15311: Simidor: Re: 15290: of Reparations and Reclamations (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Daniel Simidor <karioka9@mail.arczip.com>


>From: Moibibi@aol.com
>
>What about Boyer who agreed to pay it? If I understand well, you

mean to
>say to the French that it was an error and therefore, it should

be
>reimbursed... But wasn't Boyer an actual Ahmed Chalabi? One has

to
>wonder...
>
>Bb Pierre Louis

We can all agree that independent Haiti had no obligation to pay
any money to France, and that Boyer dishonored himself by
accepting France's ultimatum.  Having said that, the Chalabi
analogy seems a bit artificial.  Chalabi is a willing puppet
brought to Iraq to put a local or civilian face on a brutal
imperialist invasion.  Looking back at Haiti over the last decade,
it is not hard to find which Haitian personality Chalabi is more
or less modeled after . . .

Actually, a better analogy for Boyer would be Saddam Hussein. With
a French fleet sitting in the bay, Boyer had very little leverage
- not unlike Hussein's damned if you do and damned if you don't
situation.  The difference is that Boyer accepted to pay the
French ransom, whereas Hussein chose defiance.

But let me emphasize that none of those differences and
interpretations deter from the fundamental fact that France used
its superpower status then to extract a crippling and immoral
ransom from Haiti, and that it is using this same superpower
status today to deny Haiti its just due.

Back in the 1830s, people used to crowd on the wharf when the
trunks of gold coins were being shipped to France, lamenting and
crying that France was starving and bleeding them.  But there were
no riots to prevent the gold from leaving, because the people
treasured their independence above all else.

Today Haiti is more desperate as ever, and a return of that
unjustly paid ransom is all that we have to keep the country from
going under.  Whether it's 4 billions or 21 billions, it's a
refund that France can afford. But the French are not going to be
gracious about it, they will have to be embarrassed into paying
back what they owe us.

But first Haitians have to convince themselves that they are
entitled to a refund of that money, and that they can empower
themselves to get it.  Well, let me tell you, by the appearance on
this list, the French don't have much to worry about on that
front.

Daniel Simidor