Oxfam Scandal: We Need Democratic Aid And Working Class Solidarity

Sarah Sachs -Eldridge Socialist Party national organiser

- Sarah Sachs

In January 2010 when the earthquake struck we wrote: “The humanitarian catastrophe that has befallen Haiti beggars belief.” Hundreds of thousands were killed and millions left homeless, injured, denied medicine and starving.

The country had just two fire stations and no ‘quake-proof’ housing. Even before the earthquake 80% lived below the poverty line and three-quarters were out of work.

Haitians were therefore extremely vulnerable. Our headline read, “a disaster compounded by capitalism”.

Now we see that the suffering of desperate Haitians was being compounded even further. The revelations that Oxfam senior managers paid for sex in Haiti shows that these vulnerable people also faced gross exploitation at the hands of those who claimed to be there to help. The Guardian says that it is alleged some of those involved may have been underage.

But sadly this is not new news - in 2015 a document by the UN Office of Internal Oversight Services said that hundreds of women in Haiti were forced by hunger and poverty to sell sex. Some papers report that there are concerns that paedophiles and other sexual abusers are actively targeting jobs in the aid sector. UK charities recorded at least 120 incidents of sexual abuse and harassment involving their staff between 2016 and 2017.

A lot of the discussion has focused on the cover-up aspect. It appears that a senior manager was one of those accused of paying for sex in Africa and was still sent to Haiti afterwards.