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Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti

Tuesday 12 September 2006

Debate

By Michael Deibert [1]

Submitted to AlterPresse on September 11, 2006

A recent article in the British medical journal The Lancet ’Human rights abuse and other criminal violations in Port-au-Prince, Haiti: a random survey of households,†[2] rather than serving as a sober analysis of the myriad of human rights abuses that occurred under Haiti’s 2004-2006 interim government, appears to be little more than part of an ongoing attempt to rehabilitate the public image of former Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide and elements of his political party, Fanmi Lavalas [3].

The article in question, quoted extensively by Mr. Aristide’s U.S. attorney, Ira Kurzban, in a recent editorial in The Miami Herald [4], was co-authored by Athena R. Kolbe, who has previously written extensively about Haiti under the nom de plume Lyn Duff. Described as "a friend of Aristide" in a 2004 article [5] in the magazine "Dissident Voice," Ms. Kolbe worked at Mr. Aristide’s Lafanmi Selavi center for street children, which served as one of the nexuses for the gangs who terrorized Haiti during the latter’s 2001-2004 tenure as Haiti‘s president. All of this naturally begs the question of how Kolbe/Duff’s “research†into the issue of human rights violations and the perpetrators can be regarded as objective when she states that for three and half years she was an Aristide employee, and states that her sympathies are solidly with Haiti’s disgraced former president.

The atmosphere of violence in Haiti today did not spring out of a vacuum. With some of the ghastly rapes and murders carried out in the town of Saint Marc as the Aristide regime sputtered to its bloody dénouement in February 2004 [6]  [7]- including one in the ruins of the city’s burned-out commissariat by the pro-Aristide Bale Wouze (Clean Sweep) gang - carried out in the presence of Corps d’Intervention et de Maintien d’Ordre (CIMO) and Unite de Securite de la Garde du Palais National d’Haiti government forces (at the time reporting directly to Mr. Aristide’s National Palace), one must ponder whether these sexual assaults were happening with government sanction.

In his Miami Herald editorial, Mr. Kurzban writes that “The University of Miami School of Law’s Center for Human Rights, led by the prominent human-rights author and professor Irwin Stotzky, Harvard University’s Human Rights Clinic and the Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti all detailed executions and systematic human-rights violations after Aristide’s removal.â€

While no one disputes the fact that human rights abuses took place during the 2004-2006 interim government in Haiti (in a personal aside, I lost several friends to Haiti’s violence during this period), the devil, as they say, is in the details.

The University of Miami School of Law’s Irwin P. Stotzky was a long-time board member of Mr. Aristide’s aptly misnamed "Foundation for Democracy†and his own biography on the school’s website [8] announces that “he has served as an attorney and adviser to Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.†The only attorney in Haiti thanked by name in the pages of the university’s voluminous Haiti report was for a considerable time an employee of an Aristide government-funded legal organization, the Bureau des Avocats Internationaux. One of the report’s key claims - that pro-Artistide armed gangs congealed after the president’s departure - has been revealed to be false by the reporting of many journalists, foreign and Haitian, working on the ground in Haiti since 2001 [9]  [10].

The Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti (IJDH) , for its part, listed Mr. Kurzban as one it’s founders and "a member of the Board of Directors" in a 24^th March 2005 letter sent to Santiago A. Canton, Executive Secretary of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights of the OAS [11]. Though the organization is ostensibly headquartered in Oregon, where its lead attorney resides, donations are directed to be sent to a Florida address, where Mr. Kurzban resides. The group’s 2005 annual report lists $53,836 of contributions from several "individual supporters" with long-standing links to Mr. Aristide, including Mr. Kurzban himself [12]. Recently, the organization has busied itself with an attack on a Haitian public servant of unimpeachable integrity, Port-au-Prince chief prosecutor Claudy Gassant, who had to flee Haiti for his life during Mr. Aristide’s tenure while attempting to investigate the murder of Haiti’s most prominent journalist, Jean Dominique, and who the IJDH maligns as a "a prominent Lavalas critic†in a recent press release [13].

In a similar vein, when Mr. Kurzban writes that Haiti’s 2004-2006 interim government “paid a U.S. law firm $250,000 a month retainer solely to bring against Aristide a civil suit that was ultimately dismissed,†he errs in that the case was in fact withdrawn with an option to refile, not dismissed. When it comes to the subject of expenditures, Mr. Kurzban declines to reveal that, according to US Department of Justice Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) filings, his own law firm received an astonishing $4,648,964 from the Aristide government of behalf of its lobbying efforts alone between 2001 and 2004 [14], and that Mr. Kurzban still serves as Mr. Aristide’s attorney in the United States. By way of putting things in perspective, Mr. Kurzban was thus earning from the Haitian state more than 2,000 times the average yearly income of any one of the more than 7 million people in Haiti who survive on less that $2 per day. For his part in Mr. Aristide’s propaganda campaign, the public relations firms of former U.S. congressmen and head of the Congressional Black Caucus Ron Dellums received the relatively modest sum of $989,323 over the same period.

Though the Lancet report chronicles no rapes or murders committed by Fanmi Lavalas partisans, something that flies in the face of the on-the-ground reporting of journalists who have worked in Haiti for the last two years, it may be instructive to recall that, over the last two years, defectors from Mr. Aristide’s party have charged publicly that former president was orchestrating a large part of Haiti’s violence from exile with the connivance of former officials of his government [15]. Citing the July 2005 murder of Haitian journalist Jacques Roche, a May 2005 attack on a Port-au-Prince marketplace that killed seven people and saw a large part of the market, which served the capital’s poor, burned to ashes and what they charged was a campaign of rape by gangs supportive of the exiled president in the capital’s slums, last year four of Haiti’s most politically progressive organizations - the Groupe d’Appui aux Rapatries et Refugies (GARR), the Plateforme haïtienne de Plaidoyer pour un Développement Alternatif (PAPDA), Solidarité des Femmes Haïtiennes (SOFA) and Centre National et International de Documentation et d’Information de la Femme en Haïti (EnfoFanm) - all signed a petition calling for Aristide to be judged for his crimes against the Haitian people [16].

Rape and other transgressions, unfortunately, appear to be looked upon as just another weapon in the arsenal of some of Haiti’s politicians by which they can crush opposition to them and whatever designs they may have on power. It is high time that it be denounced without regards to who is committing it, and that foreign lawyers, journalists, researchers and others stop attempting to shield the guilty from having to answer for their crimes.

…………………………….

[1] Michael Deibert is the author of Notes from the Last Testament: The Struggle for Haiti (Seven Stories Press). His website is www.michaeldeibert.com. His blog can be read at www.michaeldeibert.blogspot.com.

[2] -“Human rights abuse and other criminal violations in Port-au-Prince, Haiti: a random survey of households,†by Athena R Kolbe and Royce A Hutson, The Lancet, 31 August 2006..

[3] - “Journal reconsiders article about Haiti rights abuse,†by The Associated Press, 9 September 2006..

[4] -“Latortue’s disturbing legacy,†by Ira Kurzban, The Miami Herald, 7 September 2006..

[5] -“Debunking the Media’s Lies about President Aristide,“ by Justin Felux, Dissident Voice. 14 March 2004..

[6] - “Town taken from rebels feels heat of reprisal,†by Marika Lynch, The Miami Herald, 24 February 2004..

[7] -Notes from the Last Testament: The Struggle for Haiti (Seven Stories Press) by Michael Deibert, November 2005..

[8] -University of Miami School of Law Faculty bio.

[9] -“Haitian Gangs Combat Demonstrators,†Gerry Hadden report for National Public Radio‘s “All Things Considered,†10 February 2004..

[10] -“Militias’ might key to Aristide’s grip on power,†by Steven Dudley, Boston Globe, 19 February 2004..

[11] -"Letter to Inter-American Commission on Human Rights," 24 March 24 2005..

[12] -IJDH Annual Report 2005..

[13] -“Demand Fairness for René Civil†by the Insititute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti, 31 August 2006..

[14] -Foreign Agents Registration Unit (FARA) Semi-Annual Reports (Haiti), 2001-2004..

[15] - “Un ancien zélé partisan d’Aristide passe aux aveux,†by Radio Metropole, 28 January 2005..

[16] - “Pétition citoyenne pour réclamer la mise en accusation de Jean-Bertrand Aristide et de ses partisans en Haïti,†by PAPDA, GARR, EnfoFanm and SOFA, 26 July 2005.

Participer au débat autour de cet article >> Prière d'être bref. En cas d'élaboration étendue, veuillez soumettre un nouvel article à AlterPresse Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 21 September 2006, par Wim Nusselder, a Dutch development economist Politics is organizing the future of a society as a whole. Humans rights violation is criminality for political purposes or caused by political neglect. How to organize the future of Haiti to safeguard human rights, should be priority for Haiti. Politics has to deal primarily with the terrible poverty to do so. The rich protect their wealth, the poor try to get a piece of the pie, either with political motives or as ‘mere criminals’. Many Haitians don’t seem to have much scruples about using violence to do so. Relative responsibility for the resulting human rights violation by (those pretending to represent) the poor and (those trying to hide that they primarily represent) the rich partly depends on who controls the state and who gets most outside support. Usually the rich have more means at their disposal to protect their interests than the poor and ... to give the means they use a semblance of legality. Dealing with poverty requires economics. Economics is organizing that people get what they want. Usually the organizers get more than they need and a lot of others are relatively excluded from wealth. Economics is increasingly globalized. Being rich (like me, living in the Netherlands) implies using resources from everywhere on the globe. Global wealth production stays only just within its ecological limits and even surpasses them at times, e.g. by causing global warming, deforestation, erosion, silting etc.. Being rich therefore usually implies that you use more than your share of earth’s resources. Being rich implies a responsibility to organize wealth for those excluded by one’s disproportionate claim on resources... Anyhow, human rights cannot be guaranteed without politics, economics and ecological sanity. Répondre à ce message >> Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 18 September 2006 Mr. Diebert: Aristide, it must be admitted, is a genius. A genius of Evil, that is. His disciples are back at work these days. A genius at manipulating lies until they are believed to be truths. A genius at covering the tracks of his crimes. The myriad of unsolved murders and criminal acts, starting with the bomb explosion at his December 5, 1990 election rally, speak for themselves. The moment of truth will come, and it will be thanks to those who, like you, fight for it to happen. No decent minded person can argue against the urgent need for better living conditions in Haiti, particularly for its impoverished citizenery. Bashing its "elites" and forcing its competent citizens out of the country are not the way to do it. That, lavalas is incapable of comprehending! Sorry to be anonymous: I still have family down there. Répondre à ce message >> Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 15 September 2006 This debate is between Aristidians and those opposed to him. All sides share a common characteritic: They are well fed, have clean drinking water, and have health insurance. The debate should be: How do we prioritize clean water, food, and health for the Haitian people??? Aristide, Kurzban, Gassant, you and me, are living a life of luxury compared to the people outside of PAP. Focus on those items, service those needs, and Aristide will be, as he is now, a thing of the past. Titid was President 2 times. Haiti was invaded 2 times. If he was to return once more, we will be invaded a third ime. This time, no Haitian will be in the new Government. Haiti will be put directly under foreign control. They pay, they rule. Get real, people!!!!! Répondre à ce message >> Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 9 January 2007, par Michael Deibert I just noticed now, several months later, that one of the posters in response to this piece wrote the following: This debate is between Aristidians and those opposed to him. All sides share a common characteritic: They are well fed, have clean drinking water, and have health insurance. Actually, there are 48 million Americans without health insurance. I happen to be one of them. In fact I wrote about it in a recent piece for the Inter-Press Service, Ailing Health System Defies Easy Fix. Répondre à ce message >> Deibert’s article does not show the whole truth 12 September 2006 Here is an article that exposes the campaign against the Lancet Study. Why does Alter Presse not print articles that are critical of the elites and right wingers in Haiti ? www.counterpunch.org Death Threats Against Lancet’s Haiti Human Rights Investigator COUNTERPUNCH Sep. 12, 2006 By Jeb Sprague & Joe Emersberger http://www.counterpunch.org/sprague... Répondre à ce message >> Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 12 September 2006, par kole Michael Deibert has very little credibility on the subject he’s taking about. He’s definately a partisan and not someone to be trusted, or who should be leveling charges of bias against anyone. His book reads like a demonization of the Aristide government, which is all fine and good if you want to get on a Best Seller list by demonizing the Empire’s official enemies of the day, but that has little bearing on the reality of the situation on the ground. Fact is that Deibert has been notably silent about the gross-human rights abuses under the coup-regime. Apparently, overthrowing democratic governments at the behest of France-Canada-USA is all fine and good in his books. Sad that an alternative publication would even consider publishing such rubbish. Répondre à ce message >> Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 12 September 2006 It’s this sad perspective that keeps Haiti headed backwards and not forward. Anybody who speaks openly about injustice is labelled as partisan by those who are being implicated. This finger-pointing goes on from all areas of the political spectrum in Haiti. Rather than pursuing justice for Haiti, they seek to debase their opponents. Rather than doing what’s right and just, they try to shift the attention off of them and on to others. The righteous man doesn’t need to point fingers to be justified. They’re justified by the fruit of their actions. If Haitian politicians spent more time worrying about DOING their job rather than GETTING AND KEEPING their job the governmental infrastructure wouldn’t be in the mess that it’s in now. Haiti suffers from a power-hungry population. It’s forever caught in this struggle for power and the people who suffer the most are the ones who just want to eat and live. This article is exactly what Haiti, and particularly the Haitian political class, needs to hear right now. As long as the finger-pointing game is being played, Haiti and Haitians will suffer the consequences. Haiti and its people cry out for justice. This is the least they deserve at this time. No more games. Only justice. Répondre à ce message >> Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 12 September 2006, par Christine There are other sources also critizing the study as well. A simple check of news about Haiti on google shows this... And maybe Alter Presse decided to publish it because it’s true/has validity. I am glad alternative news sites such as this one do not pick and choose news stories based on whether or not they match up with some preconceived notion or bias on a particular topic. Aristide was a promising leader who did not live up to his potential. He was passionate about Haiti and did good there but "miserable power" (Michelle Montas) corrupts and it corrupted him. Ignoring all that went on during his reign and pointing a weak finger at the "West" and babbling about consipiracy theories doesn’t change the facts of the many murders and violence perpetrated against critics of Lavalas and Arisitde during and after his tenure in office. One notable murder was that of Jean Dominique. No the interim administration in Haiti did not do a good job or maybe even a passable job during their tenure but didn’t we learn as children that two wrongs don’t make right? Simply pointing away from Aristide and his wrongdoings does not, once again, change facts. Blind partisianship towards Aristide is shown once again in the "study" done by an Aristide supporter and backed up by his lawyer... If only I had such great friends... Répondre à ce message >> Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 12 September 2006 So who should we listen to if Michael Deibert has very little credibility on the subject he’s taking about? he seems to be on point with his information. How about Ira Kurzban who represents Jean Bertrand Aristide? he seems to be the one you are listening to if you can make these comments. How about Pierre Marie paquiot? who got both his legs broken while trying to protect university students against Aristides Gangs. I’m refering to this instance because I saw video of this tragic event. when you claim that: “His book reads like a demonization of the Aristide government, which is all fine and good if you want to get on a Best Seller list by demonizing the Empire’s official enemies of the day, but that has little bearing on the reality of the situation on the ground.†You are exposing your weakness which is absolute ignorance when it comes to what is really going on in Haiti. Aristide didn’t have the Tonton Macoutes or the Army. He had is gangs or chimeres that were never disarmed after he fleed the country and till this day are terrorizing the haitian population . He is the main reason you have this big human rights catastrophy in Haiti. ARISTIDE Michael, good job of exposing these disguised chimeres that are looking out for their pockets at the expense of 8,000,000 poor souls in Haiti. Répondre à ce message >> Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 12 September 2006 Putting quotations marks around the word research is not a very convincing way of dicrediting the study, arguments would be needed here instead. No references are given about the alledged "ongoing attempt to rehabilitate the public image of former Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide", nor any arguments about why the study "appears to be little more than part" of this supposed attempt. It is har to see why the study, peer reviewed and published by one of the most prestigious journals in the area, would not be objective just because one of its authors would have sympathies for former president Aristide. For an opposite view, see the article by Jef Sprague and Joe Emesberger at http://www.counterpunch.com/sprague.... Répondre à ce message >> Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 12 September 2006, par GINOU Il est evident que les droits humains ont servi de banniere pour les groupes en conflit en Haiti et les secteurs internationaux impliques dans la situation politique locale. Il y a eu certainement une campagne a partir des denonces relatives aux violations des droits humains liees au gouvernement d’Aristide orchestree par le Departement d’ Etat et d’autres agences federales, comme la CIA et l’ USAID avec la complicite de groupes locaux. Les defenseurs du leader lavalassien, face aux graves violations des droits humains commises durant le regime de transition ont pris la revele. Le debat devrait se concentrer sur les donnees et informations degagees par cette investigation. Sont elles fausses ou non? Elles sont naturellement motivees par des interets politiques, cependant la methode explicitee par les auteurs pour arriver a leurs conclusions, donne sur le point scientifique un certain poids a leur enquette. Par ailleurs il est difficile de nier meme avec la participation des chimeres et groupes pro lavalas dans la violence politique en Haiti, que les victimes des droits humains dans ce pays soient majoritairement des habitants des quartiers populaires, dont une bonne partie est loyale a Aristide. Répondre à ce message >> Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 12 September 2006, par Michael Deibert I think the question is begged that if Ms. Kolbe intentionally deceived the editors of The Lancet and her peers about the nature of her relationship with Mr. Aristide, what else could she have deceived them about? If that, coupled with the many millions of dollars floating around Mr. Aristide’s advocates and self-described human rights organizations - that only speak out when the human rights of one political party are violated - does not suggest a coordinated campaign, it is hard to know what does. Human rights violations have been committed by all sides in the conflict in Haiti, and they should be denounced as such. I myself have repeatedly spoken out against violence, whether committed by Mr. Aristide’s partisans or the interim government, without distinction. One example can be found here: http://www.haitiwebs.com/haitianfor... The idea that the Aristide government was ousted by a small clique of Haitian bourgeois as opposed to a combination of large-scale popular protests and the Guy Philippe-lead desperado contingent arriving in Haiti from the Dominican Republic is a nice fantasy to hold onto sitting behind a computer in the United States and Canada, but is inaccurate and intentionally deceptive when seeing first-hand the situation on the streets of Haiti. Some posters seem to forget that that popular discontent with Aristide’s mis-rule of Haiti began in fact in the summer of 2002, with attempts to seize control of Haiti’s State University system (the chronicle of the climax of which can be found here: http://www.soros.org/newsroom/news/... As well as the collapse of a government-endorsed pyramid investment scheme, some of which can be read about here: http://www.alterpresse.org/spip.php... Additionally, some posters seem to forget that the armed uprising against Mr. Aristide began with the murder of Amiot Matayer in September 2003, not with the arrival of Mr. Philippe’s men four months later. Michael Norton’s article for the Associated Press “Police Raid Leaves Five Dead in Haiti,†gives a nice example of the Aristide government saw fit to respond to this: http://www.newshaiti.com/index.php?... The photos from one demonstration calling for Mr. Aristide’s departure on 26 December 2003 (by no means the largest one), taken by Raoul Vital of AlterPresse, and available here: http://www.alterpresse.org/article.... They go a long way to assessing how deep popular revulsion was with what the government had become. Répondre à ce message >> Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 12 September 2006, par Leon R. Congratulations, Mr. Deibert. You are a true friend of Haiti, unlike those like Mr. Kurzban who can best be called scavengers, always looking to make money out of the poorest of the poor, while pretending to help them, all the while associating with the demagogues like Aristide who prey upon them. it is about time someone set the facts straight for the Haitian people to know. Répondre à ce message >> Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 12 September 2006, par Adm For more information on Diebert’s credibilty, readers should see Podur’s "Kofi Annan’s Haiti". Which offers a short critique of his book "Notes from the Last Testament". A sample: Notes from the Last Testament deploys the standard literary techniques of the middlebrow foreign correspondent. The narrative is essentially experiential: our man in Port-au-Prince leaves his flat, attends a demonstration, breathes the air, encounters various characters who mutter ominous words about Aristide or sigh about what’s happening to the country. An aerosol of local colour—blue skies, crowded lanes, pungent smells, snatches of kreyol, barefoot kids, throbbing music—is spray-painted over a framework supported at all key points by international officialdom. Time and again, the clinching argument of a passage will be made by ‘a member of the oas team’, ‘a veteran of international observer missions’, or a seemingly ubiquitous ‘us official’. Further claims are attributed to still more anonymous sources: ‘many said’, ‘most said’, ‘critics wondered’, ‘it appeared’; or simply to ‘rumours’, some of which were ‘unusually detailed rumours’. Half a dozen interviews with prominent Haitian opponents of the Lavalas government—Andy Apaid, Evans Paul, Chavannes Jean-Baptiste, Hans Tippenhauer, Micha Gaillard, Pierre Esperance of the National Coalition on Human Rights and (in Manhattan) Michele Montas, widow of Jean Dominique, the radical radio journalist profiled in Jonathan Demme’s The Agronomist—fill in the gaps. Full article can be found here: Répondre à ce message >> Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 12 September 2006, par Adm The link to the article is here (didn’t show up in previous message): Kofi Annan’s Haiti : Justin Podur http://newleftreview.org/A2604 Répondre à ce message >> Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 12 September 2006, par Michael Deibert I must admit that I am partial to the review Char Miller, director of Urban Studies at Trinity University, wrote for the San Antonio Express-News here: http://www.mysanantonio.com/enterta... And the review Don Bohning (who has covered Haiti for almost 40 years) wrote for The Miami Herald here: http://www.moun.com/articles.asp?ar... However, my response to the attempts of Aristide-aligned bodies such as the Mr. Kurzban, IJDH, Counterpunch and Znet to discredit Renè Garcia Prèval’s February electoral victory (as well as Mr. Podur’s cause-du-jour approach to Haiti and its problems) can be found here: http://zope06.v.servelocity.net/hjs... Répondre à ce message >> Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 12 September 2006, par Michael Deibert It is also interesting to note that Haiti’s Commission Episcopale Nationale Justice et Paix - a genuinely non-partisan body - recently released a report where it stated the following: "Many political and even economic sectors are involved with violence and weapons. It is important to remember that fact. This is not about making accusations, but we must be conscious that arms do not resolve anything. Those who commit acts of violence, who are responsible for such acts must face that truth and accept their responsibility. The State must also face its responsibility and fight violence and impunity." The Commission counted 2506 dead victims of violence during the 47 months it has been operating. The full report can be read here: www.forumcitoyen.org.ht/jilap MD Répondre à ce message >> Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 12 September 2006, par Adm Substance aside, since none exists as usual, it’s illuminating that the response you referenced is published by an unabashed neoconservative think tank; The Henry Jackson Society . We all know these entities have an excellent record of championing "human rights" and "democracy" around the globe, as compared to evil organizations like ZNet or Counterpunch etc. Deibert - the neoconservative people’s champ, impressive. Répondre à ce message >> Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 12 September 2006, par Michael Deibert I find it suggestive that, rather than debate the subject at hand - that a well-financed, well-organized propaganda campaign is being waged to distort the truth about Haiti in progressive circles and to undermine the government of Haitian President Rene Preval for the benefit of Jean-Bertrand Aristide and sectors of his Fanmi Lavalas party - individuals not brave enough to disclose their names are reduced to making personal attacks. I guess that what happens when you don’t have an argument, and are unable to challenge a single point in the editorial itself. Perhaps those individuals disagree with the point that rape and other transgressions against the people of Haiti should be denounced without regards to who are committing them. If so, I am sure Haiti’s wealthy political class will be very relieved that there are still foreigners gullible enough to spread that message for them. Répondre à ce message >> Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti 14 September 2006, par Bob I applaud Michael Deibert’s concern for the Haitian people, especially its weakest members. Indeed the Haitian people cry out for justice against those who under the guise of their hypocritical concern, as with Mr. Kurzban, have sought continuously to prey upon its meagre resources, leaving its children without school-books and with no medical care. Imagine how much of that could have been bought with the $ 10.8 million collected by Mr. Kurzban, by his own admission, from the Haitian Treasury, while helping his friends bankrupt Teleco and the Haitian public treasury? Indeed, Human Rights, not Politics, should be the priority for Haiti! Répondre à ce message >> 2,000 times the income of an average Haitian?!?!?! 14 September 2006, par James How can these people defend the point of view of someone Aristide made rich while the Haitians starved and died in the street? They should be ashamed to speak of Haiti as they sit in their nice houses in the United States and attack Mr. Deibert and the Haitian who try to make Haiti a better country! They are the real elites. Répondre à ce message >> 2,000 times the income of an average Haitian?!?!?! 15 September 2006, par Jean For the love of money or out of true concern for Haitians? Michael Deibert is right. Our concern should be for the human rights of Haitians, who for too long have been ignored, mistreated, exploited and abused by those who like Kurzban, Concannon and their acolytes make money out of their misery, hiding their greed under a guise of concern and hoping for the day when they can once again feed at the empty trough of the Haitian people. Human rights indeed is what we need, not more blood-suckers! Jean Répondre à ce message >> Rebuilding Haiti is the Priority! 16 September 2006 Haiti needs to start healing since it has been slowly dying. We, as Haitians, must stop pointing fingers and realize we are all to blame for the deteriorating crisis in our country. In the past, we elected or tolerated demagogues, tyrants, who were allowed to pillage and destroy our country. Let’s learn from the past to build a better Haiti free of foreign influence in the likes of Kurzban, Concannon, and particularly Dellums, Maxime Waters, John Conyers (so-called African-American freedom fighters), among others. Haiti is in dire need of uplifting its health systems, revamping agricultural outputs (must deal with the erosion crisis so we can feed the masse), educational reforms (including civic education in schools to teach our youth law and order), sound investment in the rural areas to rescind the migration influx in P-au-P in order to restructure its debilitating infrastructure. We need to be rid of these notorious gangs who are terrorizing the country through adequate social programs or alternatively through “whatever means necessary†as they are proving to be a major obstacle to Haiti’s security and stability. Equally important, we need to do our utmost to positively support the current government. We may not have all voted for the new government but unless we all pull together, to support the govt., Haiti will continue in its downward path. We must end our divisiness and bring forth our goodwill through the art of compromise and unity. Haiti, can succeed through ALL of us, pulling together in the rebuilding effort of our country. Remember our ancestors’ slogan: L’Unité fait la Force... Concerned Haitian in Maryland (USA) Répondre à ce message >> Response to Wim Nusselder 25 September 2006, par Michael Deibert Dear Wim, I find your comments interesting and thought-provoking. I think you may have misunderstood the title of my piece, though. "Human rights, not politics, should be priority for Haiti," refers to my belief that human rights abuses in Haiti should be investigated and exposed without regard to the political affiliation of those committing them, rather than to advance a partisan agenda or to shield some of the perpetrators from accountability for their actions. I agree with many of the points you raise. Best, MD Répondre à ce message >> Rebuilding Haiti is the Priority! 19 December 2006 Yes - Every in Haiti needs to be rebuilt. But the big question remains: Who is going to do the rebuiling? I just don’t see it. Us Haitians have not ever come up with any sort of global (or detailed) plan to rebuilt anything, be it the broken/inexistent infrastructure, agriculture, the schooling system, the police, the justice systems ,... What we have instead are various initiatives by the UN, USAID or the EU of initiative for this and that development project. In the meantime, Haitian Governments or present and past are uusually too busy begging for hand-outs. And I am sure that no matter how much money or aid is given, nothing will get done. The main problem is and has been not the amount of money that you have, but the willingness and capacity to do useful things for the country and its population. A good example in that respect is the Democratic Republic of Congo. Its goverment has plenty of money and the country is rich in mineral resources (gold, diamond ...) - But the fact remains that it’s one the poorest in Africa. Other examples closer to home : - Aristide was given close to a billion dollars in the 2 years after he returned from exile (1994/1995). Where did that money go? - The US has given millions to reform the justice system back in 1997-1998. Any goverment who spends its time begging for money should not be trusted. Instead, they should get busy and come up with projects (even small) that can benefit the population with our own (meager) resources. As we get results, others who are willing to help will come forth with technical and financial help. We must also learn to be proud again and pick-up ourselves from the bootstartp so to speak. If post-USSR Cuba can survive, then anybody can. Our professional (and arrogant!) beggers are not worthy of ’leading’ this once great nation. We have all gotten too accustomed to our representatives whinning for crummy handouts from the International Community, " ... in order to develop Haiti ...’ This is vividly illustrated in a recent quote by our great Prime Minister, Jacques E. Alexis. He should be ashamed, and perhaps so should we. ... Article : L’ONU demande près de 98 millions de dollars pour les besoins d’Haïti. Le Premier ministre haïtien a souhaité que cet appel de l’ONU soit entendu par le plus grand nombre de donateurs. "Mon pays vit des moments difficiles, conséquences de l’irresponsabilité et de l’égoïsme de nos élites. Nous espérons que les engagements (de l’ONU) soient contagieux et suscitent d’autres participations", a dit M. Alexis. Répondre à ce message >>

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> Haiti : Risk, conflict and sustainable change

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