Haiti: straight from the united urban social movements
Haiti, January 2010 (Reuters)
Contact: solidarite.ayiti@habitants.org
The terrible destruction that has affected the population of Haiti is incalculable. The January 13, 2010 earthquake has hit the working-class areas and it is likely that those very areas will not receive international aid.
Consequently, we need the solidarity of everyone, in particular inhabitant organisations on the issues that distinguish us: the right to the security of housing and to rebuild the cities in a participative and sustainable approach.
We have already been successful in developing this approach in the post-earthquake reconstruction of 2007 in Peru, thanks to the partnership among IAI member organizations, the local Peruvian authorities assembled in AMUPAT, and the local united Spanish authorities coordinated by FAMSI. So this area is also part of the preparatory process of the World Assembly of Inhabitants (FSM Dakar, 2011).
Pedro Franco, IAI coordinator for Latin America and the Caribbean who lives in Santo Domingo, the part of the island less affected by the earthquake, tells us how, together with our members in Haiti, we can efficiently channel international solidarity, materially and politically.
What to do first:
- the requisitioning of all residential infrastructures, including tourist facilities, to provide solutions for hundreds of thousands homeless
- to cancel all the country’s external debt, under strict control of popular organizations, and to free up the resources feeding Popular Funds for Land and Housing for the reconstruction of poor areas
Continue to stay connected to this Web page where you can find all necessary and useful information, especially updates straight from Haiti’s social urban movements!
We invite all inhabitant organizations, especially those that signed the call for the World Assembly of Inhabitants, their reference networks, the united local authorities, and the foundations that share this inclusive approach, to communicate their availability.
Don’t wait!
The Volunteer translator for housing rights without frontiers of IAI who has collaborated on the translation of this text was: