Haiti: Nearly a Million People Took to the Streets.They Want the Western-imposed government out of

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Haiti and the Convenience of Imperial Amnesia

Jemima Pierre
16 Oct 2019

Haiti and the Convenience of Imperial Amnesia
The ongoing protests in Haiti are ultimately directed against the “Core Group” – US imperialism and its junior partners, who have teamed up to gang-bang the wounded and bleeding Black republic.

“The young people have been protesting under the idea that Haiti not only needs the resignation of President Moïse but also a full structural change.”

Haiti is in the middle of the fifth straight week of anti-government protests that have effectively shut down the country. Hundreds of thousands of people have taken to the streets, with one of the largest demonstrations in Haitian history taking place this past Sunday, October 13th. Makeshift roadblocks have been erected throughout the country, schools are closed and businesses shuttered, hospitals are barely managing, while agricultural goods from the countryside are unable to reach their markets, a situation acutely felt by Haiti’s rural populations. Some seventeen people have been shot and killed –by most accounts, by the Police Nationale d'Haïti—and more than 200 people have been reported injured. A prominent journalist, Néhémie Joseph , was assassinated.

The protests are not entirely new. They are a continuation of the reaction to the PetroCaribe scandal and the profound corruption of the current government. However, framing these current protests and the ensuing political crisis only through discussions of poverty and corruption – as many journalists and academics have been doing (with important exceptions ) – succumbs to an imperial amnesia. It is to forget the broad set of imperialist actions that created the conditions for protest. It is to perpetuate the easy narrative – the racialist tropes – of Haiti and Haitians as inherently corrupt and violent. It is to also condone the ongoing machinations on Haiti – the workings of an “international community” bent on keeping Haiti on its knees.

“The protests are a continuation of the reaction to the PetroCaribe scandal and the profound corruption of the current government.”

The “PetroCaribe” initiative that has benefitted Haiti since 2007 is crucial. PetroCaribe was a program established by late Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez to provide discounted oil for a number of Caribbean nations in a way that would allow the money saved to be used by these nations for development projects. When oil prices were high (at $100 per barrel), Venezuela provided oil to these nations where they only had to pay 60% up front, and then allowed a 25-year delay in repaying the total bill (at 1% interest). It was a “platform of energy cooperation ” that was key to Venezuelan diplomacy in the region. PetroCaribe raised the ire of the U.S. as it impacted the commercial interests of major oil corporations such as Chevron and Exxon Mobil. As Wikileaks cables revealed , Haiti’s participation was a constant point of contention for the U.S. relationship with former president Réne Préval – and played a part in him losing the confidence of then-secretary of State Hilary Clinton.

In 2017 investigators for the Haitian Senate revealed that almost $2 billion was diverted from Haiti’s PetroCaribe fund and directed to private hands. A number of officials from the previous government of Michel Martelly were implicated. Jovenel Moïse benefitted directly from the embezzling of funds, as Martelly used the funds to help him , Martelly’s protégé, to come to power in 2017.

“PetroCaribe raised the ire of the U.S. as it impacted the commercial interests of major oil corporations.”

In July 2018 , there were protests when the government of President Jovenel Moïse, following the dictates of the International Monetary Fund, attempted to remove oil subsidies. No oil subsidies would mean up to a fifty percent increase in prices of gasoline products. Moïse was forced to suspend the unpopular measure. Haitian people took the streets again in fall of 2018 to protest the theft of the so-called “PetroCaribe” funds. The protests were initiated on social media , with hashtags, #PetrocaribeChallenge and #KotKobPetwoKaribea (“where’s the Petrocaribe money”?).

From February 7 to 17, 2019, massive protests marked the second anniversary of Jovenel Moïse’s inauguration. Haitian people continued calling for his resignation. Many also viewed as treacherous the vote in January 2019 by the Moïse government in support of the U.S. to not recognize the legitimacy of President Nicolas Maduro. If anything, Jovenel Moïse’s presidency is illegitimate .

We can go back further. The illegitimacy of Moïse’s selection to the presidency needs to be understood in the context of a long second occupation of Haiti – an occupation that comes after two (1991, 2004) U.S./France/Canada backed coup d’états against the country’s first democratically elect president, Jean Bertrand Aristide. The 2004 coup d’état was followed by the establishment of a brutal , multinational foreign military occupation with multiple variations and proxies (UNIMIH, UNSMIH, UNTMIH, MIPONUH , MINUSTAH , MINUJUSTH , BINUH ); the designation of the “Core Group ,” an unelected group of foreign powers, as the arbiters of Haitian politics and economics; the installation of the neo-Duvalierist regime, under Michel Martelly, and the selection of his handpicked successor. As Marlene Bastien of Family Action Network Movement (FANM) recently told Nancy Pelosi in a public forum in Miami: “if there is a Jovenel Moïse today… it’s because there was a Michel Martelly who was hand-picked by some of our friends.” (A reference to the Obama administration’s installation of Martelly.)

“The illegitimacy of Moïse’s selection to the presidency needs to be understood in the context of a long second occupation of Haiti.”

The second occupation of Haiti happened and is happening through four U.S. governments, both Republican and Democratic (Clinton, Bush II, Obama, Trump). In other words, the current protests in Haiti have to be understood within the broader context of a renewed neocolonialism and imperialism that began in 2004, the 200th anniversary of Haiti’s revolutionary independence. U.S. foreign policy towards Haiti has always been an imperial policy. Journalist Kim Ives has rightly argued : “Each electoral victory of the masses (1990, 2000) has been met by a coup d’état and foreign military occupation (1991, 2004), until finally the empire changed tactics by fraudulently engineering the election of Martelly (2011) and Jovenel (2016). Their regimes returned Haiti to a cozy relationship with Washington.”

Many of the protesters are also protesting against the Core Group , with the message : “no more foreign military occupation, no more foreign meddling, stop supporting the Moïse regime.” In addition to picket signs calling for the president’s resignation, or calling the Haitian police “criminals,” there are others that declare: “Kogwoup: Ayisyen Pa Jwe” (“Core Group: Haitians Don’t Play”); “Donald Trump is a Racist American;” “USA, France-Canada…No More Coup D’état. Enough is Enough;” “Kò Group = Kò Gang” (“Core Group = Core Gang”), among others. For their part, the young people have been protesting under the idea that Haiti not only needs the resignation of Moïse but also a full structural change, a “taboularaza” (tabula raza).

After weeks of silence, Haiti’s president finally addressed the people from the National Palace at midday on October 15th, 2019. He announced that he would not resign, but blamed a corrupt political and economic “system” that, he said, would remain even if he resigns. Moïse is correct that there is a broader system that needs to be dismantled. It is true that he is only a symptom of that system. It is also the system that is keeping him in power. He will remain in power until he is of no more use.

In the meantime, the protests will continue.

Jemima Pierre is Associate Professor in the Departments of African American Studies and Anthropology at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Link:
Haiti and the Convenience of Imperial Amnesia | Black Agenda Report

 

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Trudeau government’s blackface in Haiti

Justin Trudeau recently apologized for dressing up in blackface. He acknowledged that it was a racist act. But he has continued the much more significant racism of his government’s actions towards Haiti, the country that delivered the greatest ever blow to anti-blackness.

In an example of racist double standards, the government recently put out a travel advisory warning Canadians that Haitian “police have used tear gas and live ammunition to disperse crowds.” Apart from this message to (white?) Canadians, the government has yet to directly criticize the killing of Haitian demonstrators by a police force that Canada funds and trains.

Beyond its involvement with a repressive police force, the Trudeau government has provided financial and diplomatic backing to a band of neo-Duvalerist criminals subjugating Haiti’s impoverished black masses. Despite a popular revolt against President Jovenel Moïse, Canada continues to prop up a corrupt clique of politicians who’ve recently fired bullets at protesters outside the Senate and admitted to receiving payments for votes in parliament. A Miami Herald headline explained: “That there is corruption in Haiti isn’t a surprise. But then a senator admitted it openly.” An investigation by Haiti’s Superior Court of Auditors and Administrative Disputes details the scope of Canadian-backed corruption. It concluded that Moïse’s companies swindled $2 million as part of $2 billion embezzled from a discounted oil program set up by Venezuela under Moïse’s mentor Michel Martelly. A vulgar, clownish, musician, Martelly was put in place by Washington and Ottawa not long after the deadly 2010 earthquake.

Previous Canadian governments have acted as if Haitians were incapable of running their own affairs. This has been motivated by racism, corporate interests and loyalty to the US empire.

Early in the morning on February 29, 2004, US Marines flew the learned, polyglot and popular President Jean-Bertrand Aristide out of the country. For over two years the US, France and Canada imposed an “illegal” interim government headed by a man, Gérard Latortue, who had been living in the US for 15 years.

The effort to oust Aristide began in earnest as Haiti prepared to celebrate its bicentennial. To get a sense of Washington’s thinking, then Assistant Secretary General of the OAS Luigi Einaudi told journalist/activist Jean Saint-Vil and others at Hotel Montana in Port au Prince on December 31, 2003: “The real problem with Haiti is that the ‘International Community’ is so screwed up and divided that they are actually letting Haitians run Haiti.” Eleven months before Haiti’s bicentennial Jean Chrétien’s Liberal government took a major step to ensure Haitians weren’t running Haiti. They organized the “Ottawa Initiative on Haiti” to discuss that country’s future. No Haitian officials were invited to this assembly where high-level US, Canadian and French officials decided that Haiti’s elected president “must go”, the dreaded army should be recreated and that the country would be put under a UN trusteeship. Thirteen months after the Ottawa Initiative meeting President Aristide and most other elected officials were pushed out and a quasi UN trusteeship had begun. The Haitian military has been partially re-created.

The bicentennial independence celebration heightened the racist contempt directed at Haiti since the country’s 1791-1804 revolution dealt a crushing blow to slavery, colonialism and white supremacy. From the grips of the most barbaric form of plantation economy, the largely African-born slaves led maybe the greatest example of liberation in the history of humanity. Their revolt rippled through the region and compelled the post-French Revolution government in Paris to abolish slavery in its Caribbean colonies. It also contributed to Britain’s move to abolish the trans-Atlantic slave trade in 1807.

The Haitian Revolution led to freedom for all people regardless of color, decades before this idea found traction in Europe or North America. But, within three years of independence the lighter-skinned plantation owners overthrew and murdered the country’s liberation hero Jean-Jacques Dessalines (the French having killed famous revolutionary, Tousaint Louverture, prior to independence). In a remarkable act of imperial humiliation, two decades after independence Haiti was compelled to begin paying $21 billion (in 2004 dollars) to compensate French slaveholders for their loss of property (land and now free Haitians). Haiti promised to repay its former exploiters under threat of military invasion and the restoration of slavery. Additionally, the light skinned elite wanted an end to the embargo against the country so they could access international markets. Haiti’s independence debt took 122 years to pay off.

For over half a century Haitian politics were shaped by the “politique de doublure”. Basically, the light skinned elite chose an ignorant/old black general as figurehead president. The “politique de doublure” largely ended with the US occupation of 1915– 34 (Washington kept control of the country’s treasury until 1947). For the most part the Marines simply chose a member of the light skinned elite to ‘lead’ Haiti.

A look at the individuals who dominate Haiti’s economy today highlight ongoing racial exclusion. These wealthy, light skinned Haitians generally work with North American and Dominican sweatshop, mining and other capitalists with even paler complexions.

Trudeau is likely ignorant of the history/social reality his policies in Haiti are entrenching. But, it’s unlikely he understood that blackening his face for a laugh at a party also flowed from/contributed to centuries of racial subjugation. It was just popular in the elite social circles he operated in. The same can be said of his humiliation of the impoverished black masses in Haiti today.

Link:
Trudeau government’s blackface in Haiti

 

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Conférence de presse du Président Jovenel Moïse autour de la conjoncture actuelle

Oct. 15 2019

 

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[Bawon Samedi]

White supremacy is OBSESSED with Haiti.

@loyola llothta @ZoeGod @For Da Bag @Fatboi1 @intruder v6.1

 

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Is that a double entendre?

 

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Despite Jovenel’s Obstinance, Rival Opposition Committees Plan for his Departure


October 16, 2019


Eight of the nine members of the Consensual Alternative for the Refounding of Haiti’s “Commission for the Transfer of Power” tasked with planning “the immediate and orderly departure of Jovenel Moïse.”

What happens when the unstoppable force meets the immovable object? In Haiti, the answer seems to be: you form a commission.


As calls for and anticipation of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse’s resignation become universal in the face of an ever-growing and determined nationwide revolt, two opposition fronts have each rolled out their own “transition commission” to navigate the rocky road to a provisional government and, possibly, a new constitution.

But, on Tue., Oct. 15, Moïse held a short outdoor press conference on the National Palace grounds to say that it would be “irresponsible” for him to step down. “Haiti doesn’t deserve this,” he said of the turmoil and misery gripping the country. “You voted for me to fight against a system,” he said, as if some unspecified “system” was responsible for Haiti’s woes, and he was fighting it.

On Oct. 15, President Jovenel Moïse gave an outdoor press conference, saying it would be “irresponsible” for him to resign.

His statement was reminiscent of “President-for-Life” Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier’s declaration one week before his flight from Haiti on Feb. 7, 1986 that he was holding onto power “as strong as a monkey’s tail.” That now famous phrase was the final provocation that spurred the Haitian masses to redouble their protests and send him packing.

On Thu. Oct. 10 at the Terrace Garden Villa on the capital’s Delmas 75 road, the Consensual Alternative for the Refounding of Haiti (an opposition front previously known as the Democratic and Popular Sector) presented a nine-member “Commission for the Transfer of Power,” tasked with planning “the immediate and orderly departure of Jovenel Moïse.” They would propose three judges from Haiti’s Court of Cassation (Supreme Court), one of whom would act as Haiti’s temporary President. He would choose a Prime Minister (which Haiti hasn’t had since March) and propose, to the Consensual Alternative’s signatories, a list of possible ministers for the “Transitional Government,” which would have up to three years to organize elections.

The members of the Commission are: long-time political activist and university professor Antoine “Tintin” Augustin; journalist and sociologist Antoinette Duclair, a member of the Petrochallenger coalition and of Solidarity with Haitian Consumers; Baby Doc’s former lawyer Gervais Charles; radio owner Michel Legros, Union of Popular Forces leader, and, previously, of the anti-Duvalierist Haitian League for the Implantation of Democracy (LHID); former musician and Pétionville mayor Claire Lydie Parent; Father Michel Frantz Grandois, vice-president of the Creole Academie and representative of the Forces of the Progressive Opposition (FOP); former Limonade Deputy Hugues Célestin, leader of the Marien Patriot Initiative (IPAM); writer Gary Victor, representing infamous businessman Réginald Boulos’ Movement for the Third Way party; and former Haitian Army Col. Himmler Rébu, the leader of the Grand Rally for the Evolution of Haiti party (GREH), who served as President Michel Martelly’s Sports Minister.

The Consensual Alternative’s commission was announced two days after the Moïse regime had named it own seven-member “Dialogue Commission” on Oct. 8, with the following members: Michel Martelly’s last Prime Minister Evans “K-Plim” Paul; the General Coordinator of the Office of Management and Human Resources Josué Pierre-Louis; Jovenel’s former Tourism Minister Emilie Jessy Menos; presidential advisor and former Borgne deputy Jude Charles Faustin; current Secretary General of the Council of Ministers Rénald Lubérice; Haitian Bald Headed Party (PHTK) president Sainphor Liné Balthazar; and former army officer, senator, and Martelly Defense Minister Jean Rodolphe Joazile.

At the call of Haiti’s musical artists, tens of thousands poured out on the capital’s Delmas Road on Oct. 13 to demand President Moïse’s resignation.

The regime’s commission was announced hours after Senate President and Jovenel ally Carl Murat Cantave issued a long, impassioned radio statement pleading that “dialogue is the one and only salvation for the resolution of our problems.” He called on President Moïse to put his mandate “on the table of dialogue, but also the mandates of elected officials of the Legislature and those of the Judiciary.”

The entire opposition rejected Moïse’s Dialogue Commission as too little, too late.

Finally, on Mon. Oct. 13, yet another transition shepherd was announced: the “Passerelle pour une transition” (Gateway for a Transition), a seven-member commission supposedly acting on behalf of 107 business, union, peasant, human rights, youth, and womens organizations which signed on to a “Joint Declaration for a National Rescue Government.”

The new front is ominously headed by perennial Washington ally and Episcopal Church Bishop Edouard Paultre, who is also the coordinator of the Haitian Council of Non-State Actors (CONHANE). The “Gateway for a Transition” and the Joint Declaration’s assemblage appear to be dominated by Haiti’s bourgeoisie and its business associations – Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Haiti (CCIH), Haiti Industries Association (ADIH), American Chamber of Commerce (AMCHAM), the Franco-Haitian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CFHCI), and several regional chambers of commerce and industry.

The “National Rescue” front may be a spin-off of or merger with the Patriotic Forum of Papay, the Consensual Alternative’s previous opposition rival. The “National Rescue” counts among its 107 signatories Chavannes Jean-Baptiste’s Peasant Movement of Papay (MPP) and the National Peasant Movement of the Papay Congress (MPNKP) – also known as 4 G Kontre (Four Eyes Meet) – as well as Tèt Kole Ti Peyizan Ayisyen (Heads Together of Small Haitian Peasants), founded by the assassinated Father Jean-Marie Vincent. Chavannes’ cluster of organizations were the host and central organizer of the Aug. 27-31 conference which gave birth to the Patriotic Forum front.

The “National Rescue” front is clearly the new opposition heavy-weight, not just due to the leading role of Paultre and the bourgeoisie, but also the adherence of 51 unions, including the strategic transport and drivers syndicates, key to any general strike.

The seven “Gateway for a Transition” members are: businessman and CCIH president Frantz Bernard Craan, singer Carole Demesmin, authors Castel Germeil and Dr. Charles Manigat, university professors Sabine Manigat and Lemète Zéphyr, and Dr. Sofia Loréus.

In their declaration, the “National Rescue” front calls on Moïse and the Parliament to resign, for the restoration of public order, administration, and services, an “emergency program” for the “vulnerable” poor, “revival of economic activities… Putting public finances in order… Follow-up on records related to the management of Petro Caribe funds and other matters related to corruption and misappropriation of public property… Reorganization of the Electoral Council… Organization of a National Conference… Preparation and voting of a new constitution… Reform of the justice system” aimed at ending “the culture of impunity,” among other things. The group did not specify the details of how it saw the transition taking place or its goals being achieved.

Meanwhile, after over 15 years of deployment, the last United Nations “peace-keepers” finally left Haiti on Oct. 15. The unarmed United Nations Integrated Office in Haiti (UNHIN or, in French, BINUH) replaced the 1,300-police officer United Nations Mission to Support Justice in Haiti (MINUJUSTH). The Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General held over from MINUJUSTH to head UNHIN is Helen Meagher La Lime, a former career U.S. State Department officer who was most recently U.S. Ambassador to Angola (2014-2017) before joining the UN. La Lime is the first former U.S. diplomat to head UN missions in Haiti.

UNHIN chief Helen Meagher La Lime with UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres last year. Credit: UN Photo

UNHIN has a one-year mandate to advise the Haitian government on ways to “promote and strengthen stability and good governance” and “to support the government in the areas of elections, police, human rights, prison administration, and justice system reform.”

Add to this explosive cocktail the growing size and ferocity of Haiti’s anti-Jovenel demonstrations. Marches, skirmishes, injuries, and deaths are occurring in towns around the country, but the largest actions are in and around Port-au-Prince, the capital.

On Fri. Oct. 11, marching protestors aimed to reach Moïse at his mountain home in Pèlerin 5 in order to “retrieve his resignation letter,” they said. This led to pitched battles en route in the upscale town of Pétionville between the police and demonstrators. Some protestors tried unsuccessfully to set fire to the fancy Kinam Hotel on the central square, St. Pierre Place.

Then, two days later, on Sun. Oct. 13, a giant multitude of tens of thousands turned out on the capital’s Delmas Road for a protest organized by Haiti’s musical artists. That demonstration’s tremendous size marked a new high-water mark for the popular tide relentlessly rising around the regime.

Link:

Despite Jovenel’s Obstinance, Rival Opposition Committees Plan for his Departure | Haiti Liberte

 

[Bawon Samedi]

 

[Bawon Samedi]

 

[Bawon Samedi]

 

[loyola llothta]

October 17, 2019

President Moïse Unable to Participate in Traditional Dessalines Day Ceremonies

Traditional presidential ceremonial events to remember the Father of Haiti, Emporer Jean Jacques Dessalines, were not to be held on Thursday, October 17, 2019, due to the insecurity surrounding the presence of Jovenel Moïse at the Haitian presidency.

Events such as depositing a bouquet of flowers at Pont Rouge, the site of Dessalines' assassination, and delivering an address to the Nation from the commune of Marchand Dessalines were cancelled for this year.

The Head of State was regulated to only participate in an early morning hour event at the Patheon Museum (MUPANAH) across from the National Palace. Only members of the executive branch were present. Leaders of the judiciary and legislative did not attend, which is a stark departure from normalcy for such events.

The Haitian Head of State is being called by an overwhelming majority of Haitians from diverse sectors to resign from office. He recently hired foreign mercenaries to provide security for lack of confidence in the Haitian secret service.

Link:
President Moïse Unable to Participate in Traditional Dessalines Day Ceremonies

 

[loyola llothta]

Cant forget about dread

Look up Charlemagne Péralte and Emmanuel "Dread" Wilmè. Péralte led an armed rebellion against the US invasion of 1915 and Wilmè led an armed rebellion against the 2004 UN invasion. Both went down in history as criminals and bandits. @OmowaleAfrika

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[Secure Da Bag]

October 17, 2019

President Moïse Unable to Participate in Traditional Dessalines Day Ceremonies

Traditional presidential ceremonial events to remember the Father of Haiti, Emporer Jean Jacques Dessalines, were not to be held on Thursday, October 17, 2019, due to the insecurity surrounding the presence of Jovenel Moïse at the Haitian presidency.

Link:
President Moïse Unable to Participate in Traditional Dessalines Day Ceremonies

The audacity of him even showing his face there.