Brief Background
The US' role in Haiti's 2004 coup was particularly blatant. There was no other choice. Despite the large, well-funded destabilization campaign and the creation of a new paramilitary with Haiti's most violent ex-army and ex-FRAPH militants the US could not oust President Jean-Bertrand Aristide using only its paramilitary proxies. Unlike the 1991 coup in Haiti, this time the US Marines had to remove President Aristide themselves. On February 29, 2004 in the middle of the night Aristide was escorted out of his home by US Marines under the threat of a mass blood bath in Port-au-Prince.
Today is Haiti diary book day : Current book is Damming The Flood: Haiti, Aristide, And The Politics Of Containment, by Peter Hallward: Chapter 10 Pt.1 : You can see our book list is here.
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| Chapter 10: 2004 Revenge of the Haitian Elite
konstitisyon se papye, bayonè se fe
(A constitution is made of paper, bayonets of steel.)
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The perpetrators of the 2004 coup sought to portray it as a regrettable but necessary strike, on behalf of constitutional democracy, against a dictatorial regime that had lost all connection with the Haitian people. Once the steps taken to undermine this regime started to look sufficiently spectacular, the international media descended upon Haiti to observe the dénouement. In addition to providing largely uncritical backing to the outright lies propounded by Bush, Powell and de Villepin, the more subtle effect of this media blitz was to distort the very conflict at issue. What was at stake in the civil war of February 2004 was not simiply a struggle between a weakened administration and its immediate opponents. (Damming The Flood, P.250)
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The US, France, Canada and Haitian elite, along with the compliant International press convinced most of the world that the 2004 coup was the result of a rebellion by the Haitians' against the totalitarian, corrupt and incompetent Fanmi Lavalas Administration. It was actually the Haitian elites and IC's fear of the opposite of the vast majority of Haitians that lived in dire poverty rising against the cruel, sadistic, and parasitic tiny class of elite in Haiti. Fanmi Lavalas (FL) represent a profound threat to Haiti's tiny class of elite and to the International Community. FL was the people that the tiny class of elite and IC had been exploiting, oppressing and brutalizing since before the elite conspired to have Dessalines assassinated in October 1806. And it was this that was the elites biggest fear: the uprising of its laborers. For the US, France, Canada and Haiti's elite getting rid of Aristide was a necessary first step for the success of the 2004 coup, but it was not the ultimate goal. The goal of the coup was to crush the pro-Lavalas
organisations populaires so that they would not survive this coup as they had the 1991 coup. The perpetrators had to destroy the threat of another FL or FL-like president emerging.
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The campaign to "get rid of Aristide" was a diversion: the real goal of the opposition, both in Haiti and abroad, was to break once and for all the movement that mobilized through and around Aristide. Their goal was to crush the remarkably resilient and profoundly threatening mass movement sustained by many dozens of pro-Lavalas organisations populaires. Their goal was to make sure that whatever happened, the next presidential election would not be lost to the same sort of people as the 1990, 1995, and 2000. Needless to say, the whole logic behind the 2004 coup would come crashing down if in the next round of electins the people of Haiti dared to choose yet another pro-Lavalas president. (Damming The Flood, P.250)
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In the short term, to prevent another pro-Lavalas president would require:
1. Haiti needed a new government that would be made up exclusively of members of the ruling class that were backed with sufficient foreign financial and military power.
2. A campaign of terror would need to be launched immediately and maintained. Anyone even suspected of supporting FL would have to pay; many with their lives.
3. The electorial process would have to be manipulated to divide FL in the hope that it could then be contained.
Longterm success of the coup would require:
In the longer term, it would require, intensification of the process that might "integrate" Haiti into a suitably stable regional order: the adoption of untrammeled privatization and neo-liberal adjustment, increased reliance on foreign aid, increased penetration of the economy by foreign NGOs, increased international supervision of the national police, and so on. All of these measures would serve to reinforce the class barriers that were briefly threatened by the ad-hoc alliance of the 1990 and then challenged by a united and well-organized Fanmi Lavalas in 2000. (Damming The Flood, P251)
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THE IMMEDIATE AFTERMATH OF 29 FEBRUARY
As the news of Aristide's abduction spread across Haiti, FL supporters reacted with a combination of shock, outrage and fear. Fanmi Lavalas supporters remembered the violent attacks against them after the 1991 coup. The FL's response was so intense that even the International media took notice:
Ernseau Bolivar, a student living in La Saline, tried to get the New York Times to grasp the point that his neighbors already understood only too well. "The army and the people with money always were against the poor. Traditionally the political class used the army to oppress us. That is what we fear. President Aristide made a lot of mistakes, it is true. But he was always representing people of the poor, people of my class." Bolivar could see perfectly well what his interviewer could not. "He said he thought Mr. Aristide had been forced out by American pressure. He called the president's fall a coup. 'We elected Mr. Aristide,' Mr. Bolivar said. 'How can the Americans now come and take him away? What about our Constitution? What about our laws?'" Sony Aurelien, a port-inspector who lives in La Saline, made the same point a few days later. "With Aristide, for the first time we have started to live. I am the first one in my family to have a regular job. Aristide tried to lift us up, so America kidnapped him and took him away." (Damming The Flood, P252)
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Powell, de Villepin and their "Haitian accomplices [Jodel Chamblain, Himmler Rébu, Evans Paul, Hérard Abraham,
Andy Apaid,
Charles Baker (running for President this election again), Danny Toussaint . . .]" (
Damming The Flood, P253) took advantage of the initial confusion and hit the pro-Aristide slums hard. The putschists had free reign to kill FL supporters and anyone else who got in the way. Powell did urge the putschists not to kill high profile people-that would draw unwanted media attention. It would be better to torture and imprison them. And that the Putschists did. FL supporters that weren't murdered were tortured, imprisoned or in hiding and some made it to exile.
Lavalas supporters' outrage was so intense that there was a brief period where "Dessalines loomed large over Port-au-Prince." (252) The US cut the head off the resistance by kidnapping the leader in the middle of the night before a response could be coordinated. And Aristide never endorsed and therefore never prepared his supporters for a violent uprising despite calls from militant FL supporters to create a formal militant arm of the FL movement. Aristide knew that his supporters would be slaughtered by the well funded and armed opposition.
MINUSTAH aim gun at Ansel Herz an unarmed journalist 10-15-10
The Putschists immediately began killing, torturing, and terrifing FL supporters, suspected supporters or anyone else, and the resistance was silenced within hours. It was open season for revenge. Rebels killed with impunity. .
There was no truth to all the talk of FL gangs of "chimères" roaming the streets and terrorizing people. The resistance was quiet by the morning of March 1, 2004. The putschists were not fighting a quasi-military movement; they were beating FL supporters into submission. Even members of the elite formed their own gangs and went hunting for FL supporters throughout the slums of Port-au-Prince.
Powell had two ground rules that were required for its putschists: first, keep the killing, torturing and imprisonment of FL members and supporters out of the press. Powell and de Villipin did not want their sanctioning of mass murder in the press. Washington quickly reminded Guy Philippe to be more discreet, when he stood on the balcony and announced to Port au Prince that he was Haiti's new ruler; second, and even more important, was that no boat people show up on US shores.
There was complete lawlessness and Putschists were killing in broad daylight in the streets of the slums. The morgue was overflowing with bodies. According to the morgue's director, 800 bodies were dumped and buried on March 7. Truck loads of bodies were dumped at the morgue regularly; many of the bodies still had their hands tied behind their backs when dumped. And to be sure only a fraction of bodies were even brought to the morgue. Bodies were coming up all over the place. Bodies were abandoned to the pigs; there were half eaten bodies on the city roadsides.
US priorities were painfully clear
| Despite the fact that hundreds of Marines were already in control of the city by the morning of Monday 1 March, it wasn't until the end of Wednsday that some of the 2,000 foreign troops began heavily armored patrols of the more public sections of downtown Port-au-Prince. The main purpose of such patrols was not to protect ordinary people from rebel reprisals but to soften up "hostile" neighborhoods by clearing away their last remaining defenses the makeshift barricades erected to ward off rebel attacks. Foreign reporters kept a respecful distance but the New York Times described Wednesday as "a day of violence and fear in the capital," as "rebels and the police battled Aristide loyalists with volleys of gunfire in the squalid slums that sent thousands of people fleeing." In the midst of the gunfire, US officials did their best to explain to jeering local residents why their Marines "have no instructions to disarm the rebels" and "were under orders not to use force to halt Haitian-on-Haitian violence." Journalists who visited Haiti in early April 2004 learned from numerous witnesses that in the neighborhood of Bel Air, something between fifteen and fifty people were killed and then carted away in a single attack on the night of 12 March, with the connivance (if not active participation) of US troops -- as Anthony Fenton observed, the idea seemed to be that "once the fear of militarized Haitian police and 'trigger-happy' US military are instilled in these people, they will think twice about disrupting the new political process that is being imposed on them. (Damming The Flood, P257-258) |
The 2000 US Marines were in Haiti the morning of March 1. Tellingly, it wasn't until the evening of March 3 that some of them began to help out. In case there had been any confusion about US priorities, there could be no doubt when the US Marines did not help the people being terrorized and murdered. Instead the Marines helped the putschists by destroying the barricades that pro-Lavalas slums erected for defense against rebel attacks and their last line of defense agains the murderous putschists.
To avoid the unsightly boat people that plagued both the Bush I and Clinton Administrations, Bush II made sure that the first installment of USAID aid was used to pay Haitian Coast Guards' salaries with instructions not to let any of the desperate fleeing Haitians make it out of the harbor.
While the paramilitary took care of their part of the job, Powell needed to put together a para-government. Powell knew that for the new para-government that he was choosing to have any legitimacy it would need at least a nominal Haitian face on it.
THE RESTORATION OF DEMOCRACY
Powell constructed a new Haiti Government in four steps (since Aristide only won with 90+% of the popular vote).
To construct a suitable administration to form this "Democratic Government" Powell simply ignored the inconvenient clauses in Haiti's Constitution.
The first step was to fill the void left by Aristide's removal from office. The chief justice of the Supreme Court, Boniface Alexandre, was sworn in as interim president on February 29, as stipulated in the Haitian Constitution. The Constitution also requires that the appointment be ratified by Parliament. But the Convergence Démocratique (CD) had successfully blocked Aristide's numerous efforts to hold elections, and so there were no legislators to ratify the appointment because their terms had expired. Foley magnanimously stepped in to fill the void and took the place of the whole parliament and witnessed Alexandre's appointment.
The constitution also requires that a replacement is only named when there is a clear and unambiguous resignation. The second step was taken on March 3 when a "Tripartite Council" was nominated. It had representatives of the Lavalas government (Leslie Voltaire, who was living overseas and was not authorized by anyone in the FL Party and who is now running for President this election, Plateforme Ansanm Nou Fo), the opposition (Paul Denis) and the IC (Adama Guindo). This guaranteed that the FL would lose to the opposition and IC who would speak with one voice. The Tripartite Council's job was to appoint another council.
This brings us to step three: the Tripartite Council appointed a seven member Conseil des Sages -- the "Council of the Wise." This council was supposedly made up of cross section of Haiti's political, religious and economic sectors. It actually consisted of a weak FL member (Paul Emil Simon he is probably like Colmes) and the remaining members were from anti-Lavalas elite, "including USAID/IRI/CIDA-grantees Ariel Henry (CD), Ann-Marie Issa (director of rightwing radio Signal FM) and Danielle Maglorie (director of ENFOFANM, another elite women's rights group), along with member of the anti-Aristide clergy and the anti-Aristide university sector." (Damming The Flood, P259) And these seven people would replace the unsuitable Yvon Neptune with a new prime minister.
This council to the disappointment of the elite OPL politicians, such as, Paul Denis, chose Gérard Latortue. He is a neoliberal, radio talk show host who lived in Florida for the past twenty years. He was described as objective and fair with "no ax to grind." However, he was actually a well-connected member of the anti-Aristide elite and he and his nephew Youri Latortue played a significant role in the coordination of the paramilitary and parapolitical opposition groups. Unlike any other prime minister in Haiti's history, Latortue had absolute power for the next two years because there was no parliament and only a place-holder president. His government excluded all FL and was loyal to its constituents, the anti-Aristide elite. Democratically elected governments received no aid, but since this was a US style Democracy, the Latortue Administration received 1.2 billion foreign aid dollars.
What did the Aristide administration do that so angered the US, France, Canada and Haiti's morally repugnant elite (MRE)?
It may be helpful to review the actions of the US installed 2004 coup government Latortue's administration:
1. In March 2004 the government abondened Aristide's incredibly effective literacy programme;
2. Cancelled subsidies for schoolbooks and school meals.
3. Ended agrarian reform and took the land back that had been redistributed to peasants.
4. Suspended collection of income taxes for three years in order to help the "poor sweatshop owners".
5. Ended the last remaining price controls and lifted import regulations. This caused the price of rice (Haiti's primary staple good) to increase by more than 400%.
6. The new medical Tabarre University that Aristide devoted a considerable amount of time and precious Haiti government resources to create was shut down and has been occupied by UN troops, ever since.
7. "One of the most important things that Larortue undid was Aristide's own small contribution to job creation. Almost as soon as he took control of a country with 70% unemployment, Latortue fired several thousand public sector employees. Many of the people thus sacked from the municipal government, port authority or state telecommunications company lived in poor neighborhoods, and many supported large extended family on their single paycheck." (Damming The Flood, P.261) These paychecks helped the slums of Haiti handle the cruel and inhumane US aid embargo against the country during Aristides presidency. Under the well-funded Latortue Administration there were no job development programs.
Thank you ny brit expat for editing. Chapter 10 Pt 2 next week...
Haiti 2010: Exploiting Disaster1 By Peter Hallward (PDF) The following essay is adapted from the Afterword of the 2010 printing of Hallward's 2008 book, ‘Damming the Flood: Haiti, Aristide and the Politics of Containment’. (Verso). This is a MUST READ but it isn't good. According to Hallward the FL movement is more of a idea or memory than an organization at this point.
The Victims of the Haitian "Contras" Testify
The series of deadly incursions by ex-soldiers and members of the terrorist organization, FRAPH and other mercenaries, especially on the Haitian-Dominican border, didn't just start a few days before the kidnapping and forced exile of President Aristide. Equipped and armed with expensive heavy weapons by agents of the Bush Administration, benefiting from the active complicity of the Dominican government and army, and working in coordination with the internal "opposition", these criminals have spread terror in the border region and led harassment operations which have claimed dozens of civilian victims during the last two years.
Here is a brief report on the attacks led by the former commissioner, Guy Phillipe and Louis Jodel Chamblain, the former death squad leader, who were presented as "freedom fighters" by the government of Gerard Latortue.
Please see davidseth's diary
Haiti: Yet Another Disaster Lurks
and
FishOutOfWater's diary about Hurricane Tomas-must reads!
Hurricane Tomas to Turn Towards Haiti: Tents & Cholera
This is the Justice, Not Charity! Haiti book diary. RunawayRose and I are writing these book diaries because we became shocked by the truth of Haiti’s history and what really is needed to help the Haitians after the earthquake.
News Update:
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IJDH Director Brian Concannon has agreed to an interview. If you have a question about Haiti, please leave a comment (sorry questions are full). But if you have a Haiti question lets talk about it in comments, and if we can't figure it out we can email and see if someone answers:-) I will email him a list of questions in the beginning of November and will post the interview in Black Kos on 11/16.
It is wonderful that he has taken time out of his incredibly busy schedule to give us an interview.
IJDH has been ahead of every major issue that earthquake survivors face
These are really good videos.
Haiti Today #2 of 4 on 9-9-6 Brian Concannon of IDJH (24min) Haiti Today Occupation & Resistance part #2 of 4, Berkley CA, with Brian Concannon of Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti. * with speakers Father Jean-Juste, Dr. Paul Farmer.
Change Haiti Can Believe In - Part 5 (8min)Brian Concannon, Director of the Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti, talks about the need for a "clean break from the past" in U.S. policy towards in Haiti.
And he has been on Kos for quite a while Brian Concannon
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Sources We Like
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Be sure not to miss
JDH's Summer Reading list.. Please take a couple of minutes to see/complete (takes 5 minutes) today's action alert directly below today's topic. Join us for today's news discussion and more.
Today is Haiti diary book day : Current book is Damming The Flood: Haiti, Aristide, And The Politics Of Containment, by Peter Hallward: Chapter 10 Pt.1 : You can see our book list is here.
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This is our book list so far:
- Any suggestions? We are looking for books, articles, websites where we can get accurate information about Haiti. Please share any information.
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- I found one The World Traveler - Haiti page.: This website has excerpts from books including The Uses of Haiti and Damming The Flood and other books that we are reading. It also has an extensive list of articles-excellent information
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The Aristide Foundation for Democracy (AFD) was created in 1996 by former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide (the first democratically elected president of Haiti) with a simple principle in mind: "The promise of democracy can only be fulfilled if all sectors of Haitian society are able to actively participate in the democratic life of the nation."
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Haiti Emergency Relief Foundation (HERF):
Haiti’s grassroots movement – including labor unions, women’s groups, educators and human rights activists, support committees for political prisoners, and agricultural cooperatives – are funneling needed aid to those most hit by the earthquake. They are doing what they can – with the most limited of funds – to make a difference. Please take this chance to lend them your support. All donations to the Haiti Emergency Relief Fund will be forwarded to our partners on the ground to help them rebuild what has been destroyed.
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Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti:
Mission
We strive to work with the people of Haiti in their non-violent struggle for the consolidation of constitutional democracy, jus tice and human rights, by distributing objective and accurate information on human rights conditions in Haiti, pursuing legal cases, and cooperating with human rights and solidarity groups in Haiti and abroad.
IJDH draws on its founders’ internationally-acclaimed success accompanying Haiti’s poor majority in the fields of law, medicine and social justice activism. We seek the restoration of the rule of law and democracy in the short term, and work for the long-term sustainable change necessary to avert Haiti’s next crisis.
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"IJDH is simply the most reliable source for information and analysis on human rights in
Haiti." — Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA)
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Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti: |
