Has Préval lost favor with Washington?

What does René G. Préval, considered the ideological twin brother of Jean Bertrand Aristide in many circles, really share in common with the exiled former Haitian president? They both share an aversion to Washington’s hegemony: one concealed and calculated in Préval’s case; the other expressive and emotional, the main characteristics of that of Aristide. This explains why in the twilight of his presidency, (he is due to leave office next February) Préval has become arrogant in his defiance toward Washington, an attitude that is clearly detrimental to the welfare of the Haitian people.
While no one expects Washington to send in a plane and cart away René Préval somewhere in Africa, the Haitian president is as expendable as his former friend and mentor. Like Aristide, Préval misunderstands the geopolitical reality or overestimates his abilities to circumvent the iron grip of Washington in Haitian politics. The release of a scathing report by a U.S Senate committee condemning Préval’s administration highlights two possibilities: He may be the victim of a targeted manipulation of public opinion or simply lost favor with Washington. At issue is the apparent failure of the Préval government to tackle corruption and restructure the electoral council prior to the general elections tentatively scheduled for November 28th of this year.
Last Thursday in a 16-page report by the U.S Foreign Relations Committee, the senior Republican on the panel, Richard Lugar, advised the lawmakers to reconsider sending aid to Haiti unless reforms are made. "President Préval's actions do not suggest a departure from the self-destructive political behavior that has kept Haiti the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere," wrote Senator Lugar, adding "It is incumbent upon Congress to reassess our government's investments in Haiti, if this partnership is in question." As the interests of the Haitian nation and those of the U.S, its largest aid supplier, are greater than those of Préval, the lame duck president must reconsider his blind course of action and implement the needed reforms.
Bear in mind this is the public version of the Committee report which probably contains the word incompetence and other less flattering adjectives describing Préval and his clique. It is also a sweeping indictment of the political class that has shown a marked indifference for the welfare of the Haitian people over the last two centuries. A new breed of technocrats is needed to rebuild Haiti; as Obama correctly said during the 2008 U.S presidential campaign “you cannot try the same policies with the same group of people and expect different results.” The Diaspora has a reservoir of talents but must abandon its dual-citizenship scheme unless it agrees to pay taxes, which is the primary obligation of all citizens, to the Haitian state.
René Préval is a man who rallied against emergency food aid to the victims of the January 12 disaster, arguing that it would inadvertently destroy national production. At first glance, the argument made sense, except for the fact that Préval’s own actions (he aggressively implemented the IMF prescription of ending government subsidies to Haitian farmers and lowering tariffs on imported foodstuffs), translated into Haiti importing 80% of its food needs prior to the tragedy. Any first year economic student knows that boosting national production can be accomplished by subsidizing the farmers and imposing higher tariffs on imports, but the man is too coy to stand up to the irrational demands of the IMF. The bottom line is that Préval is trying to protect the interests of the economic elite that benefits from the import of agricultural products, not the beleaguered Haitian farmers or the victims of the earthquake.
This is a man whose failure or inability to inspire and lead is preventing the nation from exculpating itself from the stupor caused by the tragedy, preferring instead to engage in petty partisan politics (obsessively trying to secure his legacy) and blaming the international community for its slow pace in delivering the promised aid. For four and a half years, Préval seemed content to ride out his term but his luck ran out on January 12. His actions or lack thereof validate the notion that Haiti needs supervision; that its future cannot be trusted into the hands of a political leadership that has proven itself to be essentially inept and utterly corrupt. Although a fair assessment of a political era or leadership is best left to the care of future historians, it is a given that history will not be kind to Préval whose ascent to the presidency of Haiti (twice) might be considered a sick joke played on the Haitian people or the premier mischief of Jean Bertrand Aristide.
In light of the overwhelming and pressing needs created by the January 12 earthquake, a freezing or rationing of U.S aid will be catastrophic for Haiti and its people. Indeed the idea of excluding the country’s largest political party from participating in the incoming elections is a self-destructive political behavior. It amounts to disenfranchising a sizable portion of the electorate at the very juncture when Haiti, attempting a rebirth in the aftermath of the tragedy, needs all its sons and daughters for the monumental task at hands. Because it is the politic of exclusion that has impeded Haiti’s development for the last 206 years, it is therefore inconceivable that a newer version of the old system is being promoted as an alternative by René Préval. The ball is in Washington’s court.

Haiti: 500 Years of Terror

The history of Haiti began on December 5th 1492 when Christopher Columbus and his party arrived at Môle Saint Nicolas on the northwestern part of Hayti, the appellation by which the island was known to the native Taino Indians. Stunned by the beauty of the island and topographical similarity to Spain, Columbus named the land La Espanola. Possessing military superiority over the natives, the Spaniards swiftly enslaved the Indians who perished by the thousands from forced labor and diseases brought on by the Europeans.
In 1514, a Spaniard priest, Bartolome de Las Casas, who would later be remembered and celebrated as “Defender of the oppressed” in nearby Cuba, started a campaign to outlaw the practice. By 1542, Las Casas succeeded when the Spanish throne adopted a series of laws prohibiting Indian slavery in its colonies. Soon thereafter, the first African slaves began arriving in Hispaniola as replacement labor. His advocacy on behalf of the Indians, who were dying in large numbers, no doubt started the enslavement of Africans in the Americas, which ended in 1888 when Brazil became the last country in the western hemisphere to abolish slavery.
In the competition among European powers vying for supremacy, the riches of Hayti or La Espanola naturally attracted the attention of French and English pirates who began harassing and capturing Spanish ships returning to Spain with their cargoes of gold. Many French pirates (buccaneers) eventually settled in Tortuga Island (Ile de la Tortue) and refused to submit to the authority of the Spaniards. After decades of conflicts between French buccaneers and Spaniard colonists, France and Spain agreed to divide the island under The Treaty of Ryswick in 1697. The French renamed the western part that fell under their control: Saint Domingue which, by the 18th century, was France’s richest colony, home to vast plantations of coffee, sugarcane and indigo produced with the forced labor of more than 500.000 African slaves supervised by 40.000 French citizens.
In 1791, however, the slaves rebelled. Toussaint Breda, a house slave, took over the insurrection and guided it through many victories over England, Spain, and France. In 1801, Toussaint, then known by the name Louverture, abolished slavery and proclaimed himself Governor General of Saint Domingue. This infuriated Napoleon Bonaparte who sent 20.000 French soldiers to retake the island under the leadership of his brother-in-law General Charles Leclerc. After many inconclusive battles, Leclerc and Toussaint signed a treaty on May 7, 1802 on the condition that slavery would not be reestablished at Saint Domingue. The French however never intended to keep their part of the bargain.
Toussaint retired to his farm at Ennery only to be arrested by the duplicitous French and sent to France where he died of pneumonia (the version put forward by his captors) on April 3rd 1803 at a prison in Fort-du-Joux in the French Alps. On his way to France, Toussaint prophesized: "In overthrowing me you have cut down at Saint Domingue only the trunk of the tree of liberty, it will spring up again from the roots, for they are deep and numerous." Indeed, on November 18th 1803, a little more than two years after Toussaint’s arrest and deportation to France, the slaves under the leadership of his chief lieutenant, Jean-Jacques Dessalines, finally defeated the French at Vertières.
On January 1st 1804, Saint Domingue was remained Haiti, an independent and sovereign country which was to serve as a refuge to all free Negroes desiring to live in peace. To slave-owning nations such as Britain, France, Spain, Holland and the U.S, this was indeed an unpardonable offense and, for that reason, Haiti has been subjected to an endless indignities ranging from economic embargoes, extortion and military invasions that not only impoverished its people but prevented the proud little nation from fulfilling its destiny. The most egregious of them all was the imposition by Charles X of France of an indemnity as condition to recognizing Haiti’s independence in 1825. The extortion, backed by threats of invasion of Haiti by France and its allies to restore slavery, remains “the supreme act of arrogance and piracy in the history of the world”, akin to Germany blockading the State of Israel and demanding a ransom for the Holocaust. It took little and defenseless Haiti 122 years (1825-1947) to service the debt, leaving successive governments with little or nothing to build the infrastructure of a modern state.
Today Haiti is derisively known as the poorest country in the Americas and is the recipient of thoughtless and unqualified comments by detractors who refuse to acknowledge the role played by the slave-owning nations which ironically consider themselves “paragon of virtues” as it relates to human rights and dignity. Consistent with the politic of subjugation of Haiti, a nascent albeit imperfect move toward democracy and social justice was summarily brought to an end on February 29, 2004 when French and U.S forces invaded the country and exiled its president to faraway Africa.
Having lost two percent of its population as a result of the January 12th earthquake, Haiti now needs a helping hand not charity, which usually comes with condescension, undue interference and other dehumanizing conditions. Our resolve is being tested but we will endure as we have done throughout our troubled existence. The land of Dessalines, Toussaint, Biassou, Jean Francois and Capois La Mort will not be abandoned to predators masquerading as saviors, Mediterranean transplants acting as plenipotentiary representatives of absentee colonizers or impenitent collaborators seeking favors from the powers-that-be.

6 months on...the drama continues

6 months on, the hope and aspirations of a little nation crushed by the terrible earthquake of January 12 that affected 3 million people, left more than a quarter of a million dead and 1.5 million homeless seem to have vanished. With the coming hurricane season, the already precarious situation is likely to get worse despite the heroic efforts of international organizations such as Doctors Without Borders (DWB) and the Red Cross. The billions pledged by the international community for a project of reconstruction of Haiti’s infrastructure have yet to materialize, the result of phony accounting, misplaced priorities of those professing to help (the donor countries) and the Préval government.
Without a doubt, many promises were not altruistic but in line with the spirit of international cooperation that rests on jockeying for political and economic advantages. Moreover, part of the reconstruction money is actually debt forgiveness and food donations rather than direct financial assistance, while the rest is subject to stringent requirements from individual donor countries. For example, a donor country financing the rebuilding of government offices would want the contract awarded to its national firms or insist that specific legislations be enacted to protect its larger economic interests. It was in that context the truncated Parliament was forced to relinquish its constitutional authority by ceding administrative control to the foreign-dominated Interim Haiti Recovery Commission (IHRC) which will decide where and how to spend the reconstruction money.
And, once you add the dysfunctional state of the Haitian government (a caretaker president and an illegal Parliament), the alibi for not doing anything becomes clearer. Most importantly, the notion that general elections amid the piles of rubbles and despair should be the first step toward stability is absurd and misguided, seeing that the electoral commission is thoroughly corrupt and general participation remains in doubt. These elections being pushed down the throat of the Haitian people could only exacerbate the volatile situation as they are geared toward cementing René Préval’s pitiful legacy, therefore detrimental to the country’s future. Lately, Préval has gotten so overconfident (he flatly rejected the revamping of the electoral commission and had attempted to prolong its mandate past the constitutional date) that he is bound to say or do something that alienates the powers-that-be, then the chicken will come home to roost. Poor Préval, he is as expendable as Jean Bertrand Aristide but remains oblivious to that simple fact. His machinations to cement his legacy (alienating old friends and creating a new political party) may come back to haunt him because the interests of the big donors are greater than those of a lame duck president of Haiti.
Does it make sense trying to rebuild a destroyed nation with the same politic of exclusion and impunity that is at the roots of its problems, notwithstanding the wanton physical destruction wrought by the January 12 earthquake? It appears that the consensus within the international community and the Préval regime revolves around this idea given that the edict against the participation of the country’s largest political party in the fall elections and the blanket immunity provided to those who committed mass murders during the reign of terror under Gérard Latortue (2004-06).
The de-Lavalastization campaign during which notorious mass murderers were let loose and thousands of Haitians disappeared remains one of the darkest periods in Haitian history. Any Haitian who protested was conveniently branded a criminal or terrorist and subjected to arbitrary imprisonment. Yvon Neptune, Haiti’s last prime minister before the February 29, 2004 invasion of the country by French and U.S forces, was immediately imprisoned, so were other eminent members of the Lavalas Party. One (Sò Ann) was even accused of having participated in the ritual killing of a child with Jean Bertrand Aristide the exiled former president and jailed without ever appearing before a judge. Postscript: (Having spent two years in jail, Sò Ann was eventually released; the fathom parents of the supposedly murdered child have yet to come forward).
Incredibly, all of this was done in the name of instilling decency in Haitian politic, promoting democracy and restoring stability. If this perplexing formula succeeds in overcoming the challenges facing Haiti (building a stable state and achieving social peace and economic prosperity), it should be recognized as one the United Nations’ greatest achievements and, by extension, western civilization. With the powers behind the coup of February 29, 2004 and their local allies assuming complete control over Haiti’s destiny, the situation is starting to resemble that of the 1915-46 period when the tiny mulatto elite controlled every aspect of the country’s social, political and economic life while the black majority is relegated to the status of a supporting cast. Simply put, the modest gains achieved by the black majority since 1946 are gradually being erased with the approval of Haiti’s political class.
To sum it all up, Haiti’s future is being help up by international politicking and a rotten political system that is reinventing itself and getting stronger under the Security Council mandated occupation (2004-?), particularly in the aftermath of the January 12 tragedy. Hundreds of thousands of Haitians are living in tent cities and surviving on food handouts, while the project of rebuilding the country’s destroyed infrastructure remains in its embryonic stage. Maybe Paul, the octopus that correctly predicted many of the last world cup matches, can tell the world what is in store for Haiti.

History is never kind to those actively seeking to make it

On July 2, the Black Stars of Ghana, the last African team left standing in the World Cup, was defeated on penalty kicks by Uruguay 4-2 in one the most bizarre finish in the competition, a lost that reverberated around the world much more than Brazil’s defeat by Holland, since Ghana stood as the standard-bearer for the whole Continent of Africa and members of its Diaspora. A definite goal by Ghana in the last minute of supplementary time was deflected by a hand play of Diego Suarez, a Uruguayan forward, whose antics following Asamoah Gyan’s failure to convert the resulting penalty kick brought disrepute to the beautiful game of football. In so doing, Suarez single-handedly dashes the hope of one billion-plus souls throughout our planet, and one can only hope something positive comes out of it. FIFA, the governing body of football, should take a determined stand against handballs by players, because such egregious behavior destroys the integrity of the game, which epitomizes the oneness of the human race.
Growing up playing football as a hobby in neighborhood competitions taught me one important lesson: not to be passionate about the game given that it brings forth abnormal behavior from ordinarily normal humans. In 1969, Honduras and El Salvador almost went to war over a football game. Following Brazil’s defeat by the Netherlands last Friday, a young Haitian, distraught over the loss, committed suicide. In the 2002 World Cup, Ahn Jung-Hwan, a South Korean player, had his contract rescinded by an Italian club for his late goal in the knock out round that dashed Italy’s hope of advancing to the quarterfinals. In Bangladesh, a nation with no football tradition, irate fans rioted when a power outage interrupted the June 12 coverage of Argentina-Nigeria bout. And these are samples of notorious cases, as millions of untold stories in which passion get the better of ordinary humans are the norm rather than the exception when it comes to football.
My conscious effort upon reaching adulthood not to be fanatical about football leads me to disassociate myself from the game, which I seldom watch except of course the World Cup. But being of African descent, I nonetheless felt an affinity with the Black Stars since they were on the verge of making history by becoming the first African team ever to reach the semifinals in a competition traditionally dominated by Europeans and South American teams. I literally felt sick last Friday and decided that unless FIFA changes the rules I would forgo watching football altogether. I used to think that whenever a team lost a game, it was the result of the other side playing better but this particular World Cup negates my amateurish opinion. Moreover, the Ghana-Uruguay bout which ended in the most ignominious circumstance for the Black Stars put this perspective to rest since they were definitely the better side. To make matters worse, history is never kind to losers and the game will be mostly remembered for the missed penalty kick by Asamoah Gyan rather than the egregious action of Uruguay’s Diego Suarez who, alongside Argentine’s Diego Maradona and France’s Thierry Henri, has tarnished the reputation of football.
Although football is simple, enforcing its rules is prone to mistakes by referees that are sometimes inept or overwhelmed by a particular game. Sometimes a referee’s call is so outrageous, (the Koman Coulibaly’s annulment of a U.S goal against Slovenia is one example), one gets the feeling that FIFA is in on the fix. FIFA should explore the possibility of having a stand-by referee to take over a game in the event that the one officiating proves incapable of handling it. Being booted for incompetence during a game might be an incentive for the referees to get it right.
The countless errors made by referees during this World Cup notwithstanding, this unhappy ending for Ghana makes the case for the introduction of instant replay since a final result cannot be invalidated regardless of its unfairness and apologies to wronged teams, as was done by FIFA to England and Mexico, cannot assuage the pain associated with losing an important game. Despite its universal popularity, football may survive as the preeminent sport unless fundamental changes are made in the way its rules are enforced. In the Ghana-Uruguay quarterfinal bout, a goal not a penalty kick should have been awarded to the former since only a goalie is allowed to use his hands to block a goal-bound ball from entering the net. The idea of Diego Suarez, using himself as a sacrificial lamb (he knew he will be red-carded for the action) to starve off a likely defeat by his team was repugnant and unfair to Ghana. Diego Suarez may be regarded as a hero by his countrymen but to billions of football fans, the man is a villain, a trickster and at best a criminal.
Like most sports, football requires physical, technical and psychological abilities. In their quarterfinal against Uruguay on July 2, the Black Stars of Ghana were physically and technically superb but psychologically unprepared for the burden imposed on them by history: to become the first African team ever to reach the World Cup semifinals. The Black Stars need not be ostracized; the pressure on them was indeed too great because history is never kind to those actively seeking to make it.