'Our hands are tied': Local aid workers exposed in pandemic

JOHANNESBURG (AP) — The coronavirus is exposing an uncomfortable inequality in the billion-dollar system that delivers life-saving aid for countries in crisis: Most money that flows from the U.S. and other donors goes to international aid groups instead of local ones. Now local aid workers are exposed on the pandemic's front lines with painfully few means to help the vulnerable communities they know so well.

Often lacking protective equipment, the groups are carrying a bigger burden than ever as COVID-19 adds to the already vast challenges of conflict, drought and hunger in places like Afghanistan and Somalia.

At times, they tell communities they have nothing to give.

“Our hands are tied,” a South Sudanese aid leader, Gloriah Soma, told an online event last month. She described foreign aid workers being evacuated early in the pandemic or working from home as many feared infection.

“Is this a humanitarian response?” she asked, saying she hopes the crisis will spark more help “at this critical moment.” Her country can hardly bear another disaster: A five-year civil war killed nearly 400,000 people, and hunger stalks half the population.

The world's most precarious regions are long accustomed to the sight of international aid organizations, often managed by expats. Now some of those foreign workers are questioning their roles amid the reckoning over racial injustice in the U.S. and elsewhere.

At times criticized as “white saviors,” some say local partners should be given more responsibility — and money. A local group can do more with it, Soma said. She asserted that $100,000 could help over 10,000 people, while the same amount to an international group will only pay one or two staff, "and that’s it.”

Recognizing the problem, major global donors including the U.S., Germany and Japan and...