29 Aug 2009, Posted by jessie in the category, 0 Comments

Rebuilding of a Nation

At times the reality that we are living in a post-Soviet nation seems more real than at others.  While there are signs of a Communist history in Chisinau, for me it’s when I hit the villages that the underlying currents of the country’s past become more evident.  Empty factories and buildings mark just about every village, and many speak of times when villages were thriving before mass population shifts took place to the nation’s capital.

To say infrastructure development has been limited since the fall of Communism in the early 1990s would be a massive understatement.  Effectively, one government walked in and left a nation to fend for itself, form a new government and take over the running of the country.  A period of transition that is as common as bread and butter in the West, was non-existent in the newly independent Republic of Moldova.  The ramifications of this are huge.

If you were suddenly a political leader in your nation, how would you start?  Where would you place resources?  What would be the effects of focussing on urban development or rural development?  How would you structure a public health care system?  Transport network?  And what would your social policy look like?  Economic policy?  Environment policy?  Immigration policy?  Which aspects would you choose to focus on first or just leave out all together because there are too many other pressing matters to deal with?

And in the mean time, how many elderly have died because of a lack of care?  Children abandoned by their parents because of a lack of employment opportunities?  Teachers walking off the job because they failed to be paid for months on end?  Doctors recycling syringes because supplies are exhausted?

Given the circumstances, perhaps it’s less surprising that the country remains the poorest in Europe.

Yet that’s not to say that the task at hand is any easier.  For me, the impending question is what is the role of a Non-Government Organisation in this?  And how can an NGO work most effectively?