a1052: Toussaint Worries US Gvt (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: JD Lemieux <lxhaiti@yahoo.com>


Popular Haitian Lawmaker Worries U.S.
Onetime Ally, a Suspect In Journalist's Death, Is Also
Rival of Aristide

By Scott Wilson
Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, March 4, 2002; Page A14


PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti -- The rule prohibiting guns on the
floor of the Haitian Senate has always seemed like a
reasonable nod toward civility in a country that has known
little in recent years. But on Jan. 31 a squad of at least
a half-dozen gun-toting men appeared in the austere chamber
escorting one of its members, a charismatic former military
man named Dany Toussaint.

No one stepped forward to remind Toussaint of the no-guns
rule. Nor did anyone suggest that the armed entourage might
intimidate his fellow senators, who on that day were
scheduled to decide whether Toussaint should stand trial
for his allegedly central role in Haiti's most audacious
political killing in a decade. For that to happen, the
Senate would have to lift the immunity Toussaint enjoys as
a lawmaker.

Instead, the Senate sent the matter back to the magistrate
prosecuting the case with a request for more evidence tying
Toussaint to the April 2000 slaying of Jean Dominique,
arguably Haiti's most influential journalist at the time.
The magistrate, however, had fled the country, claiming he
had received death threats from Toussaint's men.

Yvon Neptune, the Senate president and, like Toussaint, a
member of the ruling Family Lavalas party, has ordered an
investigation into why gunmen were in the chamber Jan. 31.
But he has already concluded that Toussaint is posing
problems for his impoverished country and for its
president, Jean-Bertrand Aristide.

"In Family Lavalas, there is only one strongman, and that
is President Aristide," Neptune said. "So anytime someone
brings criticism to the party, they must be a problem."

This was not the role the United States had in mind for
Toussaint when he was the U.S. choice to bring law and
order to Haiti. Now the bon vivant, who rarely travels
without an entourage, exemplifies how U.S. policies in this
troubled Caribbean nation are complicated by some of the
people selected to help carry them out.

Toussaint is among a long line of hardened men the United
States has turned to during Haiti's losing struggle to
create an equitable judicial system and a transparent
democracy in the rough wake of a dictatorship that
collapsed 16 years ago. Country doctor turned dictator
Francois Duvalier ruled Haiti from 1957 until his death in
1971 and was followed by his 19-year-old son, Jean-Claude
Duvalier. With U.S. prodding, and the country's troubles
increasing, he fled Haiti in 1986.

Since then, the United States has turned to, among others,
Emmanuel "Toto" Constant, a CIA operative who headed a
brutal paramilitary squad in the early 1990s, and
U.S.-trained former military men Jean-Jacques Nau and Guy
Philippe, who have been implicated in recent coup attempts.

Like some of his predecessors, Toussaint no longer enjoys
U.S. support and has been barred from entering the United
States. But he is unlikely to disappear as an obstacle to
U.S. policy goals, which center on preserving Haiti's
tenuous stability. Toussaint's hero status, inexplicable
riches and deep loyalties within the National Police he
once led have won him a vast following, making him a threat
to Aristide.

"Clearly, we were wrong about him in the beginning," said a
U.S. official. "He's a nefarious character. We believe he
is involved in political murders. We believe he's involved
in drug trafficking. And we would find it unacceptable for
him to hold any position in the government."

In September 1991, seven months after Aristide was sworn in
as Haiti's first freely elected president, the leftist
former priest was deposed by military coup. Toussaint is
credited by mutual friends with saving Aristide's life by
firing back at the attackers from inside the National
Palace.

After the coup, Toussaint left with Aristide for the United
States, where they spent three years in exile. Then, in
1994, the Clinton administration sent 20,000 soldiers to
restore Aristide's presidency. Toussaint was picked to head
the interim National Police force trained by the United
States to replace the dreaded armed forces.

But Toussaint's relationships with the United States and
with Aristide soured even as his popularity in Haiti grew.
In the May 2000 legislative elections, Toussaint received
more votes than any other candidate, and his political base
in Haiti's West province, which includes this capital of 3
million people, gives him a prime launching pad for the
2005 presidential campaign. He has announced that he
intends to run, and even his most staunch critics say he
likely will win the election.

Unless, perhaps, Aristide turns against him. Acquaintances
of the two men say their relationship is now based on
mutual fear. "They both have a lot of missiles pointed at
each other," said a U.S. official.

If Toussaint breaks with the president, Aristide would lose
much of his ability to rally poor Haitians. A number of
euphemistically named "popular organizations" that provide
mass support for Aristide or rally against his opponents
respond to Toussaint's orders -- and his money. Those
include the mobs that burned opposition headquarters and
opposition-owned houses after a Dec. 17 coup attempt.

Aristide, however, has leverage of his own. The U.S. Drug
Enforcement Administration has suspected Toussaint of
growing rich by helping Haiti become a major gateway for
Colombian cocaine headed to the United States. Toussaint is
one of two senators "credibly linked by a number of U.S.
government agencies to narcotics trafficking in Haiti,"
according to a Dec. 20 letter addressed to Secretary of
State Colin L. Powell from Sen. Mike DeWine (R-Ohio) and
Rep. Porter J. Goss (R-Fla.), who serve on the intelligence
committees of their respective chambers.

The United States is blocking more than $500 million in
badly needed international loans to Haiti, pending an
agreement on reforms between Aristide and the coalition of
opposition parties known as Democratic Convergence. Those
talks are being complicated by Toussaint and the militant
wing of Family Lavalas he represents, which contends
Aristide is giving too much away to an opposition that has
little popular support.

Toussaint, who on Wednesday submitted to questioning before
a new judge on the Dominque case, has denied the
drug-trafficking allegations. But his friends say Toussaint
fears the president could try to solve his own problems
with the United States by turning Toussaint over to U.S.
authorities. Aristide also could make sure Toussaint stands
trial for his alleged role in killing the popular
Dominique, a crime the president is under pressure to
solve.

Toussaint, who declined repeated interview requests, does
not fit the conventional image of a senator. He does not
maintain an office at the decrepit downtown Senate
building, choosing instead to conduct business from Dany
King's Police and Security Supply in the wealthy
neighborhood of Petionville.

>From the building's second-story showroom, Toussaint sells
badges, handcuffs and anti-car-theft devices, among an
array of paramilitary gadgetry. The first floor, however,
is off-limits to the public. A man with a radio stands
guard outside a large wooden door set into a windowless
facade. The man offers to pass a message to the senator,
but he will not say where Toussaint is or when he intends
to arrive.

So Toussaint leaves his friends and enemies to tell his
story. Gerard Jean-Juste, a priest who runs St. Claire's
Church in the Delmas neighborhood, met Toussaint about 15
years ago in the United States. This was during Toussaint's
first exile, when the army major had fled Duvalier's
repressive military after refusing to carry out political
killings. He stayed at Jean-Juste's Haitian Refugee Center
in Miami for a few months.

Jean-Juste portrayed Toussaint as a kind, misunderstood
hero who gets himself into trouble with his outsized ego.
Toussaint, the priest said, donates generously to the Boy
Scouts and a variety of churches. He is, Jean-Juste said, a
peacemaker.

"He's good-humored, a good guy with a little too much
pride," Jean-Juste said. "He likes talking about Dany and
the coup d'etat. He's got a big mouth, but he really makes
you like him."

The Americans working on Haiti after the collapse of the
Duvalier dictatorship certainly fell for him. His
associates say in a whisper that he worked for years with
"the guys at Langley," referring to the CIA.

Toussaint's connection to the CIA remains unclear, and the
U.S. Embassy here declined to discuss the specifics of his
relationship with the U.S. government. Toussaint has taken
to blaming his current problems with the United States on a
CIA-orchestrated vendetta. In 1997 he was held and
questioned by U.S. authorities about his alleged
involvement in the 1995 murder of an Aristide opponent,
Mireille Durocher Bertin.

After receiving FBI training that included human rights
courses, Toussaint returned with Aristide to head the
5,000-member interim National Police in 1994. But Toussaint
quickly gained a reputation for using the police as an
enforcement arm of Lavalas. When the "interim" force gave
way to the National Police at the end of 1995, U.S.
officials pressured the new president, Rene Preval, to
exclude Toussaint. Toussaint became security chief for
Lavalas while maintaining ties to his handpicked leaders of
the National Police.

Now, though, a split has emerged in Lavalas over
Toussaint's rising clout. One Lavalas member described it
as a struggle between "the honest part of the party and
those guided by self-interest," warning that if the wrong
side wins, Haiti could become a narco-state.

"Right now the United States should be trying to help the
cleaner part of this party," the Lavalas member said.
"Because if Dany runs for president, he is going to be very
hard to beat."


© 2002 The Washington Post Company

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