According to the Head of State, the idea is to implement a system as the one implemented in Colombia with the Forec (Fund for the reconstruction of the coffee zone), after the 1999 earthquake in the coffee region. Each country should have specific responsibilities for specific reconstruction tasks, Uribe explained. He said that this proposal was already sent to other presidents and multilateral organizations.  

Bogotá, Jan 15 (SP). President Álvaro Uribe Vélez proposed a plan, in which the international community can participate to move forward in the reconstruction of Haiti, by assigning specific responsibilities to each of the countries that are willing to collaborate in that assignment.

“What we are proposing is that the person in charge of the reconstruction of Haiti, with the consent of the Government, of the people of Haiti, can assign responsibilities to all the people who is willing to collaborate”, Uribe Vélez said in an interview with Radio Furatena of Chiquinquirá.

He pointed out that the idea is to copy the model implemented in Colombia, during Andrés Pastrana’s Government, which allowed to bring aid and recover the zone affected by the earthquake of 1999, though the Fund for the Reconstruction of the Coffee Zone (Forec).

“For example, they can say: Colombia is in charge of building those houses, other country is in charge of building some schools, and another country is in charge of rebuilding public buildings.

“Our proposal is the following; I am going to summarize it: organizations such as the United Nations, multilateral banks, working with consent of the Haitian Government, should participate in the reconstruction of Haiti, they should assign specific responsibilities for specific reconstruction tasks for every country that is willing to collaborate, and Colombia has all the willingness”, he explained.

The Head of State revealed that this proposal was already sent to the United Nations, multilateral banks and several presidents and that today he will present it to other presidents of the region.

A Colombian delegation, led by the Minister of Interior and Justice, Fabio Valencia Cossio, was in Haiti on Thursday providing aid and serving the Haitian Government for anything they need regarding to emergency attention and reconstruction.

Colombia’s aid is represented in a provisional military hospital, groups of professional first-aiders with dogs, and some necessities such as water and medicines.