Red Cross promises houses for 130,000 Haitians, builds only 6

These kinds of news stories, exposing fraud & corruption, within North American & European NGOs are common, but not reported so often. Reason being that the news media & the general public doesn't want to know about these corruptions, frauds, & scandals.

The general public in North America & Europe desperately wants to feel good by donating cash & kind to NGOs. Other than a few, major ones seemed to be always embroiled in corruption scandals. People like to think that since, I've donated my money, or time, everything is good. I did my share & it's time to move on to some other things. For instance, Syrian refugee crisis is on the public radar right now. Everyone has forgotten about Haitians who are still "enduring sub-standard conditions" in Haiti.

As I blogged previously, people today have ADD (attention deficit disorder). One crisis for a few weeks tops the charts of social media & then it's forgotten until something disastrous happens there again.

American Red Cross is celebrating their successes. The public is still donating in big numbers to American Red Cross. There's no notion of any checks to be done, by the public, on American Red Cross. Such a well-known NGO feeds the public garbage through their marketing campaigns & the public gobbles it up. The public keeps donating without ever asking tough questions to these NGOs. The public thinks that since, it's a NGO, they can do no wrong.

The hiring practices of these NGOs are also deplorable. Like it says in the article that expat project managers are being flown in from US, who are being paid 6-figure salaries (who obviously don't have any compassion towards humanity, since he/she is still earning 6-figure salary with all the standard perks), while nothing substantial was taking place on the ground. Everyone who is hired is through networks, which means that the person hired for a given job is not necessarily the right person.

In the end, who is actually suffering? Not the people who are working in American Red Cross. Not the people who donate to American Red Cross. But the Haitians are suffering who are not only helped in any way, but worse still, they have been completely forgotten by the North American & European public.

Once again, as I always say, corruption exists all over the world. In developing world, it's the main headline in the morning news. In developed world, it's not even reported in the media & while the public focuses on the latest crisis being reported on social media.
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http://www.rt.com/usa/264933-red-cross-haiti-money/

When a devastating earthquake struck the Western hemisphere’s poorest country in 2010, the American Red Cross was one of the organizations at the forefront of the humanitarian effort to rebuild it a year later, launching a multi-million-dollar effort.

The main program – LAMIKA (a Creole acronym for ‘A Better Life in My Neighborhood’) – was to build hundreds of permanent homes to house some 130,000 people living in abject poverty after the quake.

Now, in 2015, the Port-au-Prince neighborhood of Campeche is as dilapidated as ever, with hardly any new buildings, trash strewn around, animals walking the streets, & people enduring sub-standard conditions in self-made shacks.

“Many residents live in shacks made of rusty sheet metal, without access to drinkable water, electricity or basic sanitation. When it rains, their homes flood & residents bail out mud & water,” an introduction to a report says.

An investigation by NPR & ProPublica gained access to “confidential memos, emails from worried top officers, & accounts of a dozen frustrated & disappointed insiders” familiar with how the NGO broke its promises, misspent millions of dollars, & then issued self-congratulatory progress statements.

The ensuing report reveals very different results to the ones outlined in CEO Gail McGovern’s project plan for Haiti, which promised “brand new communities” that would make “donors proud” & “help the people in Haiti.” She claimed her experience had made her more “flexible during emergencies.”

The investigation pointed to a series of systematic blunders & untruths surrounding the Haiti effort, however.

The Red Cross’s internal proposal put the number of houses to be built at 700 by January 2013. In reality, only 6 houses were actually constructed.

“We asked the Red Cross to show us around its projects in Haiti so we could see the results of its work. It declined,” the report reads.

Part of the reason behind the failure is that the Red Cross “didn’t have the know-how” & “they had no development experience,” former employees said.

In some cases, the NGO would give millions to other groups. Poor supervision & lack of proper oversight allowed these subcontractors to rack up inordinate bills for management & overhead costs.

Another issue that could have hindered the Red Cross’s work in Haiti is trouble with the country’s “dysfunctional” land title system.

Other groups, which the report does not name, had similar problems but, according to the data, “ultimately built 9,000 homes compared to the Red Cross’s six.”

Another possible reason for the dismal results, pointed out by current & former employees, was “an overreliance” on expats who could not speak French or Creole. The Red Cross’s statement, however, said that over 90% of people hired were Haitians. That didn’t seem to be reflected in the top positions, however, according to the authors of the report.

According to the report, the NGO displayed an arrogant attitude to national staff – some of the very few people who could speak French & the local Creole. In some cases, the Red Cross actively discouraged their participation. This led to poor communication with the local population &, ultimately, to the failure of the outreach project.

“Going to meetings with the community when you don’t speak the language is not productive,” one Haitian who worked on the project in Campeche said, adding that meetings would be skipped altogether at times.

Some $140,000 was spent on housing, food, & R&R for a foreign project manager, who also enjoyed 4 paid leaves a year. That comes to more than $100,000 more than would have been spent on a local equivalent.

“A lot of money was spent on those people who were not Haitian, who had nothing to do with Haiti. The money was just going back to the US,” one Haitian who coordinated expat housing for the Red Cross confessed.

At the same time, Red Cross officials focused more on programs which would generate good publicity than those providing the most homes, according to testimony from Lee Malany, the project manager of the shelter program.

He recalled a Washington meeting where top officials had no idea what to do with the millions they’d been given for housing projects.

The organization would not provide details on how it spent the almost $500 million that it received, nor give specific details of how its projects were carried out. However, various promotional statements estimated that the initiative had repaired some 4,000 homes, erected temporary shelters for thousands of families, & donated $44 million for food aid & hospital construction.

“The Red Cross’s public reports offer only broad categories about where $488 million in donations has gone,” according to the authors of the report.

5 years since the quake, a report by McGovern says: “Millions of Haitians are safer, healthier, more resilient, & better prepared for future disasters thanks to generous donations to the American Red Cross.”

The organization claimed that it had helped 4.5 million Haitians, but according to reporters “there is reason to doubt” that.

Asked if there was any truth to the Red Cross’s claims, Haiti’s Prime Minister didn’t seem to know how the numbers could add up: “No, no… it’s not possible,” Jean-Max Bellerive said, stressing that the country’s entire population is only about 10 million.

“What the Red Cross told us is that they are coming here to change Campeche. Totally change it,” the report cites Jean Flaubert, the head of a community group set up by the Red Cross, as saying. “Now I do not understand the change that they are talking about. I think the Red Cross is working for themselves.”

The Red Cross had already been embroiled in several scandals following 9/11 & Hurricane Katrina relief efforts, but that did not matter to the many people, organizations & US celebrities who continued to support it.

The Haiti earthquake was touted as “a spectacular fundraising opportunity” within the organization, according to one former official involved with the program.

A great number of high-profile people & organizations donated to the cause, including Michelle Obama, many Hollywood A-listers, & the NFL.

It later turned out that the organization continued to collect funds for emergency relief projects even after it had hit its targets. The extra money was found to have been put toward eradicating the American Red Cross’s own debt, which exceeded $100 million.

To move beyond boom & bust, we need a new theory of capitalism

Although, this op-ed piece is a good one, posing an important question to think about in regards to the economic policy of a country & for countries, worldwide, my own view says, regardless of which economic policy we come up with, we will still have these booms & busts.

 

The idea of free markets, capitalism, democracy, social democracy etc are all good & noble, but the problem in them lie in the proper implementation of these ideas. We cannot ever properly implement it ... without religion.

 

Now, people will groan, what religion has to do with free markets or democracy or capitalism?

 

I can't talk about this from other religions since I don't know what other religions say or don't say about the problems the whole world is having by adhering to these ideals. I can, though, talk about economic policy & capitalism from Islamic perspective.

 

Since, this is a very long & deep topic to discuss even from a religious perspective, so I'll talk at a high-level. I will say here that Islam doesn't forbid capitalism. Today's problems are not with Capitalism itself; it's other factors making problems for Capitalism. What are those problems?

 

1. Greed: Islam abhors greed. Even Christianity has greed as one of its 7 deadly sins. One of the 10 commandments, "thou shall not steal," includes greed (when one is greedy, they will steal to satisfy their need).

 

Problem is greed is actually considered good in secular or atheist world. For instance, entrepreneurs are told to be hungry & greedy to achieve greatness or whatever they are trying to achieve. So, if Facebook takes your personal data & sell it to third parties for profits, then you can't complain, because it's part & parcel of free markets. Nothing is right or wrong in free markets.

 

After the 2008 crisis, there was, & still is, a lot of noise about market regulations in US & Europe. Well, the government agencies were made. Regulations were enacted (after they were heavily watered down, thanks to the heavy lobbying efforts from the Wall Street crowd). But, the implementation of those regulations are nowhere near to their initial objective. Why?

 

Because, for every law a human makes, an "anti-law" a human finds. What's an "anti-law"? A loop hole. We can see all around us that for every law, there are loop holes available.

 

We humans, regardless of how hard we try to make the strongest possible law, there will always be a loop hole. That's why, religion stopped it at the spiritual level; no greed. So, if bankers or executives or government leaders turn all devout Muslims, or Christians, or Jews or religious people tomorrow, they can't steal from the public to line up their own pockets. They have to shun greed for the public good.

 

What's that has to do with Capitalism? Capitalism says a society should have private enterprises. That's good & ok. But then, businessmen take that concept & open private companies & then to always earn more money (nobody can satisfy greed), they commit abuses (labour abuses, market abuses, corruption, lies, bribery etc etc) to fatten up their accounts. Of course, the result ends up being a major part of the populations keep becoming poorer & poorer. Inequality & injustice take the rein of society. A few elites take control of the liquidity in the market (money) & start controlling government so it makes policies favouring them (government leaders are paid handsomely). All because of few people became greedy.

 

2. Interest economy: Islam forbade interest because an economy based on interest creates a rich class & a poor class. Since, the money the rich has is making him/her more money, he/she will always make money without putting in that much effort, whereas, the poor does not have enough money, he/she will have to borrow more money (& hence, pay interest to the rich) to survive.

 

Relation to capitalism? As I said earlier, nothing is wrong with Capitalism as an idea, but this is one of the many factors which create problems for a society & its people, & then we blame capitalism.

 

3. Consumerism: It's sort of part of greed; a greed of accumulating / buying more things for yourself. So, of course, Islam abhors consumerism. Modern marketing thrives on this notion. Economy measurement tools, e.g. GDP are dependent on it. The more people buy, the more GDP goes up, the more a country is shown to be developing or doing good, economically.

 

Relation to capitalism? Again, one of the factors adversely affecting capitalism. In the race to sell more, business people abandon all ethics & morals (lying to people to buy houses with ultra-cheap interest rates, even when they know these people can't afford these houses) & people getting greedy to become homeowners at any cost. Result is in front of you all. After the house mortgages, credit card debts are the next mountain of the world. With ultra cheap interest rates around the world, people are on the hunt to load up their houses with things, even at the cost of racking up huge credit card debts. When interest rates are going to increase, & then people unable to pay their credit card bills or even service interests, the market gonna crash.

 

We are ready to blame Capitalism for all our economics ills but capitalism has nothing to do with whatever problem we are having. Capitalism only says private  enterprises. It doesn't say anything about interest economy, consumerism, human greed, or economic measurement tools (e.g. GDP). But these, & other factors, affect how the economy performs, domestically & internationally. Most of these factors can be controlled only through religion.

 

Regardless of how much we think we are intelligent to make laws to control these factors, we can never completely eliminate them (there are always loop holes), & they will always win, & when these factors take over the society, the majority of human population suffers. This is not the first time we have seen human greed destroying the world; be it the Roman emperors pillaging other colonies (& for example, heavily taxing the public) to satisfy their greed or the 1 percenters of the current world keep amassing wealth, at the expense of the other 99%, to satisfy their greed.

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http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/mar/22/to-move-beyond-boom-and-bust-need-new-theory-capitalism

 

 

This is the year that economics might, if we are lucky, turn a corner. There’s a deluge of calls for change in the way it is taught in universities. There’s a global conference at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in Paris, where the giants of radical economics ... will get their biggest ever mainstream platform. And there’s a film where a star of Monty Python talks to a puppet of Hyman Minsky.

 

Terry Jones’s documentary film Boom Bust Boom hits the cinemas this month. Using puppetry & talking heads (including mine), Jones is trying to popularise the work of Minsky, a US economist who died in 1996 but whose name has become for ever associated with the Lehman Brothers crash. Terrified analysts labelled it the “Minsky moment”.

 

Minsky’s genius was to show that financially complex capitalism is inherently unstable. Under conditions of stability, firms, banks & households will, over time, move from a position where their income pays off their debt, to one where it can only meet the interest payments on it. Finally, as instability rises, & central banks respond by expanding the supply of money, people end up borrowing just to pay back interest. The price of shares, homes & commodities rockets. Bust becomes inevitable.

 

This logical & coherent prediction was laughed at until it came true. Mainstream economics had convinced itself that capitalism tends towards equilibrium; & that any shocks must be external. It did so by reducing economic thought to the construction of abstract models, which perfectly describe the system 95% of the time, but break down during critical events.

 

In the aftermath of the crisis ... Minsky’s insight has been acknowledged. But his supporters face a problem. The mainstream has a model; the radicals do not. The mainstream theory is “good enough” to run a business, a finance ministry or a central bank – as long as you are prepared, in practice, to ignore that theory when faced with crises.

 

That, effectively, describes the situation among the policymaking elite today. They are trying to wrestle the economy back into a state where their models can cope with it again, using measures their theories say are not needed: quantitative easing, bank nationalisations, partial debt defaults & currency devaluations.

 

The radical, pro-Minsky faction is at a disadvantage because it does not possess a complete alternative model of capitalism. Some have generated computer programs showing how financial crises happen. But, by their own admission, they do not have a complete alternative model of how capitalism works.

They are, admits Dutch finance professor Theo Kocken, “roughly right” rather than “exactly wrong”. Kocken’s solution is to concentrate on why we misperceive risk. Behavioural economics has had a field day since 2008, identifying problems for the human brain when faced with complex risks: oversimplification, overconfidence & “confirmation bias”, where we ignore facts that challenge our existing beliefs. But adding behavioural insights to the Minsky model of financial mania does not turn it into a theory of capitalism.

 

Here, the parallels with events in physics are obvious. After Einstein’s big breakthrough, we were left with 2 competing – & mutually incompatible – accounts of the laws of physics. Einstein himself was dissatisfied with this, pursuing from the 1920s a “theory of everything”. It is a laudable aim in economics too. And this is where we come to the turning point. The defenders of orthodox economics & the Minsky rebels are, essentially, asking the same question: “What does capitalism normally look like?” The one answers “stable”; the other “unstable”. But it’s the wrong question. The right question is: Where are we in the long arc of capitalist development? Nearer the beginning, the middle or the end? But that question goes to the heart of darkness.

 

For the mainstream, their convictions about equilibrium & abstract models were always founded on the belief that capitalism is an eternal system: the social arrangement most completely reflecting human nature. Minsky’s followers, as with all followers of JM Keynes, assume that a better understanding of financial mania can stabilise an inherently unstable system. But even physicists, who study a universe that has lasted 13bn years, are prepared to countenance – indeed, are obsessed with modelling – its death.

 

So the pursuit of theory is obligatory in economics. The holy grail is not a new orthodoxy, cobbled together from Minsky & the remnants of mainstream thought so that bankers can construct trading models to iron out problems created by the way our brains work. The aim should be something bigger to model capitalism’s current crisis within an understanding of its destiny.

 

For me, the most fundamental question in economics still concerns the 2008 crisis. Was this event the last in a series of shocks needed to allow a third technological revolution to take off? Or was it evidence that capitalism’s tendency to adapt and reshape in response to technology has stalled, or is even finished? That is the shadow we have to jump over in economics. Amid a mania for “new economic thinking”, it is what we need to think hardest about.


Class is something you are born with ...

Crappy movie, but loved this quote ...
 
Funny how people think that a brand name dress or shoes or living in a mansion or have powerful people in their network or driving expensive cars elevate them to a higher class in society. That class is like that chocolate egg, which is hollow from inside but covered in delicious chocolate ... but devoid of any nutrition.
 
Our world has become topsy-turvy now with low class people at the top, with the help of brand names in everything they own, & high class people at the bottom of the society.

 
On top of that, public itself has changed its perspective to hold these low-class people in high regard. General public doesn't hesitate from struggling in this world, to doing anything it can do, to emulate those low-class people (e.g. Kim Kardashian is the idol to several young girls or young women in universities, in Western & Eastern countries alike, pimping themselves out to "sugar daddies" to earn enough to buy brand name accessories).
 
People are ready & willing to do anything that will make them easy money, even selling oneself is not out of bounds, just so they can buy their way into the "high-class society".

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