20103: Esser: In Rebel City, Guns Are Power and No One Wants to Let Go (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: D. Esser torx@joimail.com

The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com

March 8, 2004

In Rebel City, Guns Are Power and No One Wants to Let Go
By LYDIA POLGREEN

ONAÏVES, Haiti, March 6 — The unofficial chief of police in this
city, the birthplace of the uprising that toppled President
Jean-Bertrand Aristide, is a hot-tempered young man named Wilfort
Ferdinand, also known as T-Will.

He spends his evenings drinking local rum with his deputies and
girlfriends at the bar of a local hotel, a Haitian Secret Service
badge dangling from his neck. He spends his days policing the city's
streets, his lieutenant Billy Augustin by his side. Until eight
months ago, Mr. Augustin, 23, lived in Miami and worked as a clerk in
a Target store. Now he carries a six-shooter revolver and commands a
small posse of men.

Though Guy Philippe, leader of the rebel army to which Mr. Ferdinand
belongs, has promised American authorities that his men will disarm,
Mr. Ferdinand has no plans to put down the 9-millimeter handgun
hanging loosely from his unclasped shoulder holster anytime soon.

"We will put down our guns," said Mr. Ferdinand, 27, his cherubic
face ringed with tight curls. "But the chimères have to lay down
their guns first," he continued, referring to pro-Aristide militants.
"I can't put down my gun now. The people will be disappointed. I have
to protect the people from the chimères."

Disarming the thousands of men on both sides of the conflict that has
roiled Haiti for the past month is a daunting and crucial task. The
nation is awash in weapons, many held by men who nurse deep grudges.

When Mr. Aristide dissolved the Haitian Army in 1995, there was no
mass disarmament of combatants — soldiers were simply sent home and
allowed to keep their weapons. The abrupt dismissals, without plans
for alternative employment, so angered the former soldiers that many
joined the rebel army that sought to overthrow Mr. Aristide. With
just a small, ineffective police force, Mr. Aristide relied on armed
gangs of slum youths to serve as a paramilitary force to protect his
interests.

Both sides are tied to drug trafficking in a country that is a way
station for Colombian cocaine bound for the United States, and those
connections have helped put even more guns in the hands of street
toughs.

In the mayhem that swept the nation last month, the groups stood
arrayed against each other, both well armed and bent on violence.
Despite Mr. Aristide's departure, the violence has not ceased.

Here in Gonaïves, streets have quieted. Banks have reopened, shoppers
crowd markets and schools could reopen as early as Monday.

But the city is far from pacified. Many rebel soldiers here are
members of the Cannibal Army, a gang once loyal to Mr. Aristide but
now turned against him. Conscious of their city's long history of
fomenting violent revolution, the rebels are reluctant to give up
their arms.

It was in Gonaïves that Haiti's slave soldiers declared their nation
free from imperial France in 1804, and it was here that an uprising
against the brutal dictatorship of Jean-Claude Duvalier forced him
into exile in 1986.

Gonaïves once again has taken its place in the nation's troubled
history, which includes more than 30 coups and a long line of wars
and tyrannical leaders. The final phase of the uprising against Mr.
Aristide began here on Feb. 5, when the Cannibal Army attacked the
police station, burning it to the ground and killing several police
officers.

Wynter Étienne, a rebel leader in Gonaïves, said citizens' committees
were clearing the streets of barricades and trying to restart
municipal services. He said his men had put aside their weapons for
now but had not handed them over to the United States or any other
authority.

"As we promised, we have laid down our guns," he said. "But when you
say you lay down your arms you really have to lay them down in a
place where if needed they could be taken up again by the soldiers."

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company
.