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With Haiti in Ruins, Some U.N. Relief Workers Live Large on 'Love Boat'
For the United Nations World Food Program, it was a moment of satisfaction: the U.N.'s flagship relief agency announced on its Web site on March 19 that two gleaming passenger ships had docked in ravaged Port au Prince harbor.
What the Web site announcement did not disclose was that the vessels were intended to house not homeless Haitian refugees, but employees of the U.N. itself. Nor did it publicize the cost of leasing the ships: $112,500 a day. Nor did it mention that one of the vessels is owned by a company closely linked to the government of Venezuelan strongman President Hugo Chavez.
Another thing not mentioned: Even U.N. staffers regularly refer to one of the ships as "the Love Boat."
Then the WFP apparently had second thoughts about the whole announcement.
A slideshow photo essay had shown the two vessels, the Ola Esmeralda and the Sea Voyager, at berths near the earthquake-shattered Haitian capital. Then the photos and the story disappeared, not only from the home page but apparently from the WFP's public news story Web archive. The official explanation from a WFP spokesman: "Photos, text and video material are regularly being added and removed from WFP's Web site as stories are refreshed, restructured and replaced."
Click here to see the original story.
For whatever reason, WFP had decided that less was more when it came to publicizing the presence of the two vessels.
But that did not change the fact of their presence. And even while deep-sixing its previous publicity, the use of the ships as accommodation for many of the U.N.'s international staff was passionately defended in a telephone interview with Fox News by Edmond Mulet, head of the Haiti peacekeeping contingent, known by its acronym MINUSTAH, and also Special Representative in Haiti of U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon. (Ban's Special Envoy to Haiti is former President Bill Clinton.)
"It is the least we could do for them," Mulet, a former Guatemalan diplomat, told Fox News about the U.N. staffers. "They are working 14, 16 hours a day. The place was pulverized. Living conditions are really appalling."
In a city where much of the housing was destroyed by the earthquake, U.N. staffers' amenities aboard the two passenger ships include laundry service, catered food, hot showers and beds with fresh linens for subsidized rates of $40 per day for WFP staffers, and half that for officials of MINUSTAH.
Accommodation aboard the two ships could best be described as comfortable if not luxurious — and far better than conditions a few hundred yards from their moorings, where hundreds of relief workers, some 9,000 U.N. peacekeepers and police, and huge numbers of Haiti's 9.5 million people are sleeping in tents or on bare floors — or worse — after the devastating Jan. 12 earthquake.
Mulet says the use of the shipboard cabins by U.N. personnel is "strictly voluntary," and many decide not to use them. "Not all the cabins are full," he declares. (Mulet himself says he lives in the U.N.'s major military camp with the predominately Brazilian peacekeeping forces.)
Moreover, others aid workers in Haiti, including those who work for non-government organizations, are also free to sign up for shipboard space, he says: everything is on a "first come, first served" basis.
Additionally, the ships are used as reception areas for visiting dignitaries, including, recently, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio ("Lula"
da Silva.
The mass of Haitian civilians, however, are not among those invited to stay. "I think they understand," says Mulet. "They have gone through the same trauma themselves. They know we are there to provide shelter for them."
Mulet compares the situation to what occurs when "oxygen masks come down in a falling plane. The first thing you do is put them on yourself."
"You have to be in good shape in order to help the Haitians."
Even in some official documents, U.N. staffers refer to the Sea Voyager, the first of the vessels to reach Port-au-Prince, as the Love Boat.
A good name for the other vessel, the Ola Esmeralda, might be the Double Your Love Boat, not for its luxuries, but for its cost to WFP. While not luxury liners — the Ola Esmeralda is a reconditioned, 40-year-old passenger ship — neither of the two vessels could be called a cheap date.
The WFP is renting the 286-foot, 5,000-ton Sea Voyager (capacity: about 220 passengers) for $35,000 per day, plus a whopping additional $5,000 daily for fuel. Total for 90 days: $3,600,000.
If every cabin were full, the average daily cost to the U.N. for the fully-loaded Sea Voyager would be about $181.81 per passenger — minus the $40 or $20 paid by each U.N. staffer who stays in a cabin.
The 480-foot, 11,000-ton Ola Esmeralda — which now operates directly under the administrative auspices of MINUSTAH — is renting for $72,500 per day, all costs included.
Total for 90 days: $6,525,000. Average cost per passenger per day (the vessel accommodates 470 plus crew): about $154.25, minus the staff contributions.
Over the lives of their respective 90-day initial contracts, that brings the total outlay for the ships to $112,500 per day, or $10,125,000, minus the staff shares.
Each of the boats also has a number of single-month renewal options in its contract, which will push those totals higher. A WFP spokesman says, however, that the organization's aim is to end its charter of Sea Voyager at the end of April. That would bring the total rental cost of that vessel to $4,800,000, minus staff contributions.
In the case of the Ola Esmeralda, no such end date has been set so far.
How expensive are those charter rates? When compared to the cost of the MINUSTAH peacekeeping operation, they may not seem huge. Even before the earthquake, MINUSTAH was one of the U.N.'s more expensive peacekeeping operations, with a budget estimated to exceed $611 million this year. Post-earthquake, the MINUSTAH budget for its next financial year is expected to rocket past $700 million.
In the case of Sea Voyager, though, it is slightly less expensive than it might be otherwise. According to Niels-Erik Lund, president of International Shipping Partners of Miami, the firm that brokered the Sea Voyager charter with WFP, his firm is donating commissions and technical management fees of $25,000 per month back to WFP as relief aid for Haiti.
Fox News was unable to determine whether a similar arrangement exists for Ola Esmeralda.
According to the rate card offered by the company that operates Ola Esmeralda, when filled to capacity in the most expensive cruise season, the ship earns about 334,000 Venezuelan bolivars, the local currency unit, per day. At official exchange rates, that would amount to about $77,800 — or slightly more than its WFP paycheck — provided that Ola Esmeralda could enjoy 100 percent occupancy at home.
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For the United Nations World Food Program, it was a moment of satisfaction: the U.N.'s flagship relief agency announced on its Web site on March 19 that two gleaming passenger ships had docked in ravaged Port au Prince harbor.
What the Web site announcement did not disclose was that the vessels were intended to house not homeless Haitian refugees, but employees of the U.N. itself. Nor did it publicize the cost of leasing the ships: $112,500 a day. Nor did it mention that one of the vessels is owned by a company closely linked to the government of Venezuelan strongman President Hugo Chavez.
Another thing not mentioned: Even U.N. staffers regularly refer to one of the ships as "the Love Boat."
Then the WFP apparently had second thoughts about the whole announcement.
A slideshow photo essay had shown the two vessels, the Ola Esmeralda and the Sea Voyager, at berths near the earthquake-shattered Haitian capital. Then the photos and the story disappeared, not only from the home page but apparently from the WFP's public news story Web archive. The official explanation from a WFP spokesman: "Photos, text and video material are regularly being added and removed from WFP's Web site as stories are refreshed, restructured and replaced."
Click here to see the original story.
For whatever reason, WFP had decided that less was more when it came to publicizing the presence of the two vessels.
But that did not change the fact of their presence. And even while deep-sixing its previous publicity, the use of the ships as accommodation for many of the U.N.'s international staff was passionately defended in a telephone interview with Fox News by Edmond Mulet, head of the Haiti peacekeeping contingent, known by its acronym MINUSTAH, and also Special Representative in Haiti of U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon. (Ban's Special Envoy to Haiti is former President Bill Clinton.)
"It is the least we could do for them," Mulet, a former Guatemalan diplomat, told Fox News about the U.N. staffers. "They are working 14, 16 hours a day. The place was pulverized. Living conditions are really appalling."
In a city where much of the housing was destroyed by the earthquake, U.N. staffers' amenities aboard the two passenger ships include laundry service, catered food, hot showers and beds with fresh linens for subsidized rates of $40 per day for WFP staffers, and half that for officials of MINUSTAH.
Accommodation aboard the two ships could best be described as comfortable if not luxurious — and far better than conditions a few hundred yards from their moorings, where hundreds of relief workers, some 9,000 U.N. peacekeepers and police, and huge numbers of Haiti's 9.5 million people are sleeping in tents or on bare floors — or worse — after the devastating Jan. 12 earthquake.
Mulet says the use of the shipboard cabins by U.N. personnel is "strictly voluntary," and many decide not to use them. "Not all the cabins are full," he declares. (Mulet himself says he lives in the U.N.'s major military camp with the predominately Brazilian peacekeeping forces.)
Moreover, others aid workers in Haiti, including those who work for non-government organizations, are also free to sign up for shipboard space, he says: everything is on a "first come, first served" basis.
Additionally, the ships are used as reception areas for visiting dignitaries, including, recently, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio ("Lula"
da Silva.The mass of Haitian civilians, however, are not among those invited to stay. "I think they understand," says Mulet. "They have gone through the same trauma themselves. They know we are there to provide shelter for them."
Mulet compares the situation to what occurs when "oxygen masks come down in a falling plane. The first thing you do is put them on yourself."
"You have to be in good shape in order to help the Haitians."
Even in some official documents, U.N. staffers refer to the Sea Voyager, the first of the vessels to reach Port-au-Prince, as the Love Boat.
A good name for the other vessel, the Ola Esmeralda, might be the Double Your Love Boat, not for its luxuries, but for its cost to WFP. While not luxury liners — the Ola Esmeralda is a reconditioned, 40-year-old passenger ship — neither of the two vessels could be called a cheap date.
The WFP is renting the 286-foot, 5,000-ton Sea Voyager (capacity: about 220 passengers) for $35,000 per day, plus a whopping additional $5,000 daily for fuel. Total for 90 days: $3,600,000.
If every cabin were full, the average daily cost to the U.N. for the fully-loaded Sea Voyager would be about $181.81 per passenger — minus the $40 or $20 paid by each U.N. staffer who stays in a cabin.
The 480-foot, 11,000-ton Ola Esmeralda — which now operates directly under the administrative auspices of MINUSTAH — is renting for $72,500 per day, all costs included.
Total for 90 days: $6,525,000. Average cost per passenger per day (the vessel accommodates 470 plus crew): about $154.25, minus the staff contributions.
Over the lives of their respective 90-day initial contracts, that brings the total outlay for the ships to $112,500 per day, or $10,125,000, minus the staff shares.
Each of the boats also has a number of single-month renewal options in its contract, which will push those totals higher. A WFP spokesman says, however, that the organization's aim is to end its charter of Sea Voyager at the end of April. That would bring the total rental cost of that vessel to $4,800,000, minus staff contributions.
In the case of the Ola Esmeralda, no such end date has been set so far.
How expensive are those charter rates? When compared to the cost of the MINUSTAH peacekeeping operation, they may not seem huge. Even before the earthquake, MINUSTAH was one of the U.N.'s more expensive peacekeeping operations, with a budget estimated to exceed $611 million this year. Post-earthquake, the MINUSTAH budget for its next financial year is expected to rocket past $700 million.
In the case of Sea Voyager, though, it is slightly less expensive than it might be otherwise. According to Niels-Erik Lund, president of International Shipping Partners of Miami, the firm that brokered the Sea Voyager charter with WFP, his firm is donating commissions and technical management fees of $25,000 per month back to WFP as relief aid for Haiti.
Fox News was unable to determine whether a similar arrangement exists for Ola Esmeralda.
According to the rate card offered by the company that operates Ola Esmeralda, when filled to capacity in the most expensive cruise season, the ship earns about 334,000 Venezuelan bolivars, the local currency unit, per day. At official exchange rates, that would amount to about $77,800 — or slightly more than its WFP paycheck — provided that Ola Esmeralda could enjoy 100 percent occupancy at home.
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