ACT Alliance

GENEVA, SWITZERLAND — “ACT Alliance has been in Haiti for many years and will remain in Haiti as long as we are needed,” ACT Alliance General Secretary John Nduna affirmed on the eve of his scoping visit to Haiti.

Next week, Mr. Nduna visits Haiti where ACT has assisted 150,000 people since the earthquake nearly two months ago. He will visit ACT programs and have talks with Haitian Government officials, UN representatives and church leaders, to push for improved futures for Haitians, as emergency operations shift to rebuilding.

Among the issues Mr Nduna will discuss are the urgent matters of shelter and protection for the tens of thousands of people without proper accommodation, land rights for the poor and food insecurity. “As long as issues that marginalize the Haitian people are not fully addressed, ACT Alliance has a role to play in Haiti”, Nduna says. “It is our mandate to continue long-term development work well into the future.”

“ACT will continue working with local communities as it has done for the last three decades.” ACT has 14 members in Haiti and cooperates with 30 local organizations. The work of this church-based alliance is driven by its Christian values. Mr Nduna’s visit to church leaders includes those of the Catholic Church, Haiti’s largest denomination.Nine ACT Alliance members were present when the catastrophe hit on January 12.  Operations included standard relief work, such as distributing drinking water, water purification tablets, tents and tarpaulins, blankets, sleeping mats, clothes, mosquito nets, food parcels and daily meals, medicines, family and baby kits, hygiene kits and offering psychosocial care. Community health clinics have been supplied with essential medicines.  In months to come, ACT will move to provide long-term support for the people whose homes and businesses were destroyed.

The ACT Alliance is a global coalition of just over 100 churches and related agencies and operates in 125 countries around the world. ACT Alliance has an annual budget of $1.5 billion and a staff of around 30,000.