LUMS alumnus leads emergency effort in Haiti
Published 12 February 2010
Swiss-based NGO Medair, led by LUMS alumnus Randall Zindler, who completed the Lancaster MBA in 2000, has launched emergency relief efforts for battered Jacmel in Haiti.
“This is no place for a baby,” says Mirlande, as she carefully cradles her month-old daughter Janica in her arms and looks out over a field of makeshift shelters.
Mirlande and her family share a football field in Jacmel with 650 other families, all struggling to survive in cramped and unhygienic conditions. Children are everywhere. Numerous camps like this have formed since the earthquake struck and damaged an estimated 80 percent of Jacmel’s buildings.
Mirlande, right, holds her baby Jenica, beside other displaced families in Pinchinat Camp
But crowded camps like this are not safe places for children.
“Child protection is a major concern in displacement camps,” says Medair CEO and LUMS alumnus Randall Zindler. “There is no privacy or security when families are just living under sheets and blankets.”
In the temporary camp, arrests have already been made for sexual abuse. Indeed, there are numerous reports of sexual assault and banditry in Haiti’s displacement camps.
“Some families are sleeping in the streets or by the wreckage of their homes to avoid the risks that are found in camps,” says Randall. “None of these options are safe for families.”
The people of Jacmel urgently need safe shelter
As Jacmel’s families start on the long road to recovery, they urgently need better and safer shelter. Medair has chosen to focus on the shelter needs in Jacmel as its primary emergency response to the Haiti disaster.
Medair’s first project is to help clear the rubble away from their ruined homes so that people can safely live on their own land. To do this, relief teams are giving people tools, labour, and the knowledge of how to demolish a building safely—and how to identify what can be salvaged. Several work teams, each with 15 people, have been mobilised to clear one household at a time.
New hope for Bienbenit
Bienbenit Agela’s house was the first to be cleared of rubble. At the end of that first day, he was absolutely exhausted but also so happy for the help he had received. “These people all helped me, so of course they can now stay on our land until they get their land cleared too,” says Bienbenit.
In this way, the cleared plots of land provide a positive multiplier effect: they secure safer shelter away from the camps and streets for the landowners and also for the 15 people who help them clear it.
Bienbenit Agela and volunteers work together to clear rubble away from his home
Shelter before the storms
“Clearing away the rubble and debris is an important step,” says Randall. “But even on newly cleared land, families may continue to live under blankets and sheets that offer little protection from the elements. They simply need better shelter.”
Medair's Roger Sandberg shovels debris alongside a volunteer
With this urgency in mind, Medair is raising funds for the purchase of 1,100 sturdy emergency shelters for families in need. Each shelter weighs almost 200 kilograms and has 24 square metres of floor-space, providing an excellent temporary living solution for six people per unit—up to 6,600 people in total. A key benefit is that the shelters have a solid frame that can be used as the foundation for a more permanent transitional home in the future.
Private donations are absolutely vital at this stage of Medair’s emergency response to the people of Haiti. Each emergency shelter costs USD 700, a significant expense.
If you wish to find out more about Medair’s work supporting the vulnerable people of Jacmel visit www.medair.org.
Randall Zindler has been the CEO of Medair since 2004. He received an MBA at Lancaster University Management School in 2000. He is currently Chairman of the Administrative Council of EU-CORD, a network of European humanitarian aid organisations. He is also a member of the Advisory Board for Lancaster University Management School and is helping LUMS with Alumni Strategy.
Medair is a Swiss-founded and based humanitarian organisation that brings life-saving emergency relief and rehabilitation in disasters, conflict areas, and other crises by working alongside the most vulnerable.
Copyright for photographs © Medair
