KINGSTON, Jamaica – Minister Counsellor at the Haitian Embassy, Mr. Rodney Marcellus has expressed his gratitude to the people of Jamaica for its support to his country after the massive earthquake that struck the island in January.
“I want to thank the government and the Jamaican community for their overwhelming support to Haiti,” he said during an interview with JIS News.
Mr. Marcellus also said that a lot of work has been done by the international community to help Haiti in the aftermath of the earthquake, and noted that the Haitians were also doing their best to cope with the situation.
“From time to time there are still aftershocks which leave the people very scared. They don’t want to go into any house they stay on the streets outside. We are talking about hundreds of thousands of people dead, but they are getting there. Everybody was in shock, but after the shock you have to realise that life must go on and I think that is what is going on right now in Haiti,” he stated.
In terms of the rebuilding process, the Minister Counsellor said both the people of Haiti and the international community will have an important role to play in the reconstruction activities.
“International presence is going to be in surmounting, but they will have to have plans for the recovery, how they want to start the recovery and if they are going to develop, what are they going to develop. For instance what is going to be the main point and how are they going to start,” Mr. Marcellus said.
“I think that right now probably someone or some people are making plan about that, to determine what comes first. There will be a need to rebuild Port-au-Prince and they will have to now enhance agriculture as we need to eat so they have to know what part of the country where they will have that going on. So there is so much to do and to be done and it is going to be really an enormous task for the government to go on their feet,” he added.
On Tuesday, January 12, a 7.0 magnitude earthquake struck Haiti, causing catastrophic destruction and resulting in the death of over 250,000 persons. Jamaica has joined other countries worldwide, in the relief and recovery efforts, and has been designated as the base for CARICOM’s input.
