On a dusty hill overlooking the blue Caribbean 6 miles (10 km) north of the capital Port-au-Prince, the Haitian president, his wife Elisabeth and members of his cabinet attended a sombre memorial for the some quarter of a million people killed in the Jan. 12 quake a year ago.
Between 150,000 and 200,000 victims are believed to be buried at the St. Christophe mass grave site, where in the chaotic days following the disaster trucks carried heaps of crushed and mutilated bodies gathered in the capital’s shattered streets for hasty burial in troughs scooped out of the earth.
“Women and men of Haiti, adults, children fallen in all places; at work, at school, at church, in the street, everywhere, we want to say to all: We remember you, we will never forget you,” Preval said. Hundreds of black-painted wooden crosses cover the burial site, which was marked by two banners proclaiming in Haitian Creole “January 12, we will never forget.” A larger black cross overlooks the site, which was also flanked by recently planted trees and poles from which white fabric had been hung.
The anniversary of a disaster that many experts call the biggest urban catastrophe in modern history is going ahead amid a barrage of criticism and controversy over Haiti’s slow recovery and reconstruction, despite billions of dollars of international donations and aid pledges.
With rubble still clogging much of Port-au-Prince and more than 800,000 survivors camped out under tents and tarpaulins, questions are being asked about the effectiveness of the multibillion-dollar international aid effort.
“Look, nobody’s been more frustrated than I am that we haven’t done more,” said former U.S. President Bill Clinton, the United Nations special envoy to Haiti who co-chairs an Interim Haiti Recovery Commission with outgoing Haitian Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive.
“But I’m encouraged if you look at how much faster it’s been going in the last four months,” Clinton told reporters at a debris-clearing site in Port-au-Prince.
“If you look at the level of activity on the street, I think we’re doing better,” he said, referring to the resurgence of traffic, pedestrians and street vendors that once again jam the streets of the sprawling capital.
Health workers in the Western Hemisphere’s poorest state are also grappling with a cholera epidemic that broke out months after the quake and has killed more than 3,750 people.
“We carry the mark of the catastrophe of January 12 in our bodies, in our hearts, in our souls,” said Preval, who has come under fire from critics who say his government failed to effectively handle the quake response and the cholera.
Clinton, whose own charity foundation has also been contributing to the recovery effort, was in the country with other foreign dignitaries and senior humanitarian officials to attend the quake anniversary commemoration.
Other memorial services are planned for this afternoon in Port-au-Prince, to remember the exact time — 4:53 p.m. — when the magnitude 7.0 earthquake struck on Jan. 12, 2010.
It only lasted 10 to 20 seconds but toppled buildings like cards, killing around a quarter of a million people, injuring more than 300,000 and making more than 1.5 million homeless.
Clinton said he hoped faster progress could be made this year with resettling the tens of thousands of homeless survivors, one of the most delayed post-quake recovery tasks.
