April 21, 2011
By Chris Herlinger

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti – It's Holy Week in Haiti – a time for prayer, reflection, taking stock and looking ahead.

The quiet and calm of the week are welcome. Following the commemoration of the first anniversary of the January 2010 earthquake three months ago and the recent presidential elections, a respite is probably needed.

But Easter is a reminder of the continued work needed to rebuild Haiti – work that still requires a commitment to the Haitian people by U.S. churches and their members, say Church World Service Haitian partners and beneficiaries.

Easter, said Polycarpe Joseph, head of the Ecumenical Center for Peace and Justice, is a reminder of the need for "Christians to come together."

"It's a symbol of going from bad to good. For Haiti, it's a reminder of the need to leave the cycle of underdevelopment and embrace true development," Joseph said in an April 20 interview. "It's a time to move from violence to peace, to move from division to reconciliation."

"Democracy, development, peace and unity: it's all one dream," he said.

Herode Guillomettre, president of the Christian Center for Integrated Development, a CWS partner known by the Haitian Krey"l acronym SKDE, agreed, saying it's important for CWS and its supporters "to continue to stand behind the Haitian people, by developing a relationship that goes ‘beyond partnership.'"

"We need to support a vision of the Haitian people so they can be actors in their own development and stop the cycle of dependency," he said earlier this week, underlining the need for CWS and other international humanitarian groups to continue advocacy efforts "for a new Haiti."

"You can't have tent cities forever," Guillomettre said of the ongoing living conditions for hundreds of thousands in Port-au-Prince and other locales.

Among the long-term initiatives CWS is supporting in Haiti are:

+ Continued support and expansion, working with SKDE, for 13 food cooperatives providing food security for more than 3,000 members, in northwest Haiti.

+ Ongoing support for programs run by the Ecumenical Center for Peace and Justice, known by its Krey"l acronym FOPJ. These include initiatives for vulnerable Haitian children in Port-au-Prince, including *restavek* children (domestic servants), former gang members and teenage mothers.

+ Support for 1,200 persons with disabilities and their families in metropolitan Port-au-Prince. These persons have received six-month, $75 per-month grants and 30 families have received assistance in repairing damaged housing.

Among those who have received support in the disabilities initiative is Anne Suze Denestant, one of the beneficiaries of the CWS cash assistance program.

Denestant, 26, lost her right arm in the quake. She acknowledges that life has been extremely difficult since the quake: living in one of the tent cities, losing family members, trying to support herself, adjusting to a disability.

"We're still not where we want to be," Denestant said of Haiti 15 months after the quake.

But she thanked Church World Service for the cash assistance which provided some income for a time. With the cash assistance, Denestant was able to sell cosmetics and other items in an open-air market. Denestant called the program "good work" on the part of CWS.

"I hope they continue to do the same good work," she said.

Church World Service
Chris Herlinger is a Church World Service writer based in New York.