Where is the money?
After the devastating 2010 earthquake that struck Haiti, Western hemisphere’s poorest country, the Red Cross received about $500 million in donations.
“In late 2011, the Red Cross launched a multimillion-dollar project to transform the desperately poor area, which was hit hard by the earthquake that struck Haiti the year before. The main focus of the project — called LAMIKA, an acronym in Creole for ‘A Better Life in My Neighborhood’ — was building hundreds of permanent homes,” according to a report by ProPublica and NPR.
“Today, not one home has been built in Campeche [a neighborhood that sprawls up a steep hillside in Haiti’s capital city, Port-au-Prince.] 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 and residents bail out mud and water.”
The Red Cross claims it has provided homes to at least 130,000 people. But the investigation found that the group has built only six homes in all of Haiti.
Red Cross CEO Gail McGovern unveiled ambitious plans to “develop brand-new communities,” after the earthquake devastated the country. “None has ever been built,” says the report.
Red Cross saw the Haiti earthquake disaster as “a spectacular fundraising opportunity,” says a former official who helped with the fundraising. “Michelle Obama, the NFL and a long list of celebrities appealed for donations to the group”
Now, the Red Cross refuses to release details of how it has spent the hundreds of millions of dollars donated for Haiti. But the investigation reveals that far less money reached the quake victims than the Red Cross has claimed.
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