Canadian Delegation Reports Findings From Haiti

Hello all,

I returned yesterday from a ten-day visit to Haiti followed by stops on the way home in New York, Boston, Montreal and Ottawa. Below is an announcement of our delegation’s visit to Haiti and our plans in the coming weeks and months to speak to Canadians about it.


Next week, Tuesday July 19, 6 pm to 7 pm, I will speak at a public event in Vancouver about our visit. See the notice below, you are welcome to attend.


In my presentations, I am focusing on the housing and shelter crisis in Haiti. A series of important reports on the subject have been issued recently, you can find them at this web link: http://www.canadahaitiaction.ca/human_rights.


During my visit to Boston, I described our delegation’s findings to two meetings, of Physicians 4 Haiti and Partners In Health. I was joined by several of the excellent lawyers of the Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti at these meetings. It was very encouraging to see so many health and legal professionals and graduate students in that city working on behalf of Haitians. Now, we need something equivalent in one or more Canadian cities!


The founder of Partners In Health is Dr. Paul Farmer. He is the Deputy Special Envoy to Haiti of the United Nations Secretary General, serving as assistant to President Bill Clinton, the Special Envoy. He has just published Haiti After The Earthquake, a 400 page account of Haiti’s past, present and future. Watch for my forthcoming review of the book, submitted to the Globe and Mail (they haven't given me a publication date). Dr. Farmer appears on today's editions of Democracy Now (radio and online tv) and Charlie Rose (tv). You can watch either program online.


Best wishes,
Roger




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Canadian Delegation Reports Findings From Haiti

Tuesday, July 19, 6 pm to 7 pm
At: Maritime Labour Center
1880 Triumph St., Vancouver

The Vancouver and District Labour Council hosts a one-hour educational discussion with Roger Annis, just returned from a ten-day observation mission to Haiti. He will show photos and provide an overview of Haiti, 18 months after the earthquake.



* This event is the monthly 'pizza educational' of the VDLC. Please rsvp to the Labour Council if you wish to have pizza ($3 per slice) or a juice or soft drink during the event, at 604 284 0703. For more information on the Haiti delegation, you can phone 778 858 5179.



Just published! "Haiti After The Earthquake", in stores as of July 12. Dr. Paul Farmer, co-founder of the renowned global health agency Partners In Health, has written a 400 page book in which he recounts his experiences in the days, weeks and months following the earthquake and makes sharp and critical observations on the policy changes required by the big powers of the world if Haiti is to move forward.


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CANADIAN DELEGATION REPORTS BACK FROM TEN-DAY VISIT TO HAITI
Press release, July 11, 2011
Three Canadians have just completed a ten-day fact-finding and solidarity mission to Haiti. The delegation, organized by Haiti Solidarity BC, the Vancouver affiliate of the Canada Haiti Action Network, traveled through Port au Prince and the surrounding regions of Léogâne and Corail that were badly affected by the January 12, 2011 earthquake.


Delegation members observed the harsh conditions and the uncertain future that Haitians still confront today, 18 months after the earthquake. Their most moving experiences were visits to the camps of internally displaced persons. Delegates observed that camps are still lacking many life-sustaining services and comforts that the multi-billion dollar, international aid effort was expected to provide. The foreign-led reconstruction effort appears to have hardly begun, and political stability promised by the recent, exclusionary electoral process is not evident.


The lack of progress in sheltering and housing the displaced victims of the earthquake as well as those chronically under-housed prior to 2010 are critically examined in three recent reports, by the International Crisis Group (June 28), Haiti Grassroots Watch(June 9), and the Building Assessment and Rubble Removal Study (March, unpublished but leaked in late May).


The delegation met with many Haitian and international service providers and relief workers who are charting a course forward for the country, notwithstanding all the difficulties they face, in such fields as architecture, engineering, agriculture, health and education. Delegates met with organized labour as well as representatives of peasant and women’s rights organizations.


In the coming weeks, delegation members will issue several reports on their visit to Haiti and the people, projects and organizations they met and interviewed. Roger Annis, director of the delegation, will report to a public meeting sponsored by the Vancouver and District Labour Council on Tuesday, July 19, 6 pm to 7 pm, at the Maritime Labour Center, 1880 Triumph St.


Roger Annis, a coordinator of the Canada Haiti Action Network in Vancouver and retired member of the International Association of Machinists, directed the delegation. The other members were Sandra Gessler, a professor of nursing at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg; and Rosena Joseph, a learning coach in Toronto and representative of the International Solidarity Committee of the Ontario division of the Canadian Union of Public Employees. For interviews, or to invite a member of the delegation to speak on the visit to Haiti, contact Roger Annis at rogerannis(at)hotmail.com, or phone 778 858 5179 (Vancouver).

Good morning.Thank you for taking the risk to visit haiti at this time.I was listening last night some comments made by Dr Farmer on haiti after the earthquake.It is really discouraging to hear how much money is wasted by the bureaucrats while the majority of the victims are still living in miserable conditions.I am not impliying that the money was stolen. However the fact remains that the money didn't help as much as we should expect.

This is the reason I agree with Rouzier about the CIRH.Is this structure the most efficient to rebuild the country?I don't think so.