Duvalierist Make Some Noise

A Guide to Connecting all the Caribbean Dots

A hollow demonstration was held by a group of men in Port-au-Prince's Delma community. They were demonstrating for the return of Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier. In effect, the "manifestation" was for the return of dictatorship to Haiti. Many who commented on the spectacle observed, "How much money does it cost to buy such a demonstration?" Others were saddened by what they saw as, "A sign that democracy in Haiti is in trouble after the ouster of Aristide."

What about democracy for Haiti? Haiti's 2010 presidential election is scheduled for November 28. And Reuters reported that President Réne Preval rejected the ranking Republican on the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Richard Lugar's election proposals.

Lugar reportedly wants "to ensure the participation of factions within an opposition party loyal to exiled former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide." Question: is the Senator entirely sincere in his efforts to make sure that Haiti has a free and fair election? One can't help but noticed the equivocal term "factions" from the above statement. What does that mean exactly? It does make it clear that some "factions" are acceptable to Uncle Sam, while others are just out of luck.

In an article on MetropoleHaiti.com (French), Dr. Maryse Narcisse (who is the former president's Fanmi Lavalas party's appointed representative) is quoted as saying that there are traitors [maybe "factions"?] within Lavalas who worked to exclude Lavalas from the next election. Quoting an observer:

"If it is true, it is high treason against the people. Why doesn't she just name the people involved? The people need to know who betrayed them. She went on to say that Lavalas no longer wants to participate in the next election, but rather the resignation of the CEP and Preval only. Why would she not want the party to participate in the next election?

By doing so, she is doing exactly what she blames the traitors of doing. So the people will not have the choice to vote for Lavalas candidates. Her position makes her look like she is the head traitor, the plant, the infiltrator, the agent working to keep Lavalas from elections twice in a row.

I was in Haiti during the last election. People were on radio Guinen begging for Lavalas to get its act together so they can vote their conscience. Instead she was quite busy suing her comrade in a court infested with agents and at the end there were no Lavalas candidates. Her job is to fight and keep on fighting to keep the Party on the ballot every time there is an election, make sure the votes are counted and counting."

What is going on? Well, you see, as long as a conflict can be manufactured, then Fanmi Lavalas "factions" can be excluded from elections. It's apparently the role that the good Dr. Narcisse is playing in this "electoral coup."

It must be said that many have questioned the company that the former president has chosen to keep. This was a problem when he was president of Haiti. One issue was the U.S. based Steele Foundation, which played (or didn't play) a critical role on the night of Feb. 29, 2004, when he was forced out of the presidency. Aristide was hustled onto a plane bound for the Central African Republic in the dead of night by the U.S. At the time Aristide accused the Steele Foundation of withdrawing protection under orders from the U.S. His assertion was confirmed and you can find a detailed account of that fateful night here.

Many have also noted the make-up of Aristide's Foundation, whose board is liberal elite white -- as are by the way, his Miami lawyer and most of the people who are Aristide's closest confidants. Not that he doesn't have the right to choose exactly who he wants to represent his interests, but well, maybe it's just his interests.

Back to the Haiti election farce: It's hardly a secret that President Aristide was Washington's and the Republican party's least favorite "socialist" and liberation theology advocate. So it comes as a surprise that Richard Lugar is in support of Lavala's participation in the elections. After all, Aristide's Fanmi Lavalas party is hardly seen by Washington as a separate entity from the man they removed from office.

Given that the U.S. is leading the reconstruction effort in Haiti and that former president, Bill Clinton (a man who imposed rigorous and damaging structural adjustment programs and privatization demands on the Aristide government as a condition of his return to the Haitian presidency) is leading the Haiti Interim Reconstruction Commission (Co-Chair Jean Max Bellerive is a figurehead and Preval's "veto" power is an appeasement) and the fact that the U.S. along with the "international community" have the power to pull funding and a bevy of other supports from the Haitian government and people at will, clearly, it would be foolish to believe that Preval can choose to ignore directives from Washington.

By the way, how far removed from Haitian life on the ground is Bill Clinton? One has only to check out Bill and Hilary Clinton's new $11 million compound in Bedford Hills, New York to see that they move in a different stratosphere from the Haitian population. Maybe, this is what the Democrats actually mean when they say their party "is a big tent." This 7,000 square foot one is just for two. Clearly, their "big tent" is a far cry from a leaky tent in Haiti.

So with Haiti's most popular party out of the picture, the stage is set for a return of the "electoral coup ."

At this point, the most pressing question being asked is, who will be the U.S. pick for Haiti's presidency this time? Or, to put it another way, "who will the U.S. choose to humiliate Haiti with this time?

To hazard a guess at this stage is demonstrably early given the habit of Haiti's Provisional Electoral Council (CEP) of postponing the election at the last minute, usually by a couple of weeks or more. This device usually serves to weed out the candidates who announce early. The field is then clear for the late candidate whose coffers are full and available for that last victorious push.

Dr. Guy Theodore may just defy the odds. He fits the bill quite nicely as a U.S. candidate. He is a former U.S. military colonel, and is well positioned to impose a dictatorship in Haiti. A colonel expects a "yes sir" or "no sir" from his subordinates. Any insubordination is met with harsh punishment: court martial and jail.

Dr. Theodore bears an uncanny physical likeness to Francois "Papa Doc" Duvalier. Also, like the former brutal dictator, Dr. Theodore is a country doctor.

It must be said that Dr. Guy is known for his charity work and humanitarianism. His narrative is spotless. This is what makes him the ideal candidate to highjack or seduce a popular movement. In an interview with Little Rock, Arkansas natives and Directors, Brent Renaud and Craig Renaud for the New York Times, Dr. Theodore said he favored the postponement of presidential elections. He thinks that democracy can wait.

Little Rock, Arkansas is a haven for filmmakers who end up covering Haiti stories for the New York Times is it?

According to the website ConsortiumNews.com, back when Francois Duvalier was elected in 1957 to the Haitian presidency, the NY times originally depicted Duvalier as a "mild mannered doctor." The connection is: the NY times seems to be treating Dr Theodore with the same kid gloves. Here is the actual quote:

"Despite the New York Times’ initial portrait of him as “mild-mannered doctor,” Duvalier, upon winning the presidency in 1957, became a ruthless, corrupt dictator.

Dr. Guy, like Haiti's former "president for life," is also not too keen on elections.

"No election now, there is not the time to talk about an election." Dr. Theodore asserts forcefully, "to me, is the time to talk about taking care of the people and building the country. Going and campaigning now I don't think is the time."

He will serve the United States with great ease as a former Colonel. If he wants to, he can become a modern day Dr. Francois Duvalier.

Hopefully, the younger generation who were around during the Fanmi Lavalas grassroots movement have learned something about democracy and will not tolerate the idea of life under a dictatorship. The majority of the people who lived and suffered under the Duvalier dictatorship are either dead, in exile or disappeared all together - but many have told their stories to the next generation. It won't be so easy to fool the younger generation into thinking that a dictatorship is what is needed.

On January 16, following the earthquake, CNN's Fredericka Whitfield interviewed Arielle Jean-Baptiste . Jean-Baptiste is of Haitian descent and worked for the USAID cartel in Haiti. Some who lived through the Duvalier era may remember hearing her name in Haiti. Her family was deeply in bed with the Duvalier dictatorship. Her family was part of the Duvalier motorcade. One wonders, how could CNN parade someone so closely associated with a brutal dictatorship like her on TV without so much as a disclaimer?

Jean-Baptiste has also been tapped for interviews by NPR on matters regarding Haiti.

She was part of the Haiti Democracy Project back in 2004. HDP is funded by the right-wing Haitian Boulos family headed by the infamous Reginald Boulos. Boulos has close business ties with USAID.

Question: What NGOs or opposition organizations in Haiti didn't USAID fund? Not many. The NGOs are defacto ruling authorities in Haiti and do not have to account to the Haitian government for any of their actions.

As for Arielle Jean-Baptiste, formerly of USAID, to many Haitians who read or listen to her, she is just like the rest of her Duvalierist family -- entitled, arrogant and unconcerned about the vast majority of the Haitian people. The Duvalierist did whatever they wanted in Haiti knowing that they had the full backing of a superpower.

In her final comment to NPR, Jean-Baptiste says that government's role is limited in Haiti: "The governance is - once people start getting money, putting their kids to school, having a better life, you can have a new generation that will be - they will ask for accountability. Okay? Money in people's pocket is what's important."

The thought is muddled by the accountability issue, but one thing comes through: she does seem to be saying that government and its role is of no importance.

But can you have accountability without having a real democracy? That of course is a pipe dream or carrot stick that she's apparently learned from her time at USAID, that can never be attained. The U.S. which claims to be the land of the free and the home of the brave, is a viper's nest of war criminals, torturers, banksters and corporate raiders and marauders. Accountability -- pshshshssss!

Speaking of corporate marauders: An undeclared war on Haiti has raged undetected by the "lamestream" media and we didn't understand why such a poor country would be a target. Recently, a war was declared on Jamaica's poverty striken Tivoli gardens and as we watched the bodies pile up we asked ourselves: why are these poor people being attacked by their own government?

To see the connection, you have to understand that these two countries are seen as the weakest links. Once they fall the rest could fall like dominoes.

The Caribbean is the new target of the big guns in DC and the West because they are sitting on the kind of abundant natural resources and riches that could change the geopolitical status quo for all time. It could turn the world upside down (economically), if the governments of Cuba, Haiti, Jamaica, Grenada, Belize, Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Panama, Guyana, Suriname, Mexico, Colombia and Venezuela can hold on to the wealth for their people's benefit and prevent their torturers from the global north from extorting it from them.

The Hydrothermal Energy and the Destabilization of The Caribbean Basin

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IMF vs The Bank of the South - IMF to Clean Up Its Act?

At the Group of 20 summit in London last month, President Obama pledged to boost IMF funding to "help countries weather the global economic crisis." On Thursday, May 21st, the Senate approved the IMF funding as a part of the $91 billion funding bill for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. This seems appropriate somehow, since international banking institutions like the IMF have laid waste to the economies of poor countries of the global south.
The IMF, World Bank and International Development Bank (IDB) have similar stated missions: "working to foster global monetary cooperation, secure financial stability, facilitate international trade, promote high employment and sustainable economic growth, and reduce poverty around the world." However, a 2000 internal World Bank report concluded that poor countries are better off without structural adjustment and that some of their policies do not work. Almost a decade later no significant reforms to these antiquated policies have been made, not at the World Bank, not at the IMF nor at the IDB.
Some of the general issues that are of great concern to countries who have been burned by these institutions are outlined below. Additionally, the human rights abuses perpetrated against Haiti by the IDB are also explained. Unfortunately, when these human rights abuses were happening in Haiti, calls for accountability fell on Congress' deaf ears.
Is the global economic crisis enough to spur legislators in Washington to look into past abuses in order to avoid future missteps by these antiquated institutions? Not likely. Washington's modus operandi is to *move on* from crisis to crisis with no accountability for past abuses. When a crisis results from bad policies, the mantra from Washington is predictable; *we must look forward, and not backward*.
While it's clear that international banking institutions, sorely need to have "pre-conditions" for any new funding, what is not clear is whether the Congress has the will to impose or enforce any existing or new standards. Particularly, if it would require reform of the existing policies of these institutions.
The world banking system has virtually collapsed from greed and corruption, yet aside from show hearings, no real reform or accountability for Wall Street and banks has taken place in Congress. Also, to date the particularly predatory, criminal practices of the IMF, World Bank and IDB have not come under any substantive scrutiny from the mainstream media.
For instance, the IDB is accused of human rights violations in Haiti. An expose in 2008 by the RFK Center's Human Rights Director Monika Kalra Varma and the Director of Zamni Lasante, Loune Viaud sites internal emails at the IDB:

"In 2001, US officials threatened to use their influence to stop previously-approved IDB funding unless Haiti's majority political party submitted to political demands to accept a particular apportionment of seats in a Haitian electoral oversight body. Soon after, at the behest of the US, instead of disbursing the loans as planned, the IDB and its members took the unprecedented step of implicitly adding conditions to require political action by Haiti before the funds would be released. These actions violated the IDB's own charter, which strictly prohibits the bank and its members from interfering in the internal political affairs of member states."
... The results have been devastating. The town of Port-de-Paix, selected 10 years ago by the IDB as the first project site due to its particularly deplorable water situation, has yet to see the implementation of any water projects. A study conducted by Zanmi Lasante, Partners In Health, the Robert F Kennedy Memorial Center for Human Rights, and New York University's Center for Human Rights and Global Justice found no functioning public water sources in the city.
Researchers found three-quarters of water sources in the city contained high levels of coliform bacteria, a key indicator of contamination with faecal matter. A frightening 15% of households reported symptoms likely related to typhoid.

If the US and other member states join the IDB and take on the responsibility to improve conditions in the Americas, they cannot then use their membership to undermine the basic rights of the people they claim to serve simply to advance their own political agenda.
The IDB and the US government must take responsibility for their actions and implement the necessary transparency mechanisms to ensure that such abuses do not recur. Congressional inquiries and annual reviews of the Treasury by the Government Accountability Office could provide the oversight necessary to prevent future political misuse of the IDB and its funds. The people of Haiti, as well as US taxpayers, deserve a system that makes public the status of IDB loans and projects in Haiti in order to ensure that the US and IDB member states uphold their commitments to development and human rights."

The IMF is often criticized for undermining the basic rights of the people they claim to serve.The onerous pre-conditions they impose on poor countries for *development* loans, more often than not perpetuate poverty, underdevelopment and exploitation.

"Some IMF conditions that countries have been forced to comply with can only be described as harsh and undemocratic. Often the devaluation of a nation’s currency has been a precondition for IMF assistance. In order to qualify for IMF loans, some nations have also been forced to lower tariffs, restrict governmental subsidies and spending, balance budgets, as well as sell-off state institutions to foreign interests. In some cases, the IMF has even prohibited wage increases as some countries have tried to do so, in order to compensate for a sharp rise in food prices and other commodities. Environmental and labor rights have also taken a hit as a result of IMF policies. Under the guise of helping economic distraught countries, the IMF is really bailing out foreign investors and multinational corporations. They have further fueled chaos and instability in some of the poorest regions in the world."

-- The IMF: Raping The World, One Poor Nation at a Time

Admittedly, these international banking institutions will most likely never be held accountable for their greed and inhumanity. We have only to look at the bailout of the Wall Street speculators for confirmation of this fact.
A most significant and positive development on the global stage has been the founding of The Bank of the South by Hugo Chavez of Venezuela and his allies in May 2007. The bank is intended as an alternative to the IMF and The World Bank and intends to remedy what some perceive as "a double standard which allows richer countries to use fiscal expansion in the face of recession while poorer nations are forced into stricter economic restraints."
In fact, there has been a significant decrease in "Latin America's dependence on the IMF between 2005 and 2008, with outstanding loans falling from 80% of the IMF's $81bn loan portfolio, to 1% of the IMF's $17bn of outstanding loans.

"In April [2007], Venezuela announced that it was paying off all its outstanding debt with the World Bank—totaling $3.3 billion and dating from before President Hugo Chavez took office in (1999)—five years ahead of schedule. Venezuelan Minister of Finance Rodrigo Cabezas said that because of this, “Venezuela is free ... and thank God, neither today’s Venezuelans nor children yet to be born will owe one single cent to those organizations.” Later that month, in the wake of the Wolfowitz scandal, President Chavez declared that Venezuela was withdrawing its membership in the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. "

The Bank of the South has been heralded as a step in the formation of a unified Latin America. As Nadia Martinez of TomPaine.com puts it: Adios, World Bank! Also, the formation of this alternative bank could be effective in pushing the IMF to reform its ways. Free market competition for development funding from The Bank of The South, is more likely than any proposed Congressional oversight to motivate reform at the IMF, World Bank and IDB. Hopefully, this will mean that poor and developing countries can say, adios/goodbye to the antiquated politicies of the World Bank, IMF and IDB.
Interestingly, an article on the IMF website from February 2009 claims that it is focused on "...Bank Clean Up." Of course, they mean the clean up of banks "damaged" by the global economic crisis, but they should examine the IMF banking system itself for reform and "clean up."