Time Running Out for Rebuilding of Iraq

[Sporter]

Their time is running short, their money running out.

After three years in which the U.S. government allocated more than $20 billion for Iraq reconstruction, a bill now making its way through Congress adds only $1.6 billion this year, just $100 million of it for construction — not for building schools or power stations, but for prisons.

Does the sharp cut in aid surprise and disappoint the planners here? "Probably both," said Michael P. Fallon, programs chief for the major U.S. reconstruction agency here.

But "the program in general has been very successful," he said in an interview — "with the caveat that it hasn't gone as far as we thought we'd be able to go."

The ambitions of 2003, when President Bush spoke of making Iraq's infrastructure "the best in the region," have given way to the shortfalls of 2006, in electricity and water supply, sanitation, health facilities and oil production. A University of Maryland poll in January found strong majorities of Iraqis hopeful about their country's future in general, but only one in five thought the Americans had done a good job on reconstruction.


http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060408/...uilding_iraq_2

[Tyreds Tale]

One of my concerns is if maintanance and repair work will be done on new structures. For every plant or building, there is a lifetime of upkeep work. I hope Iraqi companies are getting trained and will be payed to do service work. The Iraqi government seems o be camplaining of fund shortages.