US tries – again – to win support on embattled Baghdad street
The US military says it is committed to rebuilding infrastructure, but it is bogged down by sectarian rifts and red tape.
from the March 16, 2007 edition
Page 3 of 3
The challenges the US faces as it continues to work on rebuilding came into sharp focus on a tour of US-funded projects in Karkh. The first stop was the Qadisiyah water-treatment plant just outside the Green Zone that serves about 300,000 residents.
Manager Issa Rzugi says that the plant is idle most of the time because it is unable to get enough fuel to turn on the generators. When it does operate, half of its output is wasted because of leaks in the distribution network.
A contractor hired by the US military to work on a $175,000 rehabilitation project rarely shows up because his employees, all Shiites from Sadr City, are afraid to cross over to mainly Sunni Karkh, according to Mr. Rzugi.
At the Karkh school board, Maj. Chip Daniels asks the administrator to give him a list of priority projects for the area's 20 schools, some of which were badly damaged in the recent fighting.
She tells him that she has been prohibited by the Ministry of Education, which is headed by a Shiite, from doing just that. She says that he must get it from the ministry himself. Instead, she asks him for money so that she can buy fuel for the in-house generator that powers her office.
"Do something for us, get us fuel. Help us. We spend half the time writing official memos by hand. Make us a gift," says Sajida al-Attar, sitting in the dark in her office with two associates.
On Sheikh Ali's main road, all the shops are shuttered. The moment that US soldiers descend from their Humvees, Sunni residents pour out of their homes to greet them with a barrage of grievances and requests.
They do not trust the Iraqi security forces, they say, because they are infiltrated by Shiite militias. They will not go to the area's hospitals because the Ministry of Health is dominated by Shiites. And they say they will not even shop for food in neighboring Rahmaniyah because it's mainly Shiite and controlled by militia loyal to cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.
"Please bring us a Sunni municipal representative to hear our problems," says Khaled Mohammed.
Despite the difficulties, Major Daniels, who is on his first tour in Iraq, is optimistic, and says he sees encouraging signs in the Haifa Street area that could potentially turn it into a success story.
He says that his unit has accomplished more in three weeks in the Karkh neighborhood than it did in four months in Dora, a violence-racked area in southern Baghdad that was also overseen by his brigade. It's now being handed over to another US military unit as part of the ongoing troop surge in Iraq.
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