Dear Editor,
The
BBC is reporting that the United Nations has admitted that, after much detailed investigations, the Nepalese troops that were under its command and were stationed in Haiti a few years ago were, in fact, responsible for the cholera outbreak that killed several thousand people. Now that these investigations have pinned the blame for the outbreak on the UN, it is now only right that the UN compensate the Haitians for what happened.
However, before some of us jump on the bandwagon and damn the UN for not wanting to accept responsibility for the outbreak years ago, when so many Haitians, and others, were demanding that the UN was at fault then, let me state that the position that the UN took then when all of the commotion about blaming the UN was high, was right. That is, at the time, and with the information that the UN and other experts had, the UN could not have accepted blame at that time, for several reasons.
Perhaps the most obvious reason the UN was right to ignore calls for accepting responsibility then was the simple fact that Haiti’s public health system then, as is now, is anything but the best in the world. Haiti’s public health system is world-renowned for its many shortcomings.
Also, Nepal is a very prolific participator in UN missions around the world, with Haiti being only one of many. It was therefore strange that those Nepalese UN troops would be the ultimate trigger for that cholera outbreak in Haiti, considering that no such cholera outbreak has been linked to Nepalese troops anywhere else.
As such, the UN, myself, and a lot of other people, were right, at the time to suspect that those Nepalese UN troops were being made scapegoats for the cholera outbreak in Haiti at that time.
I still maintain that, at the time, much of the outcry demanding that the UN accept blame for the cholera on account of those Nepalese troops was very much misplaced and coloured with much ungratefulness.
Anyway, the UN did not completely drop the investigations into the ultimate cause of the outbreak and, indeed, now that it has done the honest thing and admitted that its troops were at fault, right is right, and it must now be honest enough to compensate those Haitian victims’ families, as originally demanded.
I must say one more thing. The fact that countries like Nepal, which is practically halfway around the world, decided to contribute troops to help Haiti speaks volumes to the indifference that African and Caribbean countries showed to the Haitians. For, all of our (that is African and Caribbean) talk about “black solidarity”, when push comes to shove it’s the non-black countries that must always rescue us.
Nepal must not be damned for trying to help, she must be praised for doing what we in the region and Africa ought to have been doing from the start of the Haitian disaster.
Michael A Dingwall
michael_a_dingwall@hotmail.com
The
BBC is reporting that the United Nations has admitted that, after much detailed investigations, the Nepalese troops that were under its command and were stationed in Haiti a few years ago were, in fact, responsible for the cholera outbreak that killed several thousand people. Now that these investigations have pinned the blame for the outbreak on the UN, it is now only right that the UN compensate the Haitians for what happened.
However, before some of us jump on the bandwagon and damn the UN for not wanting to accept responsibility for the outbreak years ago, when so many Haitians, and others, were demanding that the UN was at fault then, let me state that the position that the UN took then when all of the commotion about blaming the UN was high, was right. That is, at the time, and with the information that the UN and other experts had, the UN could not have accepted blame at that time, for several reasons.
Perhaps the most obvious reason the UN was right to ignore calls for accepting responsibility then was the simple fact that Haiti’s public health system then, as is now, is anything but the best in the world. Haiti’s public health system is world-renowned for its many shortcomings.
Also, Nepal is a very prolific participator in UN missions around the world, with Haiti being only one of many. It was therefore strange that those Nepalese UN troops would be the ultimate trigger for that cholera outbreak in Haiti, considering that no such cholera outbreak has been linked to Nepalese troops anywhere else.
As such, the UN, myself, and a lot of other people, were right, at the time to suspect that those Nepalese UN troops were being made scapegoats for the cholera outbreak in Haiti at that time.
I still maintain that, at the time, much of the outcry demanding that the UN accept blame for the cholera on account of those Nepalese troops was very much misplaced and coloured with much ungratefulness.
Anyway, the UN did not completely drop the investigations into the ultimate cause of the outbreak and, indeed, now that it has done the honest thing and admitted that its troops were at fault, right is right, and it must now be honest enough to compensate those Haitian victims’ families, as originally demanded.
I must say one more thing. The fact that countries like Nepal, which is practically halfway around the world, decided to contribute troops to help Haiti speaks volumes to the indifference that African and Caribbean countries showed to the Haitians. For, all of our (that is African and Caribbean) talk about “black solidarity”, when push comes to shove it’s the non-black countries that must always rescue us.
Nepal must not be damned for trying to help, she must be praised for doing what we in the region and Africa ought to have been doing from the start of the Haitian disaster.
Michael A Dingwall
michael_a_dingwall@hotmail.com