News from Haiti
In his first comments, Aristide mostly avoided overtly political issues but stressed the importance of including all Haitians in national life. He did mention the ‘exclusion’ of his Fanmi Lavalas party, Haiti’s biggest, which was barred from registering its own candidate for the elections.
“We condemn all kinds of violence so that the education of young people can bring peace in the head and the belly” – he said, recalling one of his old campaigning slogans.
Remembering the victims of the 2010 earthquake and hundreds of thousands of homeless survivors still living in
squalid tent camps across the wrecked capital, he said: “Your suffering is running through my blood like a river”.
U.N. peacekeepers, who are providing security for the polls, reinforced Haitian police in the streets.
A large crowd at the airport carried banners and posters welcoming ‘Titide,’ as Aristide is affectionately known.
“This is a great day for the Haitian people” – said Ansyto Felix, an activist for the Fanmi Lavalas party.
- Haiti beach.
In the week following each disaster, Canadians donated significantly less money for Japan than they did for Haiti.
To date, the Humanitarian Coalition (CARE Canada, Oxfam Canada, Oxfam-Québec and Save the Children Canada), has raised 450,000 dollars for Japan. One week into the coalition’s Haiti appeal after its devastating quake last year, the group had raised 3.5 million dollars.
Similary, World Vision Canada has raised 950,000 dollars to date for Japan. In the week after Haiti, they raised 7.3 million dollars.
But the aid industry says the two disasters shouldn’t be compared, since Japan is a wealthy G8 country and Haiti is the poorest in the western hemisphere.
When the earth shook in Haiti in 2010, the devastation was swift and shattering: hundreds of thousands died. Last week, Japan saw cities dramatically torn apart by an earthquake and tsunami, and the death toll has topped 7,000 with more than 10,000 missing. In Japan, the government is leading recovery efforts. In Haiti, the presidential palace crumbled — and remains in ruins today.
“The (Japanese) government is leading the response and able to cover the vast majority of needs” – said Humanitarian Coalition coordinator Nicolas Moyer. “The role of charities is different. We’re much more focused, identifying very niche contributions.”
Moyer said the coalition is raising money for its partner agencies in Japan, and the ‘ask’ to the public is very different: “Help us help our Japanese colleagues and partners.”
“In Haiti, the government had been directly affected and had a fairly limited capacity to start with. We had a much larger role to play there and our request was larger.”
New York (CNNMoney). News of the earthquake and tsunami that rocked Japan has been widespread, but donations have lagged way, way behind.
Seven days after the 9.0 quake, donations to nonprofit organizations have reached about 87 million dollars, according to a tally by the Chronicle of Philanthropy, a newspaper covering nonprofits.
In comparison, one week after the earthquake in Haiti, donations totaled about 275 million dollars. In the case of Hurricane Katrina, it was over 522 million dollars.
Of the donations to date, the American Red Cross raised approximately 64 million dollars for the Japan earthquake and Pacific tsunami response, which includes more than 2.8 million dollars in text donations.
Save the Children raised 5.8 million dollars; World Vision U.S. said they received 3 million dollars as of Wednesday; and The Salvation Army received more than 2.5 million dollars.
But most organizations told the Chronicle that they had raised less than 1 million dollars and more than a dozen relief groups, including Doctors Without Borders, said they are not actively raising money for relief efforts at all.