The Haiti Earthquake Response: A view from the trenches

Signs of Progress in Haiti

 
I had a rare chance to get out today and see the good work that my team is doing. It is so easy to get caught up in the day-to-day hassles of managing that I lose sight of the great changes that are happening around me. 

Five weeks ago, I visited the Delmas 32 neighborhood. It was a tough visit. the area had been hard hit by the earthquake and still looked bad. Many of the roads were impassable and the area looked unlivable. I noticed a fire burning inside one of the buildings and made the mistake of asking what it was. I was told there was a body that they could not recover and were burning it. We put together a proposal to do demolish the buildings that were falling into the street and to remove the rubble from the roads. We were given a couple of grants to put 1,300 people to work in this neighborhood. We began working just over two weeks ago.

A month after the earthquake, the streets in Delmas 32 were still blocked by debris.

The change that I saw today was incredible. The streets were filled with yellow and green shirted workers that were working hard to remove the debris. many sections of the streets were already cleared and many of the partially collapsed buildings had already been demolished. However, the most impressive change was in the people. As the workers moved through the neighborhoods, street vendors set up stalls and life returned to the neighborhood. 

Today's visit reminded me that we are making progress. Sure, we might end up rebuilding the chaos, Haiti might not have elections this year, and no one knows what tomorrow will bring. But we are working hard to recover from the worst disaster to ever hit the Americas. We might not have the answers, we are making life better. Petit à petit l'oiseau fait son nid--Little by little, the bird builds its nest

The Haitian Election Question

 Should Haiti hold elections this year for the parliament, mayors, and president? Are elections a key step to ensuring honest, transparent governance or are they a dangerous distraction from the business of rebuilding the country? 

Although the international consensus seems to be that Haiti needs to hold elections to maintain a credible government, I believe that the opposite is true. Holding elections will just maintain the status quo and contribute to rebuilding the chaos.

The Haitian government is based on the 1987 constitution which was written to ensure that another dictator like Duvalier could never dominate the country. The Constitution sets out a strongly decentralized government with numerous checks and balances. Unfortunately, the structure is so complicated that Haiti has never succeeded in electing all of the required officials. As per the 1987 Constitution, the government is composed of the following levels:

The nation is divided into ten departments which are divided into 133 municipalities (communes) and 533 rural sections (sections communales). Each rural section is to have an elected three-person council (Article 63) and an assembly (Article 65). The municipality is governed by a three-member council (Article 70) plus an assembly composed of representatives of each rural section assembly (Article 66-1). The department is governed by a council and an assembly composed of representatives from each municipal assembly (Article 80). 

With all the chaos in Haiti over the last 25 years, Haiti has never managed to elect all of these different levels. There have never been functioning rural section assemblies and therefore never municipal assemblies and never departmental assemblies. 

Unfortunately for Haiti, one of the responsibilities of the departmental assemblies is to propose the candidates for the Permanent Electoral Council. Without a permanent electoral council, each election is run by a provisional one created for that purpose. To make these councils "fair," they are normally composed of members of each political party. Just imagine how hard it would be to hold elections in the United States if they had to be organized by a board composed of an equal number of Democrats and Republicans with a few independents thrown in for good measure!

Another critical problem with the Haitian government system is the division of power between the President and Prime Minister. In theory, the President sets the overall vision and the Prime Minister manages the day-to-day affairs of the government. Although the President proposes the Prime Minister to the Parliament, the candidate must come from the majority party in Parliament. Additionally, the Parliament, not the President, has the power to revoke the Prime Minister. This split seems to inevitably result in conflicts and power struggles.

The Constitution was ratified in 1987 and Haiti has struggled unsuccessfully for over 23 years to implement the envisioned government. It is time to try a fresh approach. What if, instead of holding elections amid the current chaos in Haiti to elect officials to an unworkable form of government, Haiti started fresh. The government admitted the obvious--it is impossible to campaign for office during this reconstruction and the jockeying for power and position hampers this important work. Instead of holding yet another round of elections this year, a new national assembly would be called. This new assembly would begin meeting on January 12, 2011 to write a new Constitution. In 2011, Haiti would hold a national referendum to accept or reject the new constitution (which will hopefully provide for a more streamlined government) and then to hold whatever elections are called for in the new constitution.

I met with one of the UN consultants working on the Post Disaster Needs Assessment. He said that hardest question that their team faces is, "To what state do we rebuild Haiti?" If the goal is to put Haiti right back where it was on January 11th, then Haiti should go forward with its elections. However, if the goal is to build the foundation for sustainable growth, then Haiti needs a fresh start and a new constitution.

Will we just rebuild the chaos in Haiti?

 

I went to the Jacmel area last week and came back both very impressed with what is happening in the Southeast Department and even more worried about what is happening in Port-au-Prince. We had sponsored a two-day workshop to bring together the local authorities and the international organizations to discuss the next steps for rebuilding the Southeast. There was some squabbling about where to have the tent cities and what the priorities should be. However, the authorities also had a clear idea of the work that needed to be done and the reconstruction was straight forward. They knew how many houses needed to be fixed and how much support the rural areas needed to support the influx of the population. It is easy to imagine a large reconstruction program in the Southeast that succeeds in building back better.

I can't say the same for the Port-au-Prince area. Port-au-Prince was a chaotic nightmare before the earthquake hit. of the four main roads connecting Port-au-Prince and Petionville, only one is four-lane. All four are basically parking lots during the morning and evening commute. Poor housing are consisted of houses frequently built on top of each other. There were no roads between the houses and frequently no sanitation or running water. 

 
Google Earth images of a neighborhood just off of Canape Verte before and after the earthquake.

Today, I see people rebuilding their houses right where they collapsed. Some argue that it is too early to talk about longer term issues. I fear instead that the window of opportunity is closing. Yes, we need to focus on relief and temporary housing. However, if Port-au_prince is to be rebuilt better, drastic action is needed. Haiti needs strong leadership to clearly state that a new urbanization plan will be imposed on Port-au-Prince. Any houses that do not conform to that plan will be demolished. In the Southeast, people can rebuild where they lived. In Port-au-Prince, they should not. that change will require strong leadership and the order needs to come soon.

In terms of basic reorganization, I would love to see the following:

• A commitment to widen the other three main arteries connecting Petionville and Port-au-Prince: Panamerican, Canape Vert, and Route Frere. This would involve demolishing houses on either side of the road.
• Rehabilitation of the main artery through downtown (Blvd Harry Truman) including limiting access to the road.
• Completion of the bypass through Carrefour (currently blocked since the road passes through the country's fuel depot.
• Widening of the Grand Rue to allow it to take the local traffic that can no longer pass through Blvd. Harry Truman.
• Standardization of the roads through town to allow for parking on the sides of the road and for trucks to pass in Carrefour, Cite Soliel, and the other areas that have grown rapidly.

This would require relocating tens of thousands of people--not an easy or cheap decision. To make this work, neighborhoods would need to be more dense than they are today. Currently, most neighborhoods are still single-family homes (or shacks). Instead, Port-au-Prince needs low rise apartment buildings--five to eight stories. This is a far more efficient way to house city populations and is the solution in nearly every city in the world. I realize that people will not be eager to move into apartments and that it will be critical to build the apartments well. However, the two most seismically active cities in the world are Tokyo and San Fransisco. How many poor people in these cities live in single family houses?

At the same time, there should be a large program to improve the infrastructure in the other main towns in Haiti. We don't want to suck everyone back into Port-au-Prince.

It will take strong leadership to bring about these changes. I believe that it is easier to force changes through during a crisis, as President Obama did, than to wait for the dust to settle and calmly talk about it. I worry that by the time the leadership in Haiti is ready to talk about these changes, it will be too late and we will have rebuilt the chaos.