"Sewage Saturates Sadr City as Billions Fail to Reconstruct Iraq
by Daniel Williams
Nov. 25 (Bloomberg) -- Spare tires come in handy in Sadr City when lakes of sewage overflow trenches or bubble up from broken underground pipes. Pedestrians pull them from at-ready stacks to create a foot bridge across the excrement.
It’s a routine honed by years of neglect, indifference and, recently, good intentions sucked into a cycle of despair. Almost six years after the fall of Saddam Hussein, sewers in the sprawling Baghdad slum have become the most odorous example of how things don’t get done in Iraq.
While the U.S. has been able to pacify once-roiled areas, electricity is still spotty, drinking water is scarce and health care is limited -- even though America has spent billions of dollars on reconstruction and the Iraqi government has taken in hundreds of millions of dollars in oil revenue.
“Getting rid of this -- how can I put it delicately -- this waste material has become a dream,” says Kamal Hanjab, 44, the district council chairman. “I fear that when I die, I will be buried in it.”
--MORE--"Can you imagine it, America?
Yeah, I guess you could; you certainly eat enough Zionist-controlled sewer slop that passes itself off as "news."
