(Iraqi) mayor appeals to residents to aid U.S. projects

[babylonsister]

"I can't help you if I don't know what you need", but the previous para. says there's no electricity, drinkable water, unsuitable sewage, few schools? Figure it out?

http://stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=44280


Habbaniyah mayor appeals to residents to aid U.S. projects

By Sandra Jontz, Stars and Stripes
Mideast edition, Wednesday, March 14, 2007


ANGUR, Iraq — In an effort to win over non-converts, Hussein Ali Hussein, the mayor of Habbaniyah, donned a flak vest, jumped into an American Humvee and hit rural towns with the same message: “Help me help you.”

Hussein repeated the plea Monday in decrepit towns in his district in western Iraq plagued by little or no electricity, no drinkable water, few schools, and unsuitable sewage systems.

“I can’t help you if I don’t know what you need,” Hussein, 31, told an elderly man in a wheelchair in the small fisherman enclave of Angur. “We need your help to help the Americans help us.”

No such luck, the elderly man replied.

The residents of Angur will not give up time spent fishing massive Lake Habbaniyah to help the U.S. military dredge the canals, erect water treatment plants or build new schools.

“They will not leave to work on the projects. They will not stop doing their job to help the Americans,” the old man said through a translator.

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