Haiti the big picture. By Jean H Charles

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"Ne doutez jamais qu'un petit nombre de citoyens volontaires et réfléchis peut changer le monde. En fait, cela se passe toujours ainsi"
Margaret Mead (1901-1978)

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From: Jeanhcharles <jeanhcharles@aol.com>
Date: Fri, 08 Apr 2011 16:10:59
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Subject: Haiti the big picture

Haiti, the big picture!

By Jean H Charles

The Haitian people after the birth of democracy some twenty five years
ago (the Haitian Constitution was adopted on March 29 1987) have put
their faith in three leaders to lead them into the road towards
development. Michel Joseph Martelly is the last one.

There was first Gerard Gourgue who never made it to the balloting box
as the election was disrupted by gun fire on the sadistic day of
November 28 1987. The military regime in place than, allegedly under
order of international directive, (the Reagan government mistakenly
attributed Gerard Gourgue to leftist leaning) opened fire on innocent
people in line for voting, committing the crime of lese democracy.
Dozen were killed, the proceedings were disrupted, and Gerard Gourgue a
fiery Human rights lawyer never made it onto the altar of the national
frontispiece.

The convulsion brought in a slew of de facto governments until the
election of 1991 when the Haitian people chose a fiery anti-American
cum leftist leaning, former Catholic priest Jean Bertrand Aristide as
their leader. The experience was cathartic. Aristide turned out to be a
divisive personality bent on pulling apart the very fabric of the
Haitian national ethos. Twice ejected out of the country, he is now
back home, allegedly as a private citizen interested mainly in the area
of education.

There was in between Rene Preval a nemesis of Jean Bertrand Aristide
the beneficiary of the choice of the international community. He was
not, because of his persona and his lack of commitment to the welfare
of the people, a popular choice.

Some twenty five years later after the departure of the dictator Jean
Claude Duvalier, the Haitian people has chosen an iconoclast music band
leader Joseph Michel Martelly, to avenge the country and to create a
nation that shall become hospitable to all.

The birthing of this dawn to democracy was not easy. As elaborated in
my previous columns, the government as well as a large section of the
international community did try to convince the electoral board that
the popular voice should be ignored to the benefit at first of the
candidate of the government in power (Jude Celestin). Later in the
second round the call was to shake the numbers for the benefit of the
wife (Mirlande Manigat) of a former President, elected twenty years ago
under the cloud of illegitimacy.

The big picture is: Haiti and its people for the past five (500)
hundred years have been seeking its own place in the sun. During the
first three (300) hundred years, a bloated colonial class was living
off the land like prince and princess out of the slave labor of the
masses who will become the citizens of the first black independent
nation in the world.

During the last two (200) hundred years, special interest groups, have
succeeded as would have said Alan Beattie ( False Economy) to halt and
even send in reverse all economic progress in the country.

The literature on sustainable development is now interested in seeking
out why some countries succeed and why others fail? I have been for a
long time perusing into the reasons why Haiti has been and have
remained a constant basket case. Some of the reasons are deep and
structural. Some are circumstantial.

Because of my long and personal relationship with Henry Namphy (the
strong man General after the departure of Jean Claude Duvalier) and
Gerard Gourgue, I have tried to reconcile both military and civilian
leaders for the sake of the nation. I either did not try hard enough,
or the animosity between both men was too deep and to entrenched, the
end result, Haiti missed twenty five (25) years of solace and good
governance!

The structural impediments are many and varied. Using a page story
from Franklin Delano Roosevelt, I would say at the beginning:" knowing
the right thing to do to enrich your nation is hard enough, bringing
people with you to get it done are even harder". The founding fathers,
Toussaint Louverture, Jean Jacques Dessalines and Henry Christophe knew
how to transform the mass of slaves into productive and creative
citizen.

They could not rally the team of the other generals to conceive and
build a nation hospitable to all after winning the war of independence.
As such Haiti languished during its first century into fratricide
struggles brought about by interest groups that captured the resources
of the country and dragged the nation down.

Around 1911, came about Dr. Jean Price Mars, Haiti' own Dr. Martin
Luther King who taught the nation it must love itself and engage into
nation building. The politicians transform his doctrine into a clan
policy entrenched into the Haitian ethos today.

Haiti suffered also during a long time of the resource curse as
depicted in Pirates of the Caribbean. It was first its majestic
mountains filled with mahogany trees that attracted the French and the
Spanish. Later gold and sugar cane made this island the pearl of the
Antilles.

After the independence, corruption and mismanagement exacerbated the
resource curse whereby Haiti became the failed state poster child of
the Western Hemisphere. Through dictatorship, military government and
illiberal democracy, the nation did not deliver any significant
services to its citizen.

Joseph Michel Martelly has demystified the last bastion of literati and
pundits who could not believe that the Haitian people would identify
themselves with a commoner in politics, backed only by his passion for
Haiti as his pedigree, on his way to the higher office.

I am predicting the Martelly government will be a success for Haiti and
for the region. He will have enough Haitian people at home and in the
Diaspora as well as, well intentioned members and nations of the
international community who will lend a hand to build a nation who will
at last create an aura of hospitalities for all.

After five (500) hundred years, it is about time!