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Next week marks the one year anniversary of the devastating earthquake in Haiti. The quake killed more than 200,000 people, left a million and a half homeless, and destroyed the capital of what was already the poorest country in the Western hemisphere. NPR's Jason Beaubien reports the challenges facing the Caribbean nation and the international relief agencies that are trying to help remain huge.
JASON BEAUBIEN: Where do you start: Rubble removal? Housing? Water? Toilets? Jobs? A government? Haiti's needs are so great right now that pondering them can be overwhelming.
One year after the quake and months after billions of dollars in assistance have been pledged, Gregory Bateau is tired of waiting for someone, some agency, some aid group, to rebuild his school in Port-au-Prince.
Mr. GREGORY BATEAU: (Foreign language spoken)
BEAUBIEN: The school collapsed on January 12, Bateau says. The students need to go back to school, so we are building a structure for the kids to come and receive instruction.
Except they aren't constructing another three-story concrete building. Bateau and a crew of four other men are hammering together rough-hewn sticks, which will serve as frames for improvised classrooms.
The school used to have 4,000 students attending classes in three different shifts. When the quake hit just after 5:00 p.m., much of the school was empty -not because classes were over but because most of the students hadn't paid their tuition for the New Year. The teachers had sent home early everyone who was behind on their school fees.
Mr. BATEAU: (Foreign language spoken)
BEAUBIEN: Thanks to God we had sent them out because of the money, Bateau says. If we hadn't, more than six children would have died.
Bateau says a Japanese aid agency tore down the building and hauled off the debris. Several other international groups, he says, promised to reconstruct the school but never did. He hopes in 2001 he'll find a way to completely rebuild. But for now, he simply wants a place for students to gather.
Dr. STEFANO ZANINNI (Doctors Without Borders): I think Haiti that is still waiting of a new future.
BEAUBIEN: Stefano Zaninni is the head of Doctors Without Borders in Haiti. Zaninni says the slow pace of the recovery is itself a problem for Haitians.
Dr. ZANINNI: The problem is not to live in a tent. The problem is to feel not involved in these decisions. It is not being aware about what our future will be in the next years.
BEAUBIEN: At the time of the disaster, Doctors Without Borders had a major operation in Haiti. But since the quake they've more than quadrupled their staff and now run 10 hospitals, mainly in Port-au-Prince.
Access to health care was so bad in Haiti before the earthquake that Zaninni says Haitians actually have better health care now than they did a year ago. But he says the response of international aid groups at times failed to address fundamental problems.
For instance, Doctors Without Borders is now involved in cleaning drainage canals and chlorinating water as part of their efforts to suppress cholera in Cite Soleil. There are more than 10,000 relief agencies working in Haiti and it puzzles Zaninni that this task is ultimately left for a group of doctors. He says the international response was generous but at times it lacked coordination.
Dr. ZANINNI: Sometimes different actors or NGOs especially was fighting to put a flag in the same area or in the same spot. And I think this is something we should reflect about.
BEAUBIEN: The deputy mayor of the Delmas section of Port-au-Prince, Jean Gael, has also been reflecting lately about what has and hasn't been accomplished since the quake.
Gael is walking through a market in Delmas near where the mayor's office with their own funds recently rebuilt an important bridge. The deputy mayor says at times the international community doesn't understand what Haiti needs. He says the impoverished country doesn't need food or care packages for people living in the camps.
Mr. JEAN GAEL (Deputy Mayor, Delmas Section, Port-au-Prince, Haiti): (Through translator) What we need here is resources, human resources, like skills. We need tractors, loaders to make the roads and to make gardens for all people to live. We have great vision in this community, but we have no means to implement our vision. Amen(ph).
BEAUBIEN: When he thinks back over the last year, Gael is proud and frustrated at the same time. He shows off a new school and a playground that have opened, but then he points out a retaining wall along a river that desperately needs to be replaced, bridges that have to be rebuilt, and thousands of destroyed houses waiting to be demolished.
Annie Foster, the senior emergency adviser for Save the Children, agrees that what Haiti needs right now are human resources and skills. Foster says some things have improved a lot this year. People are no longer sleeping on the street. Many kids have been able to go back to school. Water is getting delivered regularly at the camps.
Ms. ANNIE FOSTER (Save the Children): But still, I mean you can see, there's a long way for us to go. It's really a struggle here in Haiti. I've worked in a lot of different emergencies and his one's really, I think, the most challenging.
BEAUBIEN: Foster says why this is has fueled many late night debates at the Save the Children compound.
Before the earthquake, political, economic and social power were all concentrated in Port-au-Prince. The earthquake then struck at the heart of the nation.
But Foster brings up the same issue as Deputy Mayor Gael when pondering the slow pace of the recovery. She says it's hard for Save the Children to find skilled Haitian professionals to run their programs.
Ms. FOSTER: There's a big draw to the United States for professional people in Haiti. If they have a good education and the opportunity, they often leave. So that's a struggle for us.
BEAUBIEN: And it's just one of the many struggles playing out in Haiti, as the country enters its second year of recovery from the earthquake.
Jason Beaubien, NPR News.