a1314: MORE ON THE ATTEMPTED COUP (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

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Haiti's Troubles Continue
by Robert Maguire*
Published in Nueva Sociedad, Caracas, January 2002

"Civilized people do not lurk in the bushes to support terrorist coups
d'etat." So spoke Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide on January 1, 2002
during his Independence Day speech at the National Palace in Port-au-Prince,
where, 15 days earlier, three-dozen heavily armed commandos launched an
apparent pre-dawn coup attempt against his government. "The people have
suffered too much," Aristide continued. "They have said that they do not at
all want to go into hiding again. We want to live in peace and we must have
peace." Condemning violence and referring to the country's current
environment of political cynicism as exuding "the virus of division," the
President called upon Haitians to "fight for our country instead of fighting
one another." Sadly, as Haiti enters the New Year, the unabated power
struggle among the country's politicians has been joined by a renewal of the
kind of paramilitary violence that the vast majority of Haitians hoped had
ended with the disbandment of the Haitian Armed Forces in 1995.

The December 17th palace attack, a violent episode that left at least eight
dead - including five of the attackers, was quickly characterized by some as
an assassination attempt on the President (who was sleeping as his suburban
residence) and by Aristide's hard line detractors as a "staged event." It
rapidly sent shock waves throughout the country, provoking an angry response
from some government supporters, who rallied in the streets, launching angry
reprisals against offices and homes of Aristide's most vocal detractors,
including erstwhile Aristide ally Gerard Pierre-Charles, now a prominent
leader of the minority opposition coalition Democratic Convergence (CD).
Fueling these reprisals was the opposition's response to the palace attack.
As they did in late July, when an armed attack on Haiti's Police Academy left
several dead, opposition leaders, rather than denouncing the violence, death
and threat to national security posed by the attackers, immediately condemned
the Aristide government, accusing Mr. Aristide of staging the coup to
orchestrate attacks against them.

Although various government officials - including Aristide - spoke out
against the reprisals, and the Minister of Justice created a commission to
investigate the "crimes" that took place following the palace attack, the
opposition ramped up its international verbal assault on Aristide and his
government. Its rhetoric was fueled by international criticism, such as an
anonymous US State Department official's declaration regarding the "failure
of the Haitian government to protect its people from mob violence." Such is
the poisonous political atmosphere in - and beyond - Haiti.
As the smoke cleared in Port-au-Prince, however, early allegations of a
staged event appeared off the mark. Among those captured by Haitian
authorities, or implicated in the attack by the prisoners, are former
officers of the Haitian National Police and/or the disbanded Haitian Armed
Forces (FAd'H), including several individuals implicated in the July Police
Academy attack. Evidence gathered by the Haitian police indicates that the
commandos apparently planned their palace assault while in the Dominican
Republic, where several, including alleged ringleader Guy Philippe, a former
police chief and FAd'H veteran, had fled previously. Philippe, who also has
links to Haitian officers exiled in Ecuador following a previous aborted
incident, has been detained by the Dominican government which, thus far, has
refused to turn him over to Haitian authorities.

While not directly implicated in this incident, Aristide's political enemies,
with their harsh rhetoric and intransigence toward the government, most
likely have emboldened the remnants of Haiti's military and paramilitary
forces that are inclined to resort to weapons and violence to settle disputes
and seize power. Indeed, at least one opposition leader openly called,
earlier in the year, for a return of the Haitian army as a means of removing
Aristide from power. Such statements have tended to reinforce the general
lack of support among the Haitian populace for the opposition groups, many of
which are widely associated with the 1997-98 Parliament that tied the hands
of the Preval government through its intransigence and inaction, and, as
such, contributed significantly to the genesis of today's political crisis.
Many in Haiti continue to view the CD as a collection of failed politicians
who are more intent on bringing down Aristide than on finding solutions to
the country's myriad problems.

Those problems, combined with allegations of corruption and waste within the
Aristide government, as well as that government's general incapability to
effectively meet citizens' expectations, are reportedly beginning to give
rise to growing cynicism toward both Aristide and his detractors, and to a
concurrent renewal of the kind of grassroots mobilizing for political and
economic change seen throughout Haiti during the 1980's. After years of
dashed hopes, unimpressive public leadership and political turbulence,
community organizations independent of political affiliation appear to once
again be gaining momentum as agitators for change.

In the meantime, the Aristide government remains handcuffed by a lack of
resources and by the political controversy still swirling around it. In spite
of its detailed proposal for resolving Haiti's electoral crisis, submitted
last summer to the OAS and subsequently endorsed by that organization, little
real progress toward a resolution has been made. As a result, Aristide has
been unable to loosen up what is reported as some $500 million in
international development assistance that has been blocked - principally at
the behest of the U.S. government - for several years. The opposition
coalition - with more allies outside Haiti than inside the country - remains
wedded to its position of strident criticism and non-negotiation. In the
aftermath of the palace attack and in this continuing atmosphere of political
recrimination, prospects for an OAS- brokered solution to the
electoral-related problems have darkened, with the latest reports from that
organization suggesting that there is increased internal discussion for a
more aggressive intervention in Haiti through the application of the
Inter-American Democratic Charter adopted last year at the OAS summit in Peru.

And in the midst of it all, Haiti's gunmen continue to lurk in the bushes,
awaiting their next chance to wreak more havoc through violence.

Dr. Robert Maguire is Director of Programs in International Affairs at
Trinity College in
Washington, DC as well as Director of the Trinity College Haiti Program.