You can add Haiti to the growing list of failed states in the modern capitalist world. With nearly 2,000 confirmed dead so far, many more wounded, at least 60,000 homes destroyed, there is no functioning government in Haiti. Even before this latest disaster, 60% of Haitians lived in poverty, 25% in extreme poverty. There are no ambulances or bulldozers at the scene and no hospitals to take the wounded to if there were. Armed gangs block many of the main roads between the Port-au-Prince and the damaged quake zone. Another tragedy for the island that was the first to form an independent Black nation after overthrowing slavery in 1791.
A massive earthquake in 2010 killed over 200,000, destroyed much infrastructure, and left Haiti vulnerable to a cholera epidemic brought by UN peacekeepers. Most of the aid sent to the island was lost to government and NGO corruption. Since then a series of feckless Presidents have been manipulated into office by the US, the latest one assassinated by parties unknown only weeks ago.
Workers and youth on the ground are using 80 tarps to build a community shelter for collectively housing displaced workers and doing all they can as foreign assistance begins to trickle in. A “hometown association” based in Brooklyn, Fedadse, is made up of people originating in the earthquake zone. They are skilled and experienced in funding reforestation, repairing schools, and building a simple irrigation system.
Please give generously to fedadse.org. All funds go directly to local people engaged in mutual aid in the quake zone of the South.
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