Valentina's blog

At 4:53pm on Jan. 12, the earth trembled near Haiti’s capital Port-au-Prince; within seconds, roads cracked open, buildings fell like bowling pins and hundreds of thousands of people were crushed underneath. Perhaps, no neighborhood in Port-au-Prince offers a better view of the ensuing devastation than Fort National, a maze of streets winding up the top of a hill, in the heart of old town. In this poor area of one-story homes, only mounds of rubble and despair are left. From up on top, one can see the avalanche of debris that now covers the side of the hill.

It is tempting to believe, in awe of the devastation, that there is a blind rage, and an almost democratic flair, to the actions of Mother Nature. The tremor shattered everything it encountered: the young and the old, the rich and the poor alike. But, this is only partially true. Just about the only thing that even natural disasters fail to level are social and economic differences. While the loss of friends and relatives, and the difficulties of living in Port-au-Prince in the days following the tremor, were shared across all strata of the population, quickly the gap between the rich and poor returned.

In Haiti, this gap is particularly wide. The poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere, with 80% of its population living under the poverty line, Haiti had, at the start of the millennium, a GINI coefficient (which measures income inequality within a country) of 59.2, the eighth worst country in the world. According to a December 2007 paper from the World Bank Institute, Haiti’s income inequality is “the highest in the world,” with 1 percent of the population that controls nearly half the country’s wealth.

Some hope the earthquake will offer a chance to rebuild Haiti a more just society than it used to be. However, the socio-economic inequality that for centuries has plagued the country seems to have come out the rubble unscathed. More expensive, solidly built structures withstood the tremor better than their cheap counterparts, sparing lives and limiting the relative financial loss. While the children of the wealthy can fly abroad to continue their studies, the underprivileged have to wait months to go back to the classroom. Compounded by a government that, for all intents and purposes, ceased to exist on Jan. 12, a historically uncaring elite, who should stay and rebuild, seems more inclined to get out, while everybody else is stuck amidst the debris. In the meantime, the international community doesn’t seem to have a plan beyond flooding Haiti with humanitarian aid, making the country’s poor even more dependent than it was on the never reliable charity of foreign countries.

In the earthquake, as Fort National dissolved to fine powder, residences in more upscale areas, like Juvenat and Boutillier, managed to stay upright, although gravely damaged. “Many of the older houses survived,” said Henry Noel, a Haitian American who was on vacation in Port-au-Prince on Jan. 12, and whose house still stands in the upper-class suburb of Petionville. “But more recently-built homes use poor construction materials with no respect for security,” Noel said.

It’s a sentiment echoed by experts familiar with Haiti.  Nashville architect Alan Dooley is a partner in the construction of the Visitation Hospital in Petite Rivière de Nippes, about 50 miles from the capital. In his experience, the lack of quality control leaves it up to the good will of the individual contractor to behave correctly. “A bag of cement in Haiti goes for twice as much as what we pay at Home Depot,” said Dooley. “In order to stretch that bag as much as possible, they cut it.” Residents in poor neighborhoods like Ft. National are the ones most likely to “cut” the cement.

The absence of building codes, a reflection of the government’s weakness, didn’t help. “Had an earthquake like this happened in another country,” said structural Engineer Steven Baldridge, “it would not have caused as much damage.” Baldridge, who traveled to post-earthquake Haiti with a NGO called Applied Technology Council, says he was “disgusted” with the construction he saw, the result of lack of seismic detailing, quality control, and proper construction material. “Most buildings in Haiti would be red-taped by any US building official,” Baldridge said.

Once the reconstruction phase kicks-off, Haiti’s rich will repair or rebuild their homes. The poor will either remain in makeshift shantytowns, or relocate to “permanent” tent camps — that is the government plan for now – miles from their traditional source of income and to the mercy of gangs, which will, as has happened in the past, soon take over these encampments.

There are other crises that also risk exacerbating the income gap. Education is often the ticket out of poverty, but with an estimated 95% of schools in and around Port-au-Prince collapsed or damaged, the future of Haiti’s deprived children hangs by a thread. It will be months, maybe years, before classes resume on a regular schedule.

“It’s a very somber prospective for this generation,” said Jean Fils Sainton, General Secretary of Education for Haiti’s Methodist schools. He used to supervise six schools, serving 7500 underprivileged students from age four to 18 in Petit Goave, 40 miles southwest of Port-au-Prince and the city closest to the epicenter. Five of them were leveled.

In the meantime, the Haitian upper crust is shipping off its children, so that they can continue their studies in French high schools in Florida or in the Dominican Republic. “A few of my cousins and friends have already sent their children abroad,” said Leroy Jubee, an Haitian American who was visiting Port-au-Prince and will soon return to his insurance job in the U.S.

Along with the children, affluent parents are leaving too. Hardly a soul can be spotted around Haiti’s wealthiest enclaves. Only the servants are left, to guard their employer’s fortified mansions. Surrounded by 15-foot high walls, many of these villas have been built by one of the world’s most corrupt elite (Haiti ranks 168 out of 180 countries in Transparency International’s 2009 Corruption Perceptions Index), once nicknamed by U.S. diplomats and journalists MRE, or the Morally Repugnant Elite.

Since independence, Haiti’s economy has been in the hands of this small cluster of people. This “mulatto” elite comprises fair-skinned Haitians who are descendants of both the European colonial rulers and of local notaries, who took control of the country once the world’s only successful slave revolution kicked the French out in 1804.  Interpreting their country’s history of colonialism and foreign interventions as a sign of its fragile sovereignty, this elite never shook off the fear that their wealth could be lost to yet another invader. Instead of focusing on investing in Haiti’s development, the rich chose instead to reap the benefit of their position before it was too late. Today, this small circle of people controls all sectors of the economy, from textile factories to energy, from telecommunications to big government contracts.

Smaller entrepreneurs also seem to want to leave. Those who can afford the $80 USD fare, queue for hours at the entrance of Caribe Tours, a travel agency that specializes in bus trips to the Dominican Republic. Before the earthquake, said the owners, they sent about a bus a day, with thirty people onboard. Now, given the hardships of living in Port-au-Prince, the figure has quintupled, with people lining up from the wee hours of the morning. One-way tickets are in high demand. Some think the people should stay though. “These people have employees and a responsibility towards those who are dependent on them,” said Caribe Tours’ owner Maryne Rouzier, “We don’t want this to happen, we think Haitians should stay here.”

Haitian entrepreneurs, many with businesses downtown, have certainly taken a hit in the earthquake. Theirs might be, in $ amount, the largest loss of all, but not in relative terms. With at least some of their properties standing, they have the opportunity, and some argue, the responsibility, to bring their businesses back to life after the earthquake.

According to a study by the National Academy of Public Administration titled “Why Foreign Aid to Haiti Failed”, between 1990 and 2003 Haiti received more than $4 billion in international aid. Yet, the paper says, “after consuming billions in foreign aid over three decades, […] Haiti remains politically dysfunctional and impoverished.”

Perhaps, the international community can find a path other than dumping humanitarian aid on Haiti, for example enticing the same business owners catching the $80 ride to the Dominican Republic, to stay. Given Haiti’s history of inefficient governments and corrupt elites, if the country wants to begin again as a more just society, its small yet lively group of small business owners might be a good starting point. Losing them to foreign countries would be an enormous blow, leaving the country stuck, more so than ever before, between the very rich and the very poor.

Despite the discouraging reality, some people see the earthquake as an opportunity. “If politicians come together for a national plan, leaving behind their power struggles,” said an official with the Haitian government, “if the international community is ready to implement a Marshall Plan for Haiti, then there is an opportunity.” I asked him what were the chances that this would actually happen. “Almost non-existent,” he said.