Haiti recovery bogged down 6 months after quake

[cory777]

Source: AP

CORAIL-CESSELESSE, Haiti – The sun was beating down on the rocky cactus plain when men with machetes came for Menmen Villase, nine months pregnant, shoved her onto her bulging stomach and sliced up the plastic tarp that sheltered her and her four children.

The family was one of thousands of earthquake homeless who had come to this Manhattan-sized stretch of disused sugarcane land between the sea and barren mountains north of Port-au-Prince, seeking refuge from overflowing camps in the city.

But this real estate is earmarked for building a new Haiti. Villase had walked into one of the fights over land, rooted in Haiti's history of slavery, occupation and upheaval, that have bedeviled recovery in the six months since the earthquake leveled much of the capital and killed as many as 300,000 people.

The government, already weak before the magnitude-7 quake and still hobbled by its aftermath, is trying to build anew in places like Corail-Cesselesse, a nearly empty swath of land that begins about 15 kilometers (9 miles) north of the capital. But the effort is paralyzed by disorganization, bitter rivalries and private deals being struck behind its back.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100711/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/c...

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