Failed Aid: Poverty Pimps in Haiti Cont. to Play Arsonists & Firemen

By Ezili Dantò | Thu, Dec 13, 2012
ezilidanto.com/zili 

Capitalizing on its imported cholera plague to Haiti, deflecting liability and responsibility for the death of 8,000 Haitians and sickness of over 600,000 in two years, the UN poverty pimps appeal for more misery funds to fill their employee/ subcontractor pockets. UN/PAHO/NGOtocracy in Haiti continues to play arsonist and firemen.

(See denied request to peruse and comment on proposed 10-year plan by PAHO/UN to eradicate cholera in Haiti to be unveiled June 29 at OAS | Response to media time given to latest UN-cover up: The new two strain hypothesis, erzilidanto, 06/22/2012 )

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In this Post

• Audit: USAID Haiti work 'not on track'  — bigstory.ap.org
• Unease over UN bid to eradicate Haiti cholera — blogs.aljazeera.com
• The U.N. has requested $2.2 billion to battle a cholera epidemic in Haiti that has killed nearly 8,000 people since 2010 — ibtimes.com

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Audit: USAID Haiti work 'not on track'
By MARTHA MENDOZA— Oct. 1 5:23 PM EDT 

A newly released audit says the largest U.S. contractor working to stabilize Haiti after the 2010 earthquake is "not on track" to complete its assignments on schedule, has a weak monitoring system and is not adequately involving community members.

Washington D.C.-based Chemonics won a $53 million, 18-month contract from USAID in 2011 to help Haiti strengthen its economy and public institutions. USAID's Office of Inspector General released a report Monday that found Chemonics had a series of slips, including using arbitrary ways of evaluating its work, failing to hire local workers, and going ahead with potentially damaging environmental projects before they were approved.

"This report touches on a lot of issues we've seen with the overall reconstruction effort," said Jake Johnston, a researcher at the Washington D.C.-based Center for Economic and Policy Research who studies U.S. spending in Haiti. "There's a lack of transparency and the work is often poorly planned and poorly executed."

Chemonics did not have an immediate comment, but a spokeswoman said it was preparing a response. USAID's Office of Transition Initiatives, which manages the Chemonics contracts, said in a written response to the audit that it agrees with all of the recommendations and that changes are under way to resolve the issues.

"It should be noted that it is challenging to attribute direct results in complex and fluid stabilization environments, and it is often the absence of destabilizing events that demonstrates stability in these historically volatile areas," USAID directors Robert Jenkins and Steve Olive said in a joint response.

This is the second time Chemonics work in Haiti has been found lacking. In 2010, USAID auditors found the firm failed to hire thousands of Haitians as planned under a cash-for-work program, spending the funds on equipment and materials.

Also in 2010, Chemonics was one of five groups criticized for wasting aid in Afghanistan on foreign workers' high salaries, security and living arrangements.

Chemonics, which has worked in 150 countries, counts USAID as its largest client.

In Haiti, Chemonics was awarded a $39.5 million contract after the earthquake for the first phase of reconstruction, involving 301 different small projects including setting up temporary space for parliament and holding Haiti's first- ever presidential debates. Its second $53 million contract, aimed at a second phase of reconstruction, had more than 140 different projects aimed at improving the social and economic situation in Haiti by hosting job fairs, printing training guides to prevent violence against women, establishing a daily radio news program and other projects.

Auditors said the second phase lacks accountability on many levels.

For example, the U.S. is helping construct a major, $224 million industrial park which is projected to employ more than 20,000 people in a small, impoverished northern community. Chemonics set out to beautify nearby towns to project "a positive image of what role the nearby Caracol industrial park and other upcoming economic investments will play in citizens' lives."

It didn't work. The plan was to spruce up the towns by installing benches, upgrading landscaping, and doing some minor masonry work. Auditors found Chemonics purchased and planted some seedlings for the town center, but they died from lack of care, and residents said they didn't see how the activity led to the beautification of the area nor did they associate it with the industrial park.

As a contractor, Chemonics is also responsible for setting up its own system of evaluation. The auditors found some of the ways the firm was measuring accomplishments simply didn't make sense. For example, Chemonics conducted an engineering study to improve one town's roads, and then measured their accomplishment by trying to count how many rebuilt institutions and structures "incorporate principles that support democracy and government legitimacy."

At times the work has also seemed backward. For example, an environmental review required in advance of farming projects was instead signed off on three months after Chemonics had 700,000 flowering tropical jatropha seedlings planted as part of a temporary work program.


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Unease over UN bid to eradicate Haiti cholera
Benedict Moran | Benedict Moran is a producer for Al Jazeera English in New York and at the United Nations.

The UN has launched a new initiative aimed at tackling cholera in Haiti. But the programme falls short of what many had hoped for.

The new programme dedicates $215m from donors along with $23.5m from UN funds towards programmes in public health, capacity building, public education, and clean water systems. It will be part of a larger ten-year $2.2bn programme between Haiti and the neighbouring Dominican Republic to eradicate cholera from the island of Hispaniola.

"We know the elimination of cholera is possible," said UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon at the initiative’s launch on Tuesday. "It has happened in difficult environments around the world. It can and will happen in Haiti."

Cholera was introduced to Haiti in October 2010 and has since killed about 7,750 and infected more than 600,000 people.

"With this new initiative, we will eradicate and remove once and for all the consequences and negatives effects of cholera on the Island of Hispaniola," said Lorenzo Hidalgo, the Minister of Health of the Dominican Republic.

But there are concerns by some diplomats and UN observers that the funds necessary for the programme would not be forthcoming from donors.

"The humanitarian funding is already running out," said Jake Johnston of the Centre for Economic and Policy Research in Washington. "What's to give anyone faith that these funds will come through?"

Haiti will need $500m over the next two years for its own national cholera plan. The funds allocated in the programme would therefore cover only one year.

UN diplomats told me that the launch of the initiative is meant to reinvigorate the humanitarian effort to tackle cholera, and send a strong signal to donors.

"I'm confident that more resources will come," Nigel Fisher, the deputy head of the UN mission in Haiti, told reporters on Tuesday.

"As we move forward with this, we will indeed see the elimination of cholera."

Additionally, some UN observers fear that the plan will deflect international pressure on the UN to take responsibility for introducing the deadly disease.

Numerous studies - including internal investigations by the UN itself - indicate that cholera was brought in by Nepalese peacekeeping troops. Yet the international body has yet to formally take the blame.

"A just response requires allowing past victims of the UN cholera and their survivors their day in court, to seek justice for their loss of loved ones, income, property and educational opportunities," said Brian Concannon, Director of the Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti, which has launched a lawsuit against the UN on behalf of the families of 5,000 cholera
victims.

More than 6,700 people have signed an online petition launched last week by filmmaker Oliver Stone, calling for the UN to take responsibility.


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The U.N. has requested $2.2 billion to battle a cholera epidemic in Haiti that has killed nearly 8,000 people since 2010.
By Ryan Villarreal | December 12 2012 4:07 PM

The U.N. has requested $2.2 billion to battle a cholera epidemic in Haiti that has killed nearly 8,000 people since 2010.

Working with the Haitian government, the U.N. has outlined a 10-year plan to improve water and sanitation systems and provide treatment to those affected by the life-threatening disease.

“The new initiative will invest in prevention, treatment and education -- it will take a holistic approach to tackling the cholera challenge,” U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Tuesday in a press conference.

“The main focus is on the extension of clean drinking water and sanitation systems -- but we are also determined to save lives now through the use of an oral cholera vaccine.”

Mr. Ban seeks to raise $500 million for the first phase of the plan over the next two years. He said that slightly less than half of that amount had already been raised.

“Today I am pleased to announce that $215 million in existing funds from bilateral and multilateral donors will be used to support the initiative. I thank the donor community for this generous commitment,” Mr. Ban said.

“The United Nations will do its part. We are committing $23.5 million, building on the $118 million the U.N. system has spent on the cholera response to date.”

An additional $1.7 billion will be sought during the next eight years to eliminate the disease.

Haiti was struck by a cholera outbreak that killed roughly 7,000 people several months after a devastating 2010 earthquake killed an estimated 250,000 people.

It has become increasingly evident that the cholera pathogen was introduced to Haiti via U.N. peacekeepers from Nepal, where scientists have identified the original strain.

"We now know that the strain of cholera in Haiti is an exact match for the strain of cholera in Nepal," said Dr. Danielle Lantagne, a cholera expert employed by the U.N., the BBC reported.

In the area surrounding Port-au-Prince, the country's capital and most populous city, underdeveloped water and sanitation systems, many of which were damaged in the earthquake, are believed to have contributed to the spread of the waterborne pathogen.

While the U.N. has acknowledged that scientific evidence supports the idea that its employees may have introduced the cholera bacteria, it has avoided claiming responsibility for the outbreak, saying that it was not the fault of “any group or individual,” according to the Guardian.

A recent spike in cholera-related deaths has put the Haitian government on high alert, particularly in the wake of heavy rains from Hurricane Sandy, which passed through in October.

“This will not be a short-term crisis,” Mr. Ban said. “Eliminating cholera from Haiti will continue to require the full cooperation and support of the international community.”


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Forwarded by Ezili's Haitian Lawyers Leadership Network
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Background:

Why is there a UN, Chapter 7 peace enforcement mission in Haiti for 8 years? A country not at war, without a peace agreement to enforce and with less violence than most countries in the Western Hemisphere? (See the UN’s own Global Study on Homicide at page 93 ).

#Haiti - No one knows where $6 billion in earthquake relief funds has gone. What's certain: - it was not spent on Haiti poor 

Reconstruction of Haiti’s schools by the Clinton Foundation and the Interamerican Development Bank is exposed in two articles as a textbook case of the “shock doctrine,” with the U.S. trying to house schoolchildren in substandard formaldehyde-laced Hurricane Katrina trailers. (Shock-Doctrine Schooling of Haitian Children by Clinton and IDB )

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Haiti: November 18 – Disengagement is not an option - http://bit.ly/Uc9a7Q

"Last night, I didn’t catch the Little Girl in the Yellow Sunday Dress hanging by one arm over the side of a crowded, overloaded Haitian boat. Last night it was in 2007 that I Capsized. Before that, I crossed death and Capsized in 1997 too. It’s another November 18th under occupation and I guess you already know what I hide. I write this piece, each year, mostly to find the strength to carry this name until the end. But two decades of documenting, witnessing, giving homage to the fallen and struggling for justice and to prevent the continuous deaths, sufferings and incomprehensible hardships has taken its toll. The struggle is tough. I go back to the ..." ( Haiti: November 18 – Disengagement is not an option  )

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"Obama's appointed Clinton-Bush fund is closes after building their neoDuvalierist kleptocracy in Haiti back better, not democracy, not justice, equality nor the self-employed small Haiti farmers - Haiti's largest employer, biggest business assets. Their support of globalists' privatization combined with extortionist unfair trade rules and unregulated exportation of all capital out of Haiti continues to destroy local Haiti agriculture, local distribution, local manufacturing, local job growth, public accountability, local Haiti unions, civic participation, local Haiti tax base, environment protection, health and local capital circulation/multiplier. The US occupation through UN military proxy, of course, also destroys authentic Haiti government civic and democratic participation.

Haiti needs more local production, more local distribution, more local manufacturing, local jobs, local investment in Haiti infrastructure, local capital that circulates in Haiti, not "aid" that's capital to put into the pockets of selfish foreigners, Monsanto, Paul Farmer's pharmaceutical buddies, World Bank interests or Clinton toxic trailer scams. A greater tax base results from local production, distribution, manufacturing and local jobs, local sales. But that's RATIONAL, sensible and scientific. And the elite ruling nations write rational, sensible treatises but they are mostly too high tech to live love and generosity much less common sense. The NGOtocracy and the ruling nations they represent are too emotionally addicted to white narcissism, black adulation to live their own benevolent edicts. The US would rather disenfranchise all Haitians, all Africans for their land's resources and to preserve the colonial white supremacy narrative than to do the rational and sensible and less bloody alternative, which is don't dilute Diaspora local investments (remittances for instance), don't block participatory governance or initiatives as (socialists?), end the US occupation of Haiti. ALLOW the Haitians and the Haitian diaspora to succeed in investing in Haiti's local production, local agriculture, local job creation, et al.. Still we mustn't give up, or engage their insanity, confusion and murderous rampage across the world.

With broken wings, Haiti must dislodge these insane folks, not integrate with injustice." -- Ezili Danto of HLLN

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Haiti's Gold Rush - an Ecological Crime in the Making
http://bit.ly/V7RZp4

How Haiti Highlights the Failures of U.S. Immigration Policy
http://bit.ly/SBr7gK

Audit: USAID Haiti work 'not on track'
http://bit.ly/SRLfer


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Haiti is open for business
http://bit.ly/iU1xoU

"Homeless quake victims get evicted in the hurricane season while the Bush- Clinton fund builds a new $29 million shelter for Westerners with donation dollars to help quake victims... They’re open for business on top of our decomposed dead bodies, on top of our crushed bones, on top of our intense grief. Open for business on top of our ground water contaminated by their diseased feces. They’ve made so much money...they still haven’t stop counting collected donation profits, anticipating more huge returns. Panting, salivating for more Haiti crisis, more cholera outbreaks, more back-to-back hurricanes, more calculated or imposed Haiti instability, more such business opportunities.

They’ve even calculated how much they’ll make pushing our decomposed dead bodies around to sell the grieving, Clorox hungry, walking dead Haitians – still living under hurricane-soaked tarps – more of their aquatabs, antibiotics, foreign vitamins, bottled water, nitrate-laced fertilizers and Monsanto hybrid seeds. Open for business building an oasis on top of an open grave, investing in remains. Happiness rings loud laughter at the World Bank, totally orgasmic at the IMF. Rwanda-Clinton says Haiti is open for business, now... Duvalier’s Chalan is back to evict the poor quake victims, build an oasis for Westerners in Haiti, like they have in Jamaica, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic."

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Expose the Lies that fragment Haiti opposition to the tyrants, colonial terror and the NGOtocracy - Free Haiti 

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Help Haiti’s Farmers. Demand an end to unfair US trade, end to no Haiti tariffs on subsidized US rice dumped to destroy local Haiti production 

The MSM Continues to Perpetuate Fallacies About Haiti

Haiti experts have repeatedly criticized the US for excluding the Haitian government and Haitian companies from the reconstruction. The FOIA data proves them right: USAID and the State Department gave money to 6 US government entities and 7 UN agencies, but none to the Haitian government. Moreover, no NGOs or contractors listed in the FOIA were Haitian. How the Government Used Our Money in Haiti: Part II

In a Reuters blog article, Where Haiti’s money has gone, Felix Salmon rightly points out that:

"Development is a tricky game, easy to get wrong; as a rule, it only works when the people providing the aid are working at the margin, helping to strengthen existing projects, industries, and institutions, rather than trying to build them all from scratch. Let’s target it where it can be most effective, rather than where there happens to have been a newsworthy natural disaster."

However, the majority of his blog article is full of misconceptions, hearsay and disinformation:

“I’ve had two ministers come up to me this week, personally, and ask what’s in it for them,” says a frustrated IHRC official. “Since money grows on trees in this disaster, the attitude among Haitian officials is: Just call up your buddies in Washington, and they’ll send another check.”

The unanswered question is: what “Haitian officials” approached and wanted to know what was in it for them? Name names. Who? When? What are you, a reporter or a rumor monger? Look at the facts as reported by The Haiti Justice Alliance; they have documented proof gathered through a FOIA request that the U.S. excludes the Haitian government and Haitian companies from the reconstruction. The problem with reporting about Haiti is that even when a truth is conveyed, it is invariably wrapped in a lie or misconception.

"Meanwhile, Haiti’s suffering if anything is getting worse. Not only are new shantytowns springing up in places like Corail, but disease is now spreading disastrously: cholera hadn’t been seen in Haiti for more than 60 years, before the earthquake; it has now infected more than 250,000 Haitians, with no sign that it’s remotely under control."

Haiti has never had an outbreak of cholera.
The misconception is left that cholera was started by the conditions in the camps, but this is a lie. The cholera started in the countryside, in Haiti’s breadbasket. It has been conclusively proven in many scientific investigations that the UN/MINUSTAH brought cholera to Haiti. The latest was a "whole genome study", which "nails Nepal-Haiti cholera link." The cholera was spread because the Nepalese soldiers in Mirebalais dumped their feces into the Meye river, a tributary of the Artibonite river.

"The first thing to note is that most of the money given to Haiti hasn’t even started to be spent yet: a whopping $11 billion was pledged by donor countries and financial institutions in the wake of the earthquake, but if you take the US as a good example, it’s so far managed to spend just $184 million of the $1.14 billion allocated to the country. Even the Red Cross is barely halfway into its $479 million fund — all of which has been earmarked for Haiti, and none of which can be spent elsewhere, no matter how much better it might be put to use in some other context."

Haiti is the scene of an ongoing international crime. It’s to be expected that the worst sort of buzzards would be picking its bones clean. The NGOs supported by USAID are expected to return over 90% of the money spent in Haiti back to Washington.

"It’s worth remembering, too, that there was reason for optimism regarding the rebuilding of Haiti. There was lots of money, and the country’s right on America’s doorstep, which also helps. On top of that, it had the best conceivable international ambassador in Bill Clinton, backed up with the full support of the US government in the form of his wife’s oft-stated commitment to getting Haiti back on its feet.

Haiti is under occupation. Period. There is no freedom, human rights, sovereignty, autonomy or decision making by Haiti’s government. The U.S. and its “partners” are determined to keep real democracy out of the hands of the Haitian people as evidenced by their awareness and endorsement (according to Wikileaks) of the fraudulent nature of he last two major elections in Haiti.

It is a stupid decision on many levels, because every upcoming or anticipated disaster, calamity and mismanagement of resources…etc, is the direct responsibility of those who have imposed detrimental trade policies that have robbed Haiti of the ability to feed its people, that have sponsored coups, fraudulent elections, brought disease, the entire globe’s occupying armies to play their war games, the multinational exploiters of Haiti’s wealth, and others who use Haiti as their piggy bank and dumping ground for all of their toxic hate, greed and depravity… Speaking of depravity: they also share the responsibility for making Haiti the ground zero for sexual predators of every base/perverted sexual nature imaginable.

"What happens when you drop billions of dollars onto a country like Haiti? Immediately after the earthquake happened, in January 2010, I said that “one of the lessons we’ve learned from trying to rebuild failed states elsewhere in the world is that throwing money at the issue is very likely to backfire”. But that’s exactly what we did — with predictable results."

As a commenter said: "...no one has actually thrown money at Haiti! The vast majority of the $11 billion you cite has not been disbursed. It was only pledged– and it was pledged over the medium term."

The reoccurring theme of stories like this seem to assume that Haiti is a "basket case" or "failed state" because of the incompetence and corruption of Haitians themselves. See the quoted remark of "a frustrated IHRC official." Here is what should be part of that calculation, but somehow never is:

"On 12 August a group of Cuban guerrillas and Haitian exiles lands on the southern most tip of the country in another attempt to remove Duvalier. They are defeated by the Haitian Army, with the aid of US marines."

Are Haitians entirely to blame for the existing calamitous conditions that the majority is suffering under? How can that be, when the scoundrels, killers, thugs, dictators, drug dealers... etc. can invariably always count on the backing of the U.S. and its acknowledgedly most globally powerful military apparatus, intelligence agencies, institutional aid agencies, and its embedded allies in the mainstream media?

BACKGROUND:
How The Government Used Our Money In Haiti: Part II

"The only aid mechanism devoted specifically to rebuilding rather than relief is the “Office of Transition Initiatives.” They put Haiti’s future entirely in the hands of two contractors: Chemonics and Development Alternatives, Inc. (DAI)[3].

‎"Chemonics raises eyebrows for multiple reasons. First, it’s a subsidiary of ERLY Industries, which also owns American Rice. Since the 1980s, American Rice captured half of the Haitian rice market, a shift that Bill Clinton recently admitted was the reason Haiti can no longer feed itself. Moreover, the agricultural program it runs, which revolves around distributing hybrid Monsanto seed, is likely to jeopardize the future of Haiti’s agricultural system.

DAI, World Vision, and CHF International have also all been the subject of media scrutiny for their activities both in and out of Haiti.

The Center for Economic and Policy Research described DAI as having a “questionable past” of putting political objectives above humanitarian goals. Last year, World Vision came under fire for using “discredited” aid practices by aid critic Bill Easterly. Finally, CHF International’s spending habits were labeled “ostentatious” in a feature that also contained a confession from CHF’s field director that the organization has no experience in the role it’s filling in Haiti."

WIKILEAKS RELEASE: 722 Haiti-US embassy cables

Cable reference ID# 04SANTODOMINGO1361 | SUBJECT: CANARD II: DOMINICAN RIFLES FOR HAITI

"It is true that in early 2003 Foreign Minister Tolentino Dipp asked the Embassy for details about planned military training, and the Embassy furnished this information. This occurred in the context of unfounded press reports alleging that U.S. forces would number in the thousands and that they would be engaged in tasks other than training [emphasis added]."

NOTE: In the above quote from a cable by SouthCom , they are not denying that they provided Special Forces "training" of Haitian "rebels" in the DR in 2003 -- to overthrow of the democratically elected government of Jean-Bertrand Aristide. They just deny that the trainers numbered in "thousands."

In another cable (04SANTODOMINGO1515, CANARD II: DOMINICAN RIFLES FOR HAITI), the writer links the "rebels" to the supply of weapons the Dominicans had purchased through "annual licensed imports": "These are not military weapons; they are pistols, revolvers, hunting rifles and shotguns (never rifles) for use by private security services." they state. But, they conclude the cable by making a direct collation: "We understand that the arms used on this movement and in the capture of Gonaives were largely shotguns, hunting rifles, and pistols."

Sean Penn in Haiti: NGOs Not Spending Money to Head Off Diphtheria Epidemic

Video courtesy of AC360 | CNN

Sean Penn is angry. He says he has held his tongue and did not want to get into finger pointing about the performance of some NGOs in Haiti until now, but is compelled to speak up because he watched a 15 year old (who is the first confirmed victim of diphtheria) die as Penn tried all day to get him the medicine needed to stop this preventable disease from taking the youngster's life. The boy was shuttled by Penn to different aid agencies seeking the medicine that would have prevented his death, but he received the right treatment too late.

He hunted every corner of Port-au-Prince for an antitoxin for Oriel, a 15-year-old boy who contracted diphtheria, an acutely infectious disease spread through respiratory droplets.

The American Red Cross didn't have it. Nor did any of the major hospitals. Penn even had the U.S. military on the search.

The United States stockpiles the vaccine and antitoxin. But in Haiti, it took Penn -- even with his star power -- 11 hours to get his hands on one dose.

It was at a medical warehouse and Penn wrested the head of the World Health Organization from bed to unlock the door at a late hour.

"This country is not ready for an emergency," he says.

[...]

Penn cannot comprehend why, with an abundance of aid agencies working in Haiti, prevention like this has to be so difficult. He is not one to shield his anger, or mince words. "If the boy were to die," he says, "this would be murder."

A diphtheria epidemic is something that aid agencies like the American Red Cross should have been prepared for, says Penn. Aid organizations are "dominated by an inertia that killed a fifteen year old," he concluded, and they should "get off their butts, or people are gonna die en mass."

"The disaster is still on," as NGOs aren't spending the money on the people and not addressing the medical crises that may kill more people then the earthquake itself did. He says that aid groups have not been helpful and "were not prepared" to deal with preventable medical diseases. Sean says he hears a lot of criticism from NGOs of the Haitian government, but "Right now, if I were putting my money on an agency that is actually ready to act, it would be the government of Haiti."

Sean Penn says he has held his tongue and did not want to get into finger pointing about the performance of some NGOs in Haiti until now, but is compelled to speak up because he watched a 15 year old (who is evidently the first known victim of diphtheria in Haiti since the earthquake) die as Penn tried for hours to get him the medicine needed to stop this preventable disease from taking the youngster's life.

The boy was shuttled to different agencies as Penn sought the medicine that would have prevented his death. A diphtheria epidemic is something that aid agencies like the American Red Cross should have been prepared for, says Penn, but organizations are "dominated by an inertia that killed a fifteen year old" and they should "get off their butts, or people are gonna die en mass." Penn insists that the designated disaster funds should be made available now, to fight the coming devastation if the medical needs of the people are not addressed.

RIP Oriel Lynn Peter.

HatTip to Defend Haiti on Facebook

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Food donations rot in storage in New York while storm victims in Haiti die of starvation

PATRICK FARRELL/Miami Herald via McClatchy-Tribune Judith Saintilus, 9, holds a worn-down knife she was using to search the mountainside Nov. 21 for beans in Baie d'Orange, Haiti. In the past month, international aid workers and doctors have airlifted 46 children on the brink of death from this southeastern village and neighboring communities to hospitals. "Food donations rot in storage in New York as children in Haiti die of starvation: Governor Patterson's Timeline for projected delivery of donated storm goods for Haiti storm victims." This is the message that HLLN sent out this week concerning aid efforts for victims of the devastating hurricanes that hit Haiti in quick succession this year. Governor Patterson has accepted responsibility for the interminable delay in the delivery of the collected goods. "The delay was caused by difficulty getting government clearances and coordinating with a contact (Catholic Relief Services) in Haiti to receive the donations and make sure they got to victims, said Paterson spokeswoman Erin Duggan." The buzz is that politics is playing a big part in keeping the shipments in New York. The situation is that aid agencies are in control of foreign aid to Haiti and the Haitian government as usual, is being cut out of the picture and were not approached directly for assistance, making it difficult for coordinating the massive effort. This situation must change. The Haitian government must assert its right as a sovereign nation; and the foreign aid groups must relent in their need to exercise control over the flow of aid to Haiti. The Bush administration is not moved by the plight of Haitians after the hurricanes and have refused to provide any transport of the goods to Haiti. It is regrettable and unproductive that the aid charities are the liaisons in emergency situations. Governments and charities should defer to the Haitian government. NGOs and other charities must stop their monopoly on the flow of aid to Haiti. These aid agencies are being increasingly criticized by Haitians for hindering rather than helping the Haitian people in their desperate struggle to survive under increasingly more difficult circumstances. For the New York Community concerned about the approximately 77 Tons of goods donated in September, 2008 for the Gonaives/Haiti storm victims, that have, as of three months later, still not been sent to Haiti by New York officials, we can make the following statements: 1. According to Governor Dave Patterson's office, the first package of donated storm goods - approx. 8 tons, left New York via Airline Ambassador by boat and is scheduled to arrive in Haiti 2-weeks from the date of departure or December 23rd. 2. Fed. Express has donated one plane, scheduled to leave this week (by Dec. 13) with approximately 4 tons of food and the contracted recipient for distribution is Catholic Relief Services; 3. The items that are duly packaged and currently ready to be shipped are in storage at Stuart Airforce base. 4. The Federal government DECLINED the Govenor's request for transport. So the remaining bulk of the items donated for Haiti storm victims, an approximate 65 tons of food collected from mostly Haitians living in the Tri-State New York area remains to be shipped once arrangements for transport are made. The bulk of the September Haiti donations - 65 tons - have no transport arrangements, no shipping date. 5. This morning, Dec. 8, 2008, a community hearing was held at the Gov. Manhattan offices on the matter. Reporters where present. But since no press release will be issued on this, HLLN offers the community this brief. Several politicians spoke at the meeting, also attended by the Haitian media we are told, including Congresswoman Yvette D. Clarke; Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz; NY councilman Matthew Eugene, as well as Governor Patterson. The contact person on this matter for Governor David Patterson's office is, Khari Edwards, the Brooklyn regional representatives of the Governor. Ezili Danto/Marguerite Laurent Haitian Lawyers Leadership Network December 8, 2008 Update Visit the HLLN website for New York Gov. Paterson's timeline for delivery of donated goods for Haiti storm victims. Further reading: Gov. Paterson apologizes for delayed relief to storm-torn Haiti Starvation slams Haiti | Kids dying after 4 storms ravage crops, livestock Haiti: storm victims starve Haiti aid effort unravels by Mike Thomson, BBC News, Oct. 24, 2008 Ezili Dantò on Help for the Hurricane Victims in Haiti, Sept. 12, 2008

MSM: Wake Up & Smell the Misinformation

Chinese President Hu Jintao(R) meets with visiting Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, capital of China, on Sept. 24, 2008.(Xinhua/Liu Weibing) The US mainstream media (MSM) never delves into or outlines the role of the US government in the escalation of tensions in Latin America and in particular in Venezuela, Bolivia and Ecuador. The long history of US interventions and destabilizations of Latin American countries and the current "with us or against us" policy of the Bush administration should be cited as a part of any discourse or news that purports to shed light on the events occurring seemingly in a vacuum in this hemisphere, for they explain the fear and suspicion with which the US government is regarded in Latin America and beyond. Last April the US announced that it was reviving its fourth fleet in the Caribbean, a move that Evo Morales of Bolivia called "the Fourth Fleet of intervention." Hugo Chavez is continuing to seek bilateral partnerships to safeguard his country's sovereignty in the face of US covert and overt interventions and aggression. This month Venezuela announced joint Naval exercises in the Caribbean with Russia. Also, Mr. Chavez is in China this week to "push China-Venezuela strategic partnership of common development to a higher level." This month, members of the Venezuelan military were exposed on a tape plotting a coup and citing US tacit approval. Subsequently, Hugo Chavez announced the expulsion of the US Ambassador to Venezuela, Patrick Duddy; the ambassador is expelled, Chavez said, in solidarity with the expulsion of the US Ambassador to Bolivia, Philip Goldberg just a day earlier. After handily winning a referendum in Bolivia, President Evo Morales faced violent reprisals from the right-wing opposition. Evidence later emerged that Ambassador Goldberg had met with opposition leaders during the violent upheavals that left eight people dead. In the middle of this tense scenario, last Thursday in Venezuela, Americas Director José Miguel Vivanco and his colleague Americas Director Daniel Wilkinson of Human Rights Watch (HRW) held a press conference to present their report (not due for five months) harshly criticizing the Chavez government, entitled “A Decade Under Chávez: Political Intolerance and Lost Opportunities for Advancing Human Rights in Venezuela.” The next day, Vivanco and Wilkinson were accused of "meddling illegally" in Venezuelan affairs and unceremoniously escorted to a plane out of the country. In a press release, the Venezuelan Foreign Relations Ministry said Vivanco and Wilkinson "have done violence to the constitution" and "assaulted the institutions" of Venezuela by "meddling illegally in the internal affairs of our country." The ministry also said the HRW report is linked to the "unacceptable strategy of aggression" of the United States government. The ministry said the expulsion of Vivanco and Wilkinson was in the interest of "national sovereignty" and "the defense of the people against aggressions by international factors." James Suggett, writing in Venezuela Analysis points out that: "HRW has issued reports that are [sic] critical of the Chávez administration in the months leading up to crucial Venezuelan elections in the past, raising suspicion that the reports seek to sway Venezuelan voters against the president." In the days following the report, the Venezuelan government and its allies have responded to the report and in an article in OpEdNews.com, Elizabeth Ferrari explains the circumstances surrounding the expulsions and infuses some perspective into the situation that dispels some of the propaganda that has characterized coverage of this volatile situation: "...the American press seems to trust the Bush government and its adjuncts with all things Venezuelan and has once again simply passed on and proliferated the official story. I wish my betters in the press corpse would wake up and smell the disinformation." If you've read John Perkins' book "Confessions of an Economic Hit Man" then you know about the symbiotic relationship between non-governmental agencies (NGOs) and intelligence services. Is it any wonder than that Human Rights Watch and its pronouncements are viewed with justifiable suspicion? Elizabeth Ferrari sums it up in this way: "And then, there’s the matter of our intelligence services hanging out in NGOs. (I suppose, our overseas operatives can’t all work at the local embassy.) A friend of mine from El Salvador reminds me that during the war, a planeful of “humanitarian workers” was shot down and apparently, somehow it was full of US government operatives instead. It was shot down close to the capital and Rolando believes it was the government, not the guerillas, that shot it down. The government had had enough of the “Peace Corps” meddling with their affairs, allies or not. The few survivors of the crash were executed on the spot, it was later determined. Guerillas didn’t operate that close to San Salvador during the war, so this was a terrible case of a US client state sending back a message to Washington. More recently, as Amy Goodman has reported, arriving Peace Corps volunteers and young visiting scholars were solicited to spy for our government when they went to be briefed at our embassy in Bolivia. They were there for a welcome to the country and instead, they were told to spy on Venezuelans and on Cubans. It must be very upsetting to believe you are in Bolivia to work on hunger or to write a study on literacy and then to have your own Ambassador direct you to violate the trust of the very people you look forward to working with. These kids hadn’t even unpacked before they were enlisted to violate international law."