
disturbance following the departure of President Aristide in February 2004; and the
country remains ensnared in an endless cycle of poverty and environmental
degradation that comprises life in the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.

The Europe-Haiti NGO Network, which links together more than 20 European
development agencies, solidarity groups and aid organisations in eight countries,
has more than 100 partner organisations in Haiti.


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This email is forwarded as a service of the Haiti Support Group.

See the Haiti Support Group web site:
www.haitisupport.gn.apc.org

Solidarity with the Haitian people's struggle for justice, participatory
democracy and equitable development, since 1992.
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