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HAITI: WHERE'S THE MILITARY AND THE U.N?
Dolores M. Bernal, News Junkie Post - I have been driving all week around Port-au-Prince taking photos of the destroyed homes and buildings and as I've gone from one end of this city to the other, the US is military is only found at the airport - nice and secured behind those gates.
Meanwhile, the UN and its white Jeeps are driving all around this city, but I haven't seen them stop at any particular location to give food or water. Where is all the aid going, if any?
Michel David Stephan is a 22-year-old Haitian university student who has not been able to continue his studies because the campus has been badly damaged. I asked him what he thought of the UN.
"We call them 'tourists' because they don't do nothing," Stephan told me.
I also asked Stephan what he thought of the US military.
"They are tourists too, they only come to take pictures," he said.
The only people present and actively helping on the ground are members of relief organizations, but there aren't enough of them. . .
I drove by the Presidential Palace this afternoon, the scenes were even more chaotic there. Downtown Port-au-Prince was hit stronger than other places I had been - the government buildings were flattened like pancakes, floors were stacked up on top of each other. The place smells of dead, the survivors are forced to live like rats packed up on a landfill.
I've spoken with doctors and nurses who are concerned with what will happen to the survivors once the relief organizations have to pull them out.
"Who is going to take care of the amputees?" asked Dr. Eric Salado, an Orthopedic Surgeon from Miami. "Who is going to give follow up care to the people who got stitches and will need them removed a month from now?"
Meanwhile, the UN and its white Jeeps are driving all around this city, but I haven't seen them stop at any particular location to give food or water. Where is all the aid going, if any?
Michel David Stephan is a 22-year-old Haitian university student who has not been able to continue his studies because the campus has been badly damaged. I asked him what he thought of the UN.
"We call them 'tourists' because they don't do nothing," Stephan told me.
I also asked Stephan what he thought of the US military.
"They are tourists too, they only come to take pictures," he said.
The only people present and actively helping on the ground are members of relief organizations, but there aren't enough of them. . .
I drove by the Presidential Palace this afternoon, the scenes were even more chaotic there. Downtown Port-au-Prince was hit stronger than other places I had been - the government buildings were flattened like pancakes, floors were stacked up on top of each other. The place smells of dead, the survivors are forced to live like rats packed up on a landfill.
I've spoken with doctors and nurses who are concerned with what will happen to the survivors once the relief organizations have to pull them out.
"Who is going to take care of the amputees?" asked Dr. Eric Salado, an Orthopedic Surgeon from Miami. "Who is going to give follow up care to the people who got stitches and will need them removed a month from now?"
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