austraLasia #2579 Some updates, further information on the Haiti Appeal, other....
ROME: 21st January 2010 -- Just one small comment to begin with.
It is probably time to offer a further update on Haiti, given the RM's
appeal, the volume of (official and unofficial) material that passes
this desk, and the inevitable fact that ANS has to be selective and
therefore is unable to give you everything; but the current focus on
what has become a global issue should not detract from the local scene.
Since the earthquake, any other news in the region has simply
disappeared, which surely does not mean that nothing is happening,
good, bad or indifferent though it may be, anywhere in EAO. And
as we have said many a time, it's not a case of 'garbage in, garbage
out' but 'nothing in, nothing out'. We are not here to invent
news!
That much off the chest, let's get on with it.
Firstly, because we live not so much in a 'wired
world' but in a convergent personal media world, each reader has his or
her own sources, and aggregates all of them in some way or another. One
of the major tasks confronting the Congregation has been to harness and
harvest the material coming out of Salesian sources alone! (Sorry
for the mixed metaphors, but they would have come from the same
semantic 'field' a century ago!). In
the forthcoming SSCS News which many of you would be receiving, you
will find an outline of the communications challenge facing the
Congregation. And possibly foremost amongst these is coordination,
because bits and pieces of news can easily, especially in the absence
of detail, contradict one another. Despite all this, the Congregation
is succeeding in what must be possibly the most massive communications
exercise globally it has ever had to confront.
Some facts as we have them:
- we know that some 250-500 (it will be impossible
for a long time to come to know a real figure) of students between the
ages of 5-17 have perished or at least are 'missing presumed dead' at
ENAM, the School of Arts and Trades, right in the heart of the
city. Why, some ask, can't a school tell you how many students it
has at any one moment, or at least approximately, give or take a few?
Because the schools in this location were a refuge for youngsters
coming off the streets at any one moment. Sure lots were regulars, but
lots were not. That's the way it is there. Fr. Zucchi confirmed the
following numbers of students before the earthquake: mini schools -
20,000; 3 month short technical courses at ENAM – 360; regular students
at ENAM – 1040. The UN Disaster Assessment & Coordination Team
(UNDAC/OSOCC) has confirmed that a search and rescue team was sent to
ENAM on Monday 18 January. Fr. Zucchi told a Salesian Missions
representative that there were 200 casualties among the ENAM students.
- many readers might be unaware that a further
nineteen perished at the 'Little Schools' facility in the same
compound, which housed ENAM and LAKAY.
- those who died and whose bodies have been located
at these places, including Salesian Brother Sanon, have been buried in
a common grave near the school. And as the official report puts it, in
what they thought was plainly descriptive but in what will be
immortalised as purple prose if not poignant poetry: "among the
ruins, pages from exercise books drift in the warm breeze, chairs,
coloured pencils, school reports have been scattered among the dust and
in the rubble by the earthquake".
- our limited facilities are housing 3,500 refugees
and emergency plans are already in place for the thousands of others
seeking our help.
- an eleven-truck Salesian relief convoy, escorted
by a DR Republic detail, has already reached Port-au-Prince.
- Fr Mark Hyde, Director of Salesian Missions in New
Rochelle, is currently in PAP
- news is reaching us... and hopefully Salesian
Missions too... of various other initiatives from other NGOs which are
either Salesian through and through or directly connected. This
includes extensive funds being channeled through 'Youth and
Development' a Spanish NGO, and the fact that because of the good work
being done by Salesian Missions (NR) media assistance rendered by
'Shoestring', major information and ultimately donor channels have been
opened. CNN is one such. They have donated USD 10,000 worth of
advertising space, for example. Want to see what it
looks like? BEGECA, a German procurement agency, has offered its
services. BEGECA is recognized by the disaster relief department – ECHO
- of the EU for purchasing relief items in their emergency programs.
BEGECA has been a partner of Salesian NGOs for many years. A
coordination officer from BEGECA will soon be posted in PAP.
- the church and parish centre at the Cite Soleil
collapsed around children receiving catechism
- UN coordinated rescue teams have been attempting
to find survivors, but in each case it is now far too beyond any
possible chance of survival.
- water trucks and food rations, under the aegis of
Salesian Missions are already moving around the city. A 'rat pack' can
sustain a family for three days. They estimate they have therefore been
able to provide 20,000 meals.
That's it for now.
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