[News] Haiti After the Quake - Where the Relief Money Did and Did Not Go

[Anti-Imperialist News]

January 03, 2012
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/01/03/haiti-after-the-quake/

Where the Relief Money Did and Did Not Go


Haiti After the Quake

by BILL QUIGLEY and AMBER RAMANAUSKAS

Haiti, a close neighbor of the US with over nine 
million people, was devastated by earthquake on 
January 12, 2010.  Hundreds of thousands were killed and many more wounded.

The UN estimated international donors gave Haiti 
over $1.6 billion in relief aid since the 
earthquake (about $155 per Haitian) and over $2 
billion in recovery aid (about $173 per Haitian) over the last two years.

Yet Haiti looks like the earthquake happened two 
months ago, not two years. Over half a million 
people remain homeless in hundreds of informal 
camps, most of the tons of debris from destroyed 
buildings still lays where it fell, and cholera, 
a preventable disease, was introduced into the 
country and is now an epidemic killing thousands 
and sickening hundreds of thousands more.

It turns out that almost none of the money that 
the general public thought was going to Haiti 
actually went directly to Haiti.  The 
international community chose to bypass the 
Haitian people, Haitian non-governmental 
organizations and the government of Haiti.  Funds 
were instead diverted to other governments, 
international NGOs, and private companies.

Despite this near total lack of control of the 
money by Haitians, if history is an indication, 
it is quite likely that the failures will 
ultimately be blamed on the Haitians themselves 
in a “blame the victim” reaction.

Haitians ask the same question as many around the 
world “Where did the money go?”

Here are seven places where the earthquake money did and did not go.

One.  The largest single recipient of US 
earthquake money was the US government.  The same 
holds true for donations by other countries.

Right after the earthquake, the US allocated $379 
million in aid and sent in 5000 troops. The 
Associated Press discovered that of the $379 
million in initial US money promised for Haiti, 
most was not really money going directly, or in 
some cases even indirectly, to Haiti.  They 
documented in January 2010 that thirty three 
cents of each of these US dollars for Haiti was 
actually given directly back to the US to 
reimburse ourselves for sending in our 
military.  Forty two cents of each dollar went to 
private and public non-governmental organizations 
like Save the Children, the UN World Food Program 
and the Pan American Health Organization.  Hardly 
any went directly to Haitians or their government.

The overall $1.6 billion allocated for relief by 
the US was spent much the same way according to 
an August 2010 report by the US Congressional 
Research Office: $655 million was reimbursed to 
the Department of Defense; $220 million to 
Department of Health and Human Services to 
provide grants to individual US states to cover 
services for Haitian evacuees; $350 million to 
USAID disaster assistance; $150 million to the US 
Department of Agriculture for emergency food 
assistance; $15 million to the Department of 
Homeland Security for immigration fees, and so on.

International assistance followed the same 
pattern.  The UN Special Envoy for Haiti reported 
that of the $2.4 billion in humanitarian funding, 
34 percent was provided back to the donor’s own 
civil and military entities for disaster 
response, 28 percent was given to UN agencies and 
non-governmental agencies (NGOs) for specific UN 
projects, 26 percent was given to private 
contractors and other NGOs, 6 percent was 
provided as in-kind services to recipients, 5 
percent to the international and national Red 
Cross societies, 1 percent was provided to the 
government of Haiti, four tenths of one percent 
of the funds went to Haitian NGOs.

Two.  Only 1 percent of the money went to the Haitian government.

Less than a penny of each dollar of US aid went 
to the government of Haiti, according to the 
Associated Press.   The same is true with other 
international donors.  The Haitian government was 
completely bypassed in the relief effort by the 
US and the international community.

Three.   Extremely little went to Haitian 
companies or Haitian non-governmental organizations.

The Center for Economic and Policy Research, the 
absolute best source for accurate information on 
this issue, analyzed all the 1490 contracts 
awarded by the US government after the January 
2010 earthquake until April 2011 and found only 
23 contracts went to Haitian companies.  Overall 
the US had awarded $194 million to contractors, 
$4.8 million to the 23 Haitian companies, about 
2.5 percent of the total.  On the other hand, 
contractors from the Washington DC area received 
$76 million or 39.4 percent of the total.  As 
noted above, the UN documented that only four 
tenths of one percent of international aid went to Haitian NGOs.

In fact Haitians had a hard time even getting 
into international aid meetings.  Refugees 
International reported that locals were having a 
hard time even getting access to the 
international aid operational meetings inside the 
UN compound.  “Haitian groups are either unaware 
of the meetings, do not have proper photo-ID 
passes for entry, or do not have the staff 
capacity to spend long hours at the 
compound.”  Others reported that most of these 
international aid coordination meetings were not 
even being translated into Creole, the language 
of the majority of the people of Haiti!

Four.  A large percentage of the money went to 
international aid agencies, and big well 
connected non-governmental organizations (NGOs).

The American Red Cross received over $486 million 
in donations for Haiti.  It says two-thirds of 
the money has been contracted to relief and 
recovery efforts, though specific details are 
difficult to come by.  The CEO of American Red 
Cross has a salary of over $500,000 per year.

Look at the $8.6 million joint contract between 
the US Agency for International Development 
(USAID) with the private company CHF for debris 
removal in Port au Prince.  CHF is politically 
well-connected international development company 
with annual budget of over $200 million whose CEO 
was paid $451,813 in 2009.  CHF’s connection to 
Republicans and Democrats is illustrated by its 
board secretary, Lauri Fitz-Pegado, a partner 
with the Livingston Group LLC.  The Livingston 
Group is headed by the former Republican 
Speaker-designate for the 106th Congress, Bob 
Livingston, doing lobbying and government 
relations.  Ms. Fitz-Pegado, who apparently works 
the other side of the aisle, was appointed by 
President Clinton to serve in the Department of 
Commerce and served as a member of the foreign 
policy expert advisor team on the Obama for 
President Campaign.  CHF “works in Haiti out of 
two spacious mansions in Port au Prince and 
maintains a fleet of brand new vehicles” according to Rolling Stone.

Rolling Stone, in an excellent article by Janet 
Reitman, reported on another earthquake contract, 
a $1.5 million contract to the NY based 
consulting firm Dalberg Global Development 
Advisors.  The article found Dalberg’s team “had 
never lived overseas, didn’t have any disaster 
experience or background in urban planning
 never 
carried out any program activities on the 
ground
” and only one of them spoke 
French.  USAID reviewed their work and found that 
“it became clear that these people may not have even gotten out of their SUVs.”

Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton 
announced a fundraising venture for Haiti on 
January 16, 2010.  As of October 2011, the fund 
had received $54 million in donations.  It has 
partnered with several Haitian and international 
organizations.  Though most of its work appears 
to be admirable, it has donated $2 million to the 
construction of a Haitian $29 million for-profit luxury hotel.

“The NGOs still have something to respond to 
about their accountability, because there is a 
lot of cash out there,” according to Nigel 
Fisher, the UN’s chief humanitarian officer in 
Haiti.  “What about the $1.5 to $2 billion that 
the Red Cross and NGOs got from ordinary people, 
and matched by governments?  What’s happened to 
that?  And that’s where it’s very difficult to trace those funds.”

Five.  Some money went to for profit companies whose business is disasters.

Less than a month after the quake hit, the US 
Ambassador Kenneth Merten sent a cable titled 
“THE GOLD RUSH IS ON” as part of his situation 
report to Washington.  In this February 1, 2010 
document, made public by The Nation, Haiti 
Liberte and Wikileaks, Ambassador Merten reported 
the President of Haiti met with former General 
Wesley Clark for a sales presentation for  a 
Miami-based company that builds foam core houses.

Capitalizing on the disaster, Lewis Lucke, a high 
ranking USAID relief coordinator, met twice in 
his USAID capacity with the Haitian Prime 
Minister immediately after the quake.  He then 
quit the agency and was hired for $30,000 a month 
by a Florida corporation Ashbritt (known already 
for its big no bid Katrina grants) and a 
prosperous Haitian partner to lobby for disaster 
contracts.  Locke said “it became clear to us 
that if it was handled correctly the earthquake 
represented as much an opportunity as it did a 
calamity
”  Ashbritt and its Haitian partner were 
soon granted a $10 million no bid 
contract.  Lucke said he was instrumental in 
securing another $10 million contract from the 
World Bank and another smaller one from CHF 
International before their relationship ended.

Six.  A fair amount of the pledged money has never been actually put up.

The international community decided it was not 
going to allow the Haiti government to direct the 
relief and recovery funds and insisted that two 
institutions be set up to approve plans and 
spending for the reconstruction funds going to 
Haiti.  The first was the Interim Haiti Recovery 
Commission (IHRC) and the second is the Haiti Reconstruction Fund (HRF).

In March 2010, UN countries pledged $5.3 billion 
over two years and a total of $9.9 billion over 
three years in a conference March 2010.  The 
money was to be deposited with the World Bank and 
distributed by the IHRC.  The IHRC was co-chaired 
by Bill Clinton and the Haitian Prime 
Minister.  By July 2010, Bill Clinton reported 
only 10 percent of the pledges had been given to the IHRC.

Seven.  A lot of the money which was put up has not yet been spent.

Nearly two years after the quake, less than 1 
percent of the $412 million in US funds 
specifically allocated for infrastructure 
reconstruction activities in Haiti had been spent 
by USAID and the US State Department and only 12 
percent has even been obligated according to a 
November 2011 report by the US Government Accountability Office (GAO).

The performance of the two international 
commissions, the IHRC and the HRF has also been 
poor.  The Miami Herald noted that as of July 
2011, the $3.2 billion in projects approved by 
the IHRC only five had been completed for a total 
of $84 million.  The Interim Haiti Recovery 
Commission (IHRC), which was severely criticized 
by Haitians and others from its beginning, has 
been effectively suspended since its mandate 
ended at the end of October 2011.  The Haiti 
Reconstruction Fund was set up to work in tandem 
with the IHRC, so while its partner is suspended, 
it is not clear how it can move forward.

What to do

The effort so far has not been based a respectful 
partnership between Haitians and the 
international community.   The actions of the 
donor countries and the NGOs and international 
agencies have not been transparent so that 
Haitians or others can track the money and see 
how it has been spent.  Without transparency and 
a respectful partnership the Haitian people 
cannot hold anyone accountable for what has 
happened in their country.  That has to change.

The UN Special Envoy to Haiti suggests the 
generous instincts of people around the world 
must be channeled by international actors and 
institutions in a way that assists in the 
creation of a “robust public sector and a healthy 
private sector.”  Instead of giving the money to 
intermediaries, funds should be directed as much 
as possible to Haitian public and private 
institutions.  A “Haiti First” policy could 
strengthen public systems, promote 
accountability, and create jobs and build skills among the Haitian people.

Respect, transparency and accountability are the 
building blocks for human rights.  Haitians 
deserve to know where the money has gone, what 
the plans are for the money still left, and to be 
partners in the decision-making for what is to come.

After all, these are the people who will be 
solving the problems when the post-earthquake relief money is gone.

Bill Quigley teaches at Loyola University New 
Orleans, is the Associate Legal Director at the 
Center for Constitutional Rights and volunteers 
with the Institute for Justice and Democracy in 
Haiti. He is a contributor to Hopeless: Barack 
Obama and the Politics of Illusion, forthcoming 
from AK Press.  Bill can be reached at 
<mailto:quigley77 at gmail.com>quigley77 at gmail.com.

Amber Ramanauskas is a lawyer and human rights 
researcher.  A more detailed version of this 
article with full sources is available.  Amber 
can be reached at <mailto:gintarerama at gmail.com>gintarerama at gmail.com.




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