January 3, 2012
It has been two years since the devastating earthquake in Haiti that killed over 300,000 people and left 1.5 million homeless. In January, on the anniversary of the event, Canada’s Minister for International Cooperation, Bev Oda, paid a visit to Port au Prince, with the customary blizzard of press releases.
One is hard-pressed to imagine the joy of Haitians at yet another visit from the Honourable Bev, who has made multiple trips to the country during her tenure as minister responsible for CIDA. But Haitians would be fully justified in asking “So what?” in the face of more promises from Canada.
The official line from CIDA, on behalf of the Canadian government, is that Canada’s generosity to Haiti knows no bounds. “Canada is on track to disburse more than $1 billion in Haiti (2006-2012) to implement long-term development and to meet immediate humanitarian and reconstruction needs….” according to Ms Oda’s letter marking her visit. But just what is happening to this impressive amount of money?
The showcase announcement during the Minister’s most recent Haitian sojourn was $20 million for the resettlement of 5,000 families who have been living since the earthquake in makeshift shelter on the Champ de Mars, a major park in the centre of Port au Prince. The label on this project is “Canada to resettle Haitians from Champ de Mars.” No mention of Haitian partners, whether government or civil society. Isn’t it their country? Maybe we just forgot.
In digesting the news of this latest component of Canadian largesse, a certain degree of scepticism is understandable. When will this wonderful – and very necessary – work actually be done? Canada is very adept at making announcements, but delivering is another matter. Look at the saga of the national police academy, an $18 million project announced in October 2008, in recognition that a strong and competent police force is an essential component of Haiti’s sustainable development. Good for Canada to support this initiative.
Obviously Ms Oda thinks so too, which is why she re-announced the project in April 2010, though nothing had been done by CIDA to implement the project to that point. All right, there had been an earthquake in January, but even before then the project had become embroiled in contractual gridlock. In a press release in October 2011, the last time Oda was in Haiti, there was again mention of the national police academy project (“Canada is committed to the construction of the National Police Academy….”) but no word on when it would happen.
Hence the cynicism in reading the fulsome announcement regarding the displaced persons resettlement project; it’s natural to speculate a bit on just when anything will actually occur. In dealing with Haiti, is Canada following the pattern of so many donors and external agencies scrambling to do things right – Ms Oda’s well known preoccupation with her version of accountability – rather than doing the right things, and helping build Haiti’s capacity to develop itself?
In the absence of meaningful details from CIDA on what has been and is being done with the $1 billion-plus devoted to Haiti – as opposed to press releases extolling ministerial commitments – one is left to speculate how many other commitments made in the last three to four years are also languishing somewhere in bureaucratic limbo. More transparency regarding Canada’s aid performance is long overdue. This would be welcomed by Canadians, and even more by our partners in developing countries. Now that Canada has signed on to the International Aid Transparency Initiative, can we hope for some change?