IT IS surprising - and distressing - to hear from the chief executive officer of the brand new Office of National Reconstruction (ONR) that he is having difficulty raising funds.
Mr. Danville Walker's appointment to lead the recovery from the damage wrought by Hurricane Ivan was generally applauded. Seconded from his substantive post as Director of Elections, he qualified thereby as a non-partisan functionary as specifically cited by the Prime Minister.
We therefore welcome his forthright declaration at a press briefing on Thursday that he is facing difficulty in raising the required funds for the recovery programme which is estimated to cost billions of dollars.
While the ONR had received nearly $900 million in commitments from various local and international agencies - a good start in the first week of operations - the current flow in terms of actual cash is very small, Mr Walker said.
This must be particularly critical for those communities that were hardest hit by the hurricane. For example, the victims in Portland Cottage in southern Clarendon, had actually started rebuilding in the same location ravaged by the hurricane. This prompted a peremptory 'stop-order' from the Prime Minister himself.
The prohibition was to prevent building without the requisite safeguards stipulated by the Building Code relating both to actual construction practices and the siting on unsuitable terrain such as flood plains.
The persons affected must therefore be accommodated, in the first instance, in available shelters, and ultimately in housing that will have to be established elsewhere. Thus hurricane relief commitments must be converted to actual cash without delay.
Apart from the urgency in the areas most badly damaged, replanting in the agricultural sector should not be delayed given the time it takes for fresh crops to be replanted and reaped; and there is still some way to go before the full restoration of the public utilities.
In short, there has to be a combination of local and diplomatic lobbying to hasten the delivery of relief funds. Recovery should not be short-changed so soon after the disaster.
THE OPINIONS ON THIS PAGE, EXCEPT FOR THE ABOVE, DO NOT NECESSARILY REFLECT THE VIEWS OF THE GLEANER.
