Heard someone on the radio offer his suggestions of what Canada should do for Haiti moving forward. Most seemed level-headed and common sense to me.The crux of his argument was that Canada and the U.S. propped up governments that served their commercial interests and this prevented Haiti from moving forward.
Billions and billions sent to Haiti all embezzled by politicians. Whatever the truth, the people paid the price. That's in the past. It's time to look forward. How to accomplish this?
According to this activist, Canada sent the bulk of its aid to NGOs and to him, this was a problem. He argued it was better to send it to local ministries. And this is where I raised an eyebrow or two. On one side, I agree, power is best served to the locals.
On the other hand, with no accountability measures in place, why should the Haitian government get a blank cheque so to speak?
Without a doubt, Haitians need to rebuilt their country the way they see fit. We can provide the technical and psychological know how to achieve this goal. The debate, it looks like, is who will get the funds and how will they be held to account?
For the activist, he believed it should go to the government and not so much to NGOs. He used the analogy of Canadians who have shown time and again they want the government to run education and health, why shouldn't it be the case for Haiti? Do we not want this for Haitians?
As if the government is the only mechanism by which we can accomplish this goal.
Now, if you believe the forces of neo-liberalism were conspiring to keep Haiti down, then of course, you'd prefer the money going into the hands of (possibly) corrupt government officials and hope you can devise some type of accountability scheme.
But is this a bit of a logical fallacy? He sets it up as if there are only two choices: Charities or government. Nothing in between, no cooperation between the two.
Secondly, can it be Canadians cling on to government as the best provider of health and education because they don't know of any other option?
If Canadians were presented with options, would this change our views?
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