Nicaragua and its people are not unlike others; we’re all struggling to allocate money and other limited resources in a way that brings the greatest utility or otherwise achieves our goals and desires. Most of us have good intentions but we don’t always make good choices. (http://www.cbsnews.com/news/when-disaster-relief-brings-anything-but-relief/)
My limited charitable dollars and time need to go where they can make a difference. At a minimum, they shouldn’t be used in ways that hurt instead of help.
As an outsider to the world of NGOs, I’m still forming opinions of what I want to support. I question money for buying anything that is handed out. Even giving food seems a bit irrational. Once the food is eaten, the people will soon be hungry again. What has the short-term food consumption helped? In some cases, I’m afraid that giving food and other aid enables people to stay in bad situations instead of making greatly needed changes.
If, however, giving food or clothing is the goal, money can be used much more effectively than tangible items. It avoids the cost of transportation, insures that local professionals can get exactly what is needed in the right portions to the right people, and it supports local businesses that employ those who need jobs.
Let’s be real about it. If my sole goal was to help the Orphan Network (Onet) children, I should have stayed home and written a check. The thousand dollars I spent traveling could have paid for a six-month welding certification program that, seriously, could break the chain of poverty and take a young person from deplorable conditions to a good job and a brighter future. Like most well-intended donors, my goals were less defined and more complicated but they included helping the children, seeing first-hand where my money was going, and experiencing a little of Nicaragua and its people.
While it’s good to support art, many people are questioning the new initiative in Managua. First Lady Rosario Murillo has launched a campaign to install what she calls Trees of Life. There are dozens of large, abstract structures; each costs $20,000 and they continue to run up electric bills of more than $10,000 every month. The Trees of Life are said to have been inspired by scripture, “And out of the ground the Lord God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was in the midst of the garden …” (Genesis 2:9). Murillo and her husband, Daniel Ortego, are prominent on billboards and posters campaigning for the upcoming November election in which he’s unopposed. After losing re-election in 1990, Ortega reshaped his platform to what gets more votes. It seems Christianity appeals to the voters. The new motto is “Christian, Socialist, and United”. The red and black Sandinista colors were abandoned for fuchsia and baby blue.
How can abstract art at taxpayers’ expense be reconciled with large communities that have no sanitation, no trash collection, and the hungry residents have no jobs and no welfare assistance?
Kathryn Byler, blog 