Dear Editor,
Permit me to most sincerely congratulate President Bharrat Jagdeo not only for his government’s donation of US$1M to help the suffering people of Haiti but also for his leadership and alacrity of response. Surely, these have inspired our people immensely.
I have been a broken man since Tuesday January 12, 2010. Since then, fighting back the tears has been almost a daily battle for me as I watch the unspeakable horrors, death and destruction which is unfolding daily in Haiti.
As the sick, dying, starving, homeless and emotionally and psychologically disoriented and battered people struggle to live, the United States authorities made their declaration loud and clear to the Haitians, indeed to the world.
The Guyana Chronicle of January 21, 2010 carried an AP report which said: “United States authorities are readying for a potential influx of Haitiains seeking to escape their earthquake-wracked nation, even though the policy for migrants remain the same; with few exceptions, they will go back… ‘There is no new incentive for anyone to try to enter the United States illegally by sea,’ O’Neil said.”
“I’ll be honest with you: If you think you will reach the US and all the doors will be wide open to you, that’s not at all the case,” an official was quoted as saying on America.gov, a State Department site. “And they will intercept you right on the water and send you back home where you come from.”
Editor, I have no contention with the Americans. The United States belongs to them; it is their country and anyone who truly knows who the Americans are, will know that they say what they mean and mean what they say when it comes to the so-called third world peoples.
Almost two million people in Haiti have no homes to go to; they live in the open under the sky – on the streets, in pastures, under trees, on every open space and a few of them in tents. Their food is whatever is handed or thrown to them. These people are at the mercy of the sun, rain, wind, storms (and God forbid) another passing hurricane.
This is exactly how cattle live. Yet we can hear those in the affluent societies saying, ‘Stay where you are, don’t come to our home or we will dump you right back where you come from.’
In view of the reality in Haiti, I appeal to President Bharrat Jagdeo to discuss within his government and party, and indeed with our people the possibility of implementing either or both of the following proposals:
Discuss the feasibility of persons who are willing and capable to take into their homes, one, two or three Haitians to live with us for the next two years. Yours truly will be the first volunteer to have two young men (who do not steal or drink alcohol).
Two, based on the fact that we have a relatively large country and small population, that a proposal be taken to Caricom stating that Guyana will provide some land for a group of Haitians while the Caribbean Community will provide the logistics and the cost of part of the group’s maintenance. I am confident that many of our tradesmen and artisans would voluntarily pitch in to build ranch-type accommodation if this option is chosen.
Yours faithfully,
Rev Reuben A Gilbert