19347: radtimes: Background on Haiti: Some Questions and Answers (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: radtimes <resist@best.com>

Background on Haiti: Some Questions and Answers

http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/022604J.shtml

     By Mary Turck
     Resource Center for the Americas
     Tuesday 24 February 2004

      As violent gangs invade Haitian towns, murdering police and opening
jails, news reports repeat several catch phrases as if everyone knew their
meaning. In fact, those catch phrases—from "the opposition" to "flawed (or
fraudulent) elections of 2000"—are laden with political and historical freight.

      What happened in the 2000 elections?

      Two elections took place in 2000. The first elections, in May, saw
full participation by a range of political parties, including the Lavalas
party of now-president Jean-Bertrand Aristide. In the May elections of
legislators and municipal government authorities, Lavalas won by a
landslide. Observers from the Organization of American States did not fault
the conduct of the elections. However, in eight cases, the electoral
council seated Senators who had won by a plurality of the votes, not by an
absolute majority. Because these eight Senators were Lavalas party
candidates, the opposition immediately cried fraud.

      Knowing they would lose the presidential election in November 2000,
the opposition Democratic Convergence refused to participate. They cited
the eight contested senatorial elections as "proof" that the presidential
vote would be rigged. In November, President Jean-Bertrand Aristide was
elected.

      The OAS tried, in more than 20 missions, to arrange new elections or
compromise between the Democratic Convergence and the government. President
Aristide persuaded seven of the eight senators to resign, clearing the way
for new elections. Aristide agreed to OAS proposals for new elections. The
Democratic Convergence did not.

      In January, the terms of all legislators elected in 2000 expired. The
opposition refused to allow new legislative elections, so now there is no
legislature.

      The opposition has consistently demanded—and continues to demand—that
Aristide immediately leave the presidency, without completing his elected
term of office, and they be put in charge of a non-elected "transition"
government. They will accept nothing less. They want power, but not
elections. They know they could not win elections, as they never have had
anywhere near majority support.

      Most recently—on February 21—Aristide unconditionally accepted yet
another international peace proposal, this one calling for power-sharing
with the opposition.

      Who is in the opposition?

      The political opposition is headed by the Democratic Convergence,
which is primarily led by the Haitian business elite. Other opposition
groups, such as the Group of 184, include students, teachers, and even
former Aristide supporters who have become disillusioned with his
government's performance. But the political opposition, while it turns out
demonstrators in the streets of the capital, is not the power behind the
current armed "rebellion" in Haiti.

      The leadership of the armed rebels is drawn from criminal gangs and
from the disbanded army, which was responsible for the 1991-94 reign of
terror that took over the government and killed more than 5,000 Haitians.
Former leaders of that era, some of whom have been tried in absentia and
convicted of massacres and other crimes, have returned from their hiding
places to lead the armed rebels. They include former military death-squad
leader and convicted murderer Louis-Jodel Chamblain and former police chief
and coup plotter Guy Phillippe.

      How did Aristide become president and what has he done?

      Aristide, a populist, leftist, charismatic leader of the poor, was
first elected president in 1991, by a landslide. Within a few months, he
was deposed and replaced by a brutal military government, whose leaders now
seek to return to power. In 1994, U.S. and U.N. forces restored Aristide to
the presidency. Haiti had been the poorest country in the hemisphere before
1991. After the coup, its economy was further destroyed. Yet international
economic aid, promised for Haiti's rebuilding, came in tiny trickles rather
than in the needed flood.

      When Aristide's first term ended, he acceded to the constitutional
prohibition against consecutive presidential terms, even though he had
lived in exile for most of his first term. The next president, also a
candidate of Aristide's Lavalas party, was René Preval. During Preval's
1996-2001 term, the opposition continued to do what it does so well—to
oppose any and all government initiatives and sabotage progress. In 2000,
Aristide was again elected president, and he began his current five-year
term in 2001.

      Seizing upon the excuse offered by opposition criticism of the 2000
elections, the United States orchestrated a suspension of international
aid. The small amounts of aid that have been doled out have been
conditioned on adoption of neo-liberal economic measures, such as cutting
education spending and ending fuel subsidies. These measures are anathema
to Aristide's political base, and his reluctant acquiescence in them has
alienated some of that base. Haiti remains divided between the desperately
poor farmers and slum-dwellers and a small elite running export-import
businesses and light industry.

      Who are the police and who are the "thugs"?

      After 1994, the Haitian military was disbanded, but not disarmed. A
small police force—5,000 officers for a country of eight million— was
trained with U.S. and international assistance. They are outgunned by
criminal gangs and underpaid by the government. Today they are a prime
target of the rebels. In Hinche, as in other towns, the rebels' first move
was to attack the police station, kill the police, and open the jail.

      The opposition speaks repeatedly of "Aristide's thugs" or the
chiméres. It is true that Aristide supporters, including "thugs" recruited
from the slums, have targeted opposition demonstrators and organizations
that have taken anti-Aristide positions, including unions and students. The
opposition also claims that the rebels are former Aristide supporters,
including members of the "Cannibal Army." This claim is, at best, a
misrepresentation and a half-truth, based on the strange saga of the
Metayer brothers.

      Amiot Metayer was the leader of a criminal gang that called itself
the "Cannibal Army." Amiot Metayer and his gang supported the military from
1991-94, but his allegiance was based on profit rather than principle. For
a time during Aristide's second term, he professed allegiance to Lavalas.

      That allegiance ended when the Aristide government jailed Amiot
Metayer for arson in July 2002. His gang broke into the jail and released
him and 158 other prisoners in August 2002. After the jailbreak, Metayer
and his gang first opposed the government, then supported it again. Last
September, Amiot Metayer was murdered.

      The gang, now led by Amiot's brother, Butter Metayer, blamed the
Aristide government for Amiot's killing, and again threw its lot in with
Aristide's opponents. Now the gang has changed its name from "Cannibal
Army" to the "Gonaives Resistance Front." This is the gang that took over
Gonaives and that now, in cooperation with the former military, is
attempting to oust Aristide and take control of all Haiti.

      Where is the United States government in all of this?

      The United States government has never been comfortable with the
leftist, populist platform of Jean-Bertrand Aristide. The U.S. National
Endowment for Democracy has consistently funded opposition groups in Haiti,
including many members of the Democratic Convergence.

      During the current violence, the U.S. position has fluctuated from
day to day, and from official to official. Donald Rumsfeld, quoted on PBS
News Hour February 16, gave perhaps the most accurate view of the currently
unclear U.S. position: "Needless to say, everyone is hopeful that the
situation, which tends to ebb and flow down there, will stay below a
certain threshold, and that there's—we have no plans to do anything. By
that, I don't mean we have no plans. Obviously, we have plans to do
everything in the world that we can think of. But we—there's no intention
at the present time, or no reason to believe, that any of the thinking that
goes into these things year in and year out would have to be utilized."

.