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[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: D. Esser torx@joimail.com

Club Haiti
http://www.telepark.de/clubhaiti/start.html

April 30, 2004

Setting business rules, Teleco and EDH up for grabs 

At a dinner of the Haitian-American Chamber of Commerce U.S.
ambassador Foley urged Haiti's tiny and mostly lighter-skinned elite
to abandon its class system, pay their taxes and renounce their
antiquated business methods that breed corruption while keeping the
darker-skinned majority in near-serfdom. Foley chided the Democratic
Platform coalition of 184 political parties and civic groups
including many businesspeople, saying their refusal to work with
Aristide under an internationally agreed compromise for transition
nearly caused another coup in Haiti. Foley's speech, delivered in
French, drew much applause but some hostility. "I think it is time
now to accept your responsibility and admit you made a mistake in
making us suffer 10 years of Aristide," said businessman Philippe
Villedrouin. In an equally memorable speech at the American
Enterprise Institute in mid-April, Roger F. Noriega, U.S. Assistant
Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs, paved the way to
put the two grand prizes of privatization, Teleco and electricity
company EDH on the market: "we will also encourage the government of
Haiti to move forward, at the appropriate time, with restructuring
and privatization of some public-sector enterprises through a
transparent process." Noriega added: "At previous critical junctures,
the hard work and aspirations of the Haitian people were subverted
from within by bad leaders and from without by indifference and
cynicism in the international community, but we do not have to repeat
those mistakes." At least those were his prepared statements. The new
executive at the helm of state-owned Teleco, René Méroné,
an engineer formerly in charge of budgeting and planning at Haiti's
telecommunications company, might have some interesting times ahead.
[Source: U.S. State / HPN / Taipei Times]
.