US military help clean up Sadr city

Residents of Sadr City, long seen as the poorest and smelliest neighbourhood of Baghdad, woke up one recent morning to the sound of something they had never heard before - steamrollers and other street paving machines. Not only that, but much of the rubbish piled high around their suburb during fighting between the Mehdi Army and US forces just a few months ago has now been cleaned up. Residents can be seen walking with their children in the streets jammed with vehicles. "We hope to have more services here now. We have always been neglected, but this street paving makes us feel hopeful," Ali Chakheawar, 28, a teacher who lives near the road construction, told IRIN. "The most important thing is the sewers - they haven't started fixing them yet and they are broken." So little maintenance had been done in Sadr City over the last 30 years that just a block away from the paving project cars negotiate what looks like a rutted dirt road. Open sewers line the street. "It was usual not to have paving before," Yusuf Ali told IRIN, watching with his friends as steam rose from the newly poured asphalt. "Of course this makes us think that things will get better." The US military and Sadr City government officials expect to spend more than US $100 million to fix broken sewers, mend water pipes, pave roads and keep things clean, Mohammed Hamid, municipal engineer for infrastructure services, told IRIN. Since virtually all international aid agencies that would usually undertake such projects are currently outside the country because of kidnappings, car bombings and the like, the US military and local officials have stepped in, Hamid said. US military projects for the city of more than two million include $70 million for sewer infrastructure, $30 million for power projects, $90 million for water and $7 million for cleaning. The US Projects and Contracting Office (PCO), tasked with spending an $18.4 billion appropriation from the US Congress, plans to spend $40 million in Sadr City, Hamid said. Some of the sewer projects are still being studied, but others are already in full swing, including a project to bury a new trunk line which is employing about 200 former Mehdi Army fighters, Faraj Alwas Alwan, 45, the contractor of the $500,000 project, told IRIN. "Sadr City didn't have as many people when this [sewer] was first built, so we need to put in bigger pipes," he said. Up to 3,000 people will work on sewer projects around the suburb, Talib Gallwi, an engineer on the main pipe project, told IRIN. Some smaller lines will be cleaned and repaired, Gallwi said. Sometimes even those directly involved feel like the work isn't going fast enough. "We need electricity now - we have it only one hour on, followed by five hours off," Raad Hassan, a security guard for the sewer line project, told IRIN. "We know this is in the budget, so we hope it will get fixed soon." In fact, saboteurs continue to blow up power lines around Baghdad, creating huge power shortages to the city. Some other parts of the country have full-time power. And even Iraqi contractors still don't feel safe, said Alwan. Three dead bodies recently found near the local hospital had a note pinned to them saying the men had worked with US troops, for example, he explained. "If they find out that I work with Americans, they will kill me," Alwan said, adding that insurgents now busy fighting in places like Fallujah and Mosul are the ones against the new infrastructure improvements. "I'm working for my country, not for Americans. Probably 70 percent of the people here support me, but 30 percent bring troubles to our city." In addition, spending so much money so quickly means that some of it can get wasted or go into contractors' pockets, Hamid said. For example, city officials expect to pay about $150,000 on one sewer pipeline project, he said. The contractor bid for the same project at $700,000 to US forces, he added. "US forces say this is from the taxpayers in the USA," Hamid said. "They should come to ask us for advice so that we can tell them if they are paying too much."