Montreal, Wednesday, August 11, 2010
The CECI and its spokesperson, Luck Mervil, have jointly decided to end their long and rewarding partnership.
Luck Mervil anounced earlier today that he will be devoting himself entirely to his project, Vilaj Vilaj: Un Village pour le monde, which he began after the earthquake in Haiti on January 12 of this year. The mission of Vilaj Vilaj, a registered and independent NGO, is to build model villages, not only in Haiti, but around the world.
The CECI would like to thank Luck for the years he was involved with the organization. Six years of travelling the world, meeting women, men and children in Asia, the Americas, Africa and, of course, in Haiti, countries which have been tirelessly working to improve the living conditions of their people. Six years of sharing the values of solidarity and equality between Luck and the CECI, a veritable school of international cooperation.
The CECI is very pleased that Luck is involved in Haiti; it is a country that has great need of all its economic and social players. As the CECI has an established connection to Luck Mervil, it will have a special interest in the Vilaj Vilaj project. However, we would like to stress that the CECI is currently studying the project, and that the Vilaj Vilaj organization is the project manager. The road from Luck’s innovative idea of using containers to create houses to installing the first homes in Haiti will be paved with difficulties: acquiring property titles, selecting beneficiaries, negotiating with local authorities, delivering materials and containers, hiring and clearing labourers, etc. These are the elements that the CECI is now analyzing.
The CECI is currently leading several projects in Haiti, and all of the donations received since January 12 from our generous donors are committed to these projects. They are stimulating the economy of this country in need of rebuilding by creating several thousand jobs for displaced people in the hard-hit regions of Léogane and Artibonite, keeping people in the area instead of sending them to Port-au-Prince. The CECI projects are crucial to getting daily life back to normal: they include refinancing 6,000 women merchants, providing jobs in cleaning projects and school, community centre and public market reconstruction projects, direct support for Haitian health services, and food distribution to the most vulnerable—orphans, the elderly and the physically disabled. The CECI and its local and municipal partners, in close collaboration with Haiti’s department of civil protection (responsible for risk and disaster management), are preparing for the coming cyclone season, which meteorologists expect to be especially threatening.
The CECI is involved in several humanitarian aid and development projects in 18 countries worldwide. We currently have humanitarian aid projects running in Haiti, Guatemala, the Philippines and in the Sahel due to the food crisis in Nigeria. We are also following the situation in Pakistan very closely with the help of a partner located in the most affected area. Following the immediate emergency, we implement socio-economic rehabilitation projects and reconstruction projects.
