Thursday, July 15, 2010
Port-au-Prince, 6 months later (AP Photo: Alexandre Meneghini)
Two percent. That’s how much of the aid promised by the United States that so far has been given to earthquake-ravaged Haiti, according to Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank.
“Only 2 percent of promised reconstruction aid has been delivered. Only 2 percent of the rubble has been cleared. And not quite 2 percent of the dislocated have been moved into housing,” writes Milbank.
The U.S. to date has begun construction on only four small schools, each with only two or three rooms and “a similar number of latrine stalls.” The schools, Milbank points out, are under development in a part of Haiti that “wasn’t directly affected by the earthquake.”
No wonder Bill Clinton has called the reconstruction effort “horribly frustrating,” as aid workers find the Haitian government ineffective.
The 550 U.S. troops in Haiti will return to the United States September 18.
The Sad Math of Aid in Haiti: 6 Months, 2 Percent (by Dana Milbank, Washington Post)
Comments