13585: This Week in Haiti 20:34 11/6/2002 (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

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                           HAITI PROGRES
              "Le journal qui offre une alternative"

                      * THIS WEEK IN HAITI *

                       November 6 - 12, 2002
                          Vol. 20, No. 34

STYMIED BY CALLS FOR OAS SECURITY, CEP DEADLINE PASSES

Despite the optimism they professed only days before, Haitian
government officials failed to entice declared and undeclared
political opponents to join in forming a new Provisional
Electoral Council (CEP) by the Nov. 4 deadline fixed by
Organization of American States (OAS) Resolution 822 (see Haïti
Progrès, Vol. 20, No. 26, 9/11/2002). The resolution, adopted
Sep. 4, gave the government 60 days to assemble a new CEP with
members from the U.S. Republican-supported Democratic Convergence
opposition front and other "civil society" sectors.

Besides the Convergence's predictable refusal to name a
representative to the new body, five "civil society" sectors also
spurned participation until the government invites the
"international community" (as the U.S./European axis is called)
to provide, in the words of the Civil Society Initiative's State
Department protege Rosny Desroches,  "a foreign security
contingent," in other words, a new military occupation force.

The five sectors -- the Episcopal Conference of Haiti, the
Catholic Church, the Protestant Church Federation, the Human
Rights sector, and the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Haiti
-- acknowledged in a statement that their representatives should
have been chosen by the deadline but that they would not "be
inclined to formally communicate the selection as long as the
Haitian State and the OAS have not formally started the process
of assuring the security and consequently the reliability of the
electoral process."

This group of five also wrote on Oct. 26th to David Lee, the head
of the OAS's special mission to Haiti, to remind him that he had
already asked the government in an Oct. 10 letter to invite the
"international community" to supply this "assistance" to the
police.

To sugar-coat their implicit demand for an interventionist force,
the five sectors even proposed a two-week period for Haitian
authorities and the OAS work out the details of this "technical'
military assistance.

In an Oct. 29 letter to Lee, Prime Minister Yvon Neptune
requested technical assistance for police professionalization,
justice, human rights, governance, disarmament, and the
elections, including their security. Neptune did not specify what
form this assistance should take. But Lee needs no more than a
nod to set in motion the OAS machinery that will take charge of
security and disarmament as outlined in Res. 822. In his Oct. 31
response, Lee said: "In the name of the OAS mission aimed at
strengthening democracy in Haiti, I have the honor to confirm our
agreement with this official request."

Gérard Pierre-Charles, the leader of the Convergence's OPL
component, echoed the group of five's call, asking for a
"substantial mission" of the "international community" to
complement the police in providing election security. Other non-
Convergence opposition parties followed the herd saying that they
too would only send their joint representative to the CEP if
"security supervision" was set in place.

In short all these groups are maneuvering the country toward a
replay of the 1915 and 1994 military occupations of the country.
Most ironically, this comes as the bicentennial of Haiti's Jan.
1, 1804 independence day approaches.

In the end, the government could muster only two representatives
for the nine-member CEP: the Executive's and the Supreme Court's.

Thus Aristide finds his back to the wall, particularly after U.S.
representative to the OAS, Roger Noriega, stated on Oct. 30 that
""we have very serious concerns about the leadership of Jean
Bertrand Aristide." He was echoed the next day by Assistant
Secretary of State for the Western Hemisphere Otto Reich who
ominously warned that the Aristide government faces the prospect
of "forfeiting its credibility and legitimacy" by not complying
with Res. 822.

In a Nov. 4 press conference at the National Palace, Aristide
feigned optimism and called on all sectors to take part in
forming the CEP. He argued that 2003 elections would result in
the "the lifting of economic sanctions on the country " and also
evoked the approach of Haiti's 2004 anniversary. "We should
quickly establish the Provisional Electoral Council so that there
is no conflict with the festivities planned for the bicentennial
celebrations," he explained, as if the bitter political struggle
of the past 3 years has resulted from his opponents not checking
their calendars.

Speaking on Radio Métropole on Nov. 5, Jonas Petit, the interim
head of Aristide's Fanmi Lavalas party, called the refusal of the
different sectors to name CEP reps a "disgrace" and a "deficit of
engagement."

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