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domingo, 1 de julio de 2012

Hoteles de lujo: una dudosa ayuda humanitaria a Haití

HAITI: Humanitarian Aid for Earthquake Victims Used to Build Five Star Hotels

By Julie Lévesque

URL of this article: www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=31646

Mientras unos 500 000 haitianos todavía viven en campos de refugiados, se construyen cinco hoteles de 5 estrellas. Entre ellos  el Royal Oasis del grupo haitiano SCIOP y que será gestionado por la empresa española Occidental Hotels & Resorts. ¿Contribuirán tales inversiones a paliar la miseria del país caribeño?. El artículo de Julie Lévesque ofrece elementos de juicio.
As some 500 000 Haitians still live in displaced camps, five star hotels are being built amid shanty towns.


As part of the country's "Reconstruction", The Clinton-Bush Haiti Fund recently invested $2 million in the Royal Oasis Hotel, a deluxe structure to be built in a poverty-stricken metropolitan area "filled with displaced-persons camps housing hundreds of thousands”. Royal Oasis belongs to a Haitian investment group (SCIOP SA) and will be managed by the Spanish chain Occidental Hotels & Resorts.


AP reported in April that funds raised by the former US Presidents to help the neediest Haitians are now being used to build a hotel for "rich foreigners" including tourists as well many foreign NGO "aid workers" currently in Haiti. (Daniel Trenton, AP: New hotels arise amid ruins in Haitian capital, Clinton Bush Haiti Fund, April 29, 2012)


It is worth noting that Western governments have insisted that aid money for Haiti be given to NGOs and foundations rather than to the Haitian government, which they consider to be "corrupt".


In the aftermath of the January 2010 earthquake, people in the US, Canada and the EU, who made donations to those humanitarian organisations and NGOs did not realize that their contribution to Haiti's reconstruction would be channeled towards the building of five star hotels to house foreign businessmen. Their expectation was that the money would be used to provide food and housing for the Haitian people.


Royal Oasis hotel. More pictures at http://www.oasishaiti.com/


Royal Oasis Infomercial


The Royal Oasis as well as other hotel projects totalling over $100 million are, according to AP, “raising hopes that thousands of [foreign] investors will soon fill their air-conditioned rooms looking to build factories and tourist infrastructure” (emphasis added)


The “10-story building [...] will include an art gallery, three restaurants, a commercial bank and high-end shops. Construction on the Royal Oasis began before the earthquake and is expected to finish by the end of the year.” The earthquake was therefore a blessing for the hotel promoter and contractors, bringing $2 million dollars originally raised to “go directly to supplying these material needs [food, water, shelter, first-aid supplies]” (see add below). Among the companies involved in the construction of the Royal Oasis two are Haitian, one is Canadian (Montreal) and the other American (Miami).










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