Today marks the eleventh anniversary of that fateful January 12, when a devastating earthquake shook an entire nation, leaving hundreds of thousands dead. This Tuesday, Haiti remembers one of the darkest spots in its history, one that seems indelible in the eyes of many.
“We will never forget that day, a day that cost the country a lot, we lost thousands of people and even today the wounded are still alive. Today is a very sad day for us, everyone lost something that day, but we were very strong, “Haitian President Jovenel Moise said during one of the many commemorations they have held since then.
An earthquake measuring 7.0 on the Richter scale is estimated to have killed at least 300,000 people and injured several others.
Only 35 seconds were enough to destroy part of a country’s infrastructure, exposing a weakness in Haiti, a tragedy that after a decade was not completely overcome.
“A lost decade”
More than 1.5 million Haitians are said to be homeless, leaving local authorities and the international humanitarian community facing a colossal challenge in a country that lacks a land registry or building rules.
“It’s been a lost decade, totally lost,” Haitian economist Kesner Pharel said in a 2020 interview. “The capital has not been rebuilt, but our poor governance is not the sole responsibility of local authorities; at the international level, we have not seen an aid administration mechanism that allows the country to benefit. “
He also said that the millions of dollars that had been donated for reconstruction in Haiti were not fully received, which was reflected in the situation of many survivors who until then had been exposed to the same dangers that existed before the earthquake. .
Not so temporary settlements
One of the most common relief measures in the days after the earthquake was temporary settlements for millions of displaced people.
However, as of 2020, thousands of Haitian citizens continue to live in these spaces that were temporarily designed, according to a report by the Efe news agency.
According to this writing, one of the 22 most populous temporary settlements standing is Corail, the name of a community of hundreds of houses built 25 kilometers north of Port-au-Prince.
“We live here in misery, misery surrounds us. If we had money we could do something, but we don’t have it,” Helene Laura, a mother who shares a house with her six children, told EFE.
About 34,000 people, according to estimates by the International Organization for Migration (IOM), have continued to live in a similar situation since 2020 since the earthquake.
The houses in Corail were built by a non-governmental organization (NGO) to serve as a refuge for up to two or three years, although most people have already been relocated.
Witness
“In fractions of a second, that column of dust began to rise, from the side we were climbing and I thought: Well, if all that dust were houses that collapsed, there are many problems, there will be many deaths. “said Jorge Cruz, a photographer from Listín Diario, who was present during the earthquake.
Cruz and his partner Javier Valdivia were in the neighboring nation for a mission in this environment and felt the movements of the earthquake as they moved to Petionville, the Haitian capital.
“I remember the bus started moving in an unusual way for me, because I was never in a place where there was an earthquake … Valdivia really realized and immediately said to me: Jorgito make sure it’s an earthquake, “he said.
Cruz admitted that after this experience, which he described as one of the worst days he had ever lived, it took him a long time to sleep, making sure that for three months any unexpected movement or brushing on his bed he was already awake and expecting the worst.