Argentina's President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner (C) addresses the
audience during a meeting of the annual Mercosur trade bloc presidential
summit in Mendoza June 29, 2012. (Credit: Reuters/Enrique Marcarian)

Chinese leader woos Latin America with deals

Chinese leader woos Latin America with deals
Chinese President Xi Jinping (4-L, first row) poses with leaders of the CELAC group of Latin American and Caribbean states, in Brasilia, on July 17, 2014 (AFP Photo/Nelson Almeida)
"A Summary" – Apr 2, 2011 (Kryon channelled by Lee Carroll) (Subjects: Religion, Shift of Human Consciousness, 2012, Intelligent/Benevolent Design, EU, South America, 5 Currencies, Water Cycle (Heat up, Mini Ice Ace, Oceans, Fish, Earthquakes ..), Middle East, Internet, Israel, Dictators, Palestine, US, Japan (Quake/Tsunami Disasters , People, Society ...), Nuclear Power Revealed, Hydro Power, Geothermal Power, Moon, Financial Institutes (Recession, Realign integrity values ..) , China, North Korea, Global Unity,..... etc.) -

“ … Here is another one. A change in what Human nature will allow for government. "Careful, Kryon, don't talk about politics. You'll get in trouble." I won't get in trouble. I'm going to tell you to watch for leadership that cares about you. "You mean politics is going to change?" It already has. It's beginning. Watch for it. You're going to see a total phase-out of old energy dictatorships eventually. The potential is that you're going to see that before 2013.

They're going to fall over, you know, because the energy of the population will not sustain an old energy leader ..."

"Update on Current Events" – Jul 23, 2011 (Kryon channelled by Lee Carroll) - (Subjects: The Humanization of God, Gaia, Shift of Human Consciousness, 2012, Benevolent Design, Financial Institutes (Recession, System to Change ...), Water Cycle (Heat up, Mini Ice Ace, Oceans, Fish, Earthquakes ..), Nuclear Power Revealed, Geothermal Power, Hydro Power, Drinking Water from Seawater, No need for Oil as Much, Middle East in Peace, Persia/Iran Uprising, Muhammad, Israel, DNA, Two Dictators to fall soon, Africa, China, (Old) Souls, Species to go, Whales to Humans, Global Unity,..... etc.)
(Subjects: Who/What is Kryon ?, Egypt Uprising, Iran/Persia Uprising, Peace in Middle East without Israel actively involved, Muhammad, "Conceptual" Youth Revolution, "Conceptual" Managed Business, Internet, Social Media, News Media, Google, Bankers, Global Unity,..... etc.)



Map of Latin America showing countries where major protests have occurred in recent months (AFP Photo)
.
A student holds a sign reading "Don't shoot, listen!!!" during a protest
on June 17, 2013 in Brasilia (AFP, Evaristo)

Paraguay police search S. American football HQ

Paraguay police search S. American football HQ
The Conmebol headquarters in Luque, Paraguay, is seen on January 7, 2016, during a raid within the framework of the FIFA corruption scandal (AFP Photo/Norberto Duarte)

'Panama Papers' law firm under the media's lenses

'Panama Papers' law firm under the media's lenses
The Panama Papers: key facts on the huge journalists' investigation into tax evasion (AFP Photo/Thomas Saint-Cricq, Philippe Mouche)

Mossack Fonseca

Mossack Fonseca

.

.
"The Recalibration of Awareness – Apr 20/21, 2012 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) (Subjects: Old Energy, Recalibration Lectures, God / Creator, Religions/Spiritual systems (Catholic Church, Priests/Nun’s, Worship, John Paul Pope, Women in the Church otherwise church will go, Current Pope won’t do it), Middle East, Jews, Governments will change (Internet, Media, Democracies, Dictators, North Korea, Nations voted at once), Integrity (Businesses, Tobacco Companies, Bankers/ Financial Institutes, Pharmaceutical company to collapse), Illuminati (Started in Greece, with Shipping, Financial markets, Stock markets, Pharmaceutical money (fund to build Africa, to develop)), Shift of Human Consciousness, (Old) Souls, Women, Masters to/already come back, Global Unity.... etc.) - (Text version)

… The Shift in Human Nature

You're starting to see integrity change. Awareness recalibrates integrity, and the Human Being who would sit there and take advantage of another Human Being in an old energy would never do it in a new energy. The reason? It will become intuitive, so this is a shift in Human Nature as well, for in the past you have assumed that people take advantage of people first and integrity comes later. That's just ordinary Human nature.

In the past, Human nature expressed within governments worked like this: If you were stronger than the other one, you simply conquered them. If you were strong, it was an invitation to conquer. If you were weak, it was an invitation to be conquered. No one even thought about it. It was the way of things. The bigger you could have your armies, the better they would do when you sent them out to conquer. That's not how you think today. Did you notice?

Any country that thinks this way today will not survive, for humanity has discovered that the world goes far better by putting things together instead of tearing them apart. The new energy puts the weak and strong together in ways that make sense and that have integrity. Take a look at what happened to some of the businesses in this great land (USA). Up to 30 years ago, when you started realizing some of them didn't have integrity, you eliminated them. What happened to the tobacco companies when you realized they were knowingly addicting your children? Today, they still sell their products to less-aware countries, but that will also change.

What did you do a few years ago when you realized that your bankers were actually selling you homes that they knew you couldn't pay for later? They were walking away, smiling greedily, not thinking about the heartbreak that was to follow when a life's dream would be lost. Dear American, you are in a recession. However, this is like when you prune a tree and cut back the branches. When the tree grows back, you've got control and the branches will grow bigger and stronger than they were before, without the greed factor. Then, if you don't like the way it grows back, you'll prune it again! I tell you this because awareness is now in control of big money. It's right before your eyes, what you're doing. But fear often rules. …

Thursday, June 4, 2015

American Red Cross squandered aid after Haiti earthquake, report alleges

Despite raising nearly half a billion dollars and allocating $170m to ‘shelter relief’, the aid organization built only six permanent homes, an investigation has found

The Guardian, Alan Yuhus, 4 June 2015

An undated American Red Cross handout photo of the aftermath of the earthquake
shows the devastation to homes in Haiti. Photograph: Matt Marek/American
Red Cross/PA

Despite collecting nearly half a billion dollars for Haiti earthquake relief, the American Red Cross has built only six permanent homes and seemingly squandered millions in the country, according to a new report.

A joint investigation by ProPublica and NPR uncovered rampant mismanagement, high overhead costs and deeply rooted acrimony from Haitians toward the aid organization. Among the investigation’s findings was that although the Red Cross apportioned about $170m to the category of “shelter” relief, and although it at first planned to build some 700 houses, it only constructed six permanent homes.

The report charges the Red Cross with consistent misrepresentation of its projects, especially in housing. The authors cite promotional materials that say the Red Cross provided more than 130,000 people with homes, and then note that that total includes people in “transitional shelters”, recipients of short-term rent assistance, and people who had been “trained in proper construction techniques”.

The Red Cross disputes the report and asserts it has “helped build and operate eight hospitals and clinics” and “move more than 100,000 people out of make-shift tents into safe and improved housing”. In a statement, the organization said it is “disappointed” by the “lack of balance, context and accuracy” on the part of ProPublica and NPR.

A major problem for the organization was leadership and staffing, according to the report. Integral positions, including experts for health and shelter, were left vacant for months and sometimes years. The positions that were staffed were predominantly held by expats or by people flown in from the United States, many of whom could not speak French or Creole.

In one 2011 document, Red Cross official Judith St Ford notes that there are “serious program delays caused by internal issues that go unaddressed”, including for cholera relief.

“There is a clear lack of foresight and planning,” she wrote, and “the lack of leadership ability has contributed to poor morale in the field.”

She also urged her superiors to hire more Haitians: “the implication that talented, smart, competent Haitians cannot be found in Haiti has to be dispelled.”

In its statement the Red Cross says 90% of its current staff are Haitians; the organization did not break down the hierarchy or positions of its staff.

“If they were an organization that had a real history in Haiti I think this would’ve gone a lot better,” said Justin Elliott, one of the journalists who co-wrote the report. “The entire Haiti reconstruction effort has been really problematic, but the outside groups that have done better have roots there, have Haitian people working at high levels, have people who speak the language.”

In one 2013 email published by ProPublica, CEO Gail McGovern admitted a project had failed and that she did not know what to do with a $20m remainder. “Now that the Northern project is going bust and we are still holding $20 million of contingency, any ideas on how to spend the rest of this?” she asked, before mentioning a mysterious “wonderful helicopter idea”.

Without Haitians in leadership positions, the Red Cross was particularly ill-prepared to deal with Haiti’s land tenure rules, a system so tangled and unforgiving that it has intimidated USAid and Vatican relief efforts.

Residents of the Jean-Marie Vincent camp for people displaced by the 2010
earthquake, wait for customers outside their tent where they have set up a
stand to sell rice, oil and canned goods in Port-au-Prince on 9 January 2013.
Photograph: Dieu Nalio Chery/AP

“Land tenure is probably the biggest stumbling block,” said Jonathan M Katz, a freelance journalist and author of a book about the earthquake, The Big Truck That Went By. The system has stymied aid organizations for years, and Katz said that for years aid organizations have “thrown up their collective hands and said ‘we don’t really want to deal with this.’”

The Red Cross entangled itself in a web of other organizations, often paying them to do relief work, themselves struggling in Haiti. This outsourcing is commonplace in the international aid industry, Katz said, and leads to inevitable but not necessarily unreasonable overhead costs. But eager to better solicit donations, organizations often try to downplay these costs.

The report notes that overhead charges by the Red Cross and its contractors undermine McGovern’s claim that “minus the nine cents overhead, 91 cents on the dollar will be going to Haiti.”

In one case, Elliott and his co-author, NPR’S Laura Sullivan, found that the International Federation of the Red Cross (IFRC) exacted $1.56m in overhead from the American Red Cross’s payment of $6m, all to help give Haitians rental subsidies so they could leave tent camps. The IFRC said the costs were related to “administration, finance, human resources”.

In another case, the Red Cross commissioned Swiss and Spanish Red Cross societies to upgrade shelters, but still took 24% of the money for the project in additional overhead costs, according to the report.

Where exactly the $488m of the American Red Cross’s Haiti budget has gone is unclear, Elliott said, since “the whole international aid sector is pretty opaque in general. And the spending of the American Red Cross is incredible opaque. You can tell hardly anything from their disclosures.”

He said that the issue of money was particularly sensitive to Haitians who had coordinated with the Red Cross.

“They were furious basically over broken promises,” Elliott said. “About three years ago, the Red Cross told people they were going to build hundreds of new homes in this very hard-hit area, and this thing was just stalled. Over the next two years they had meetings with the community, handed out juice boxes and so on, and nothing happened for a long time.”

The Red Cross is now helping build a road and install solar lights in the area.

Katz said that the problems of the American Red Cross are “typical of the aid industry in general. The Red Cross is sort of the biggest kid on the block. Because they make way more money than anybody else, what they do is magnified.”

The interconnected NGOs and aid organizations of the world, ranging from the many satellites of the Red Cross to Doctors Without Borders to the Clinton Foundation, Katz said, should deserve more skepticism from the public. Reports have traced the 2011 cholera epidemic to United Nations relief efforts, he noted, adding that many organizations operate more like businesses than anything else.

“Even when an aid group is pulling off a project well,” he said, “if it isn’t going to be there forever, if it isn’t going to be accountable for successes and failures, if it isn’t leaving something behind that’s permanent, then it’s still capable of doing damage.”

Last year the Red Cross similarly took issue with another ProPublica report that said the organization had disastrously mismanaged aid relief after hurricane Sandy.

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