23673: (pub) radtimes: Haitian Americans focus on homeland (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: radtimes <resist@best.com>

Haitian Americans focus on homeland

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/10/30/BAGQV9IJ4I1.DTL

Filmmaker to show footage of nation's continuing turmoil

Jason B. Johnson, Chronicle Staff Writer
Saturday, October 30, 2004

Bay Area Haitian Americans are pooling their resources to help improve
conditions in their troubled homeland, which is struggling to overcome
devastation caused by a recent tropical storm and continuing political unrest.

Gatherings will be held during the next week in San Francisco, Berkeley,
Palo Alto and San Rafael featuring a Port-au-Prince-based documentary
filmmaker showing footage from his most recent film about human rights
conditions in Haiti. With proceeds from these events, local Haitian groups
hope to fund projects ranging from reforestation to food relief to capital
formation through the Marin Interfaith Task Force.

In addition to starvation and illness following Tropical Storm Jeanne in
September, the island nation has been plagued by civil unrest, said
filmmaker Kevin Pina. Pina will show portions of his latest work Sunday at
Palo Alto Unitarian Universalist Church and First United Methodist Church
in San Rafael, and Wednesday in San Francisco at Bissap Baobab restaurant,
2323 Mission St.

Pina said there was "a need for a government that represents a transition
back to democracy." Many people in Haiti still support ousted President
Jean- Bertrand Aristide, he said.

"What we are trying to do is to educate the public, to bring attention to
the public about the reality of Haiti," said Pierre Labossiere of Oakland,
a founding member of the Haiti Action Committee, who helped organize the tour.

Bay Area churches and community organizations are working with churches and
labor groups in Haiti to channel money to schools there. They also send
people from the United States to the island to help potential donors
connect with groups working to improve living conditions on the island.

Parts of Haiti, such as the coastal city of Gonaives, remain damaged by
flooding and mudslides from Jeanne, and about 2,000 people are missing and
feared dead. Relief efforts have been hampered by political unrest prompted
by the Feb. 29 departure of Aristide.

Aristide left the country under escort of U.S. troops following a violent
three-week rebellion. He later said he was forced out by the Bush
administration, which has denied the charge.

Thirty members of Congress, including Reps. Maxine Waters, D-Los Angeles,
Barbara Lee, D-Oakland, and John Conyers, D-Mich., sent a letter this week
to Secretary of State Colin Powell urging the Bush administration to become
more involved in Haiti and to secure the release of political prisoners there.

The recent turmoil is the latest in a long line of natural, economic and
political disasters to befall the impoverished country.

About 80 percent of Haiti's more than 7 million inhabitants live in abject
poverty in a country that's slightly smaller than the state of Maryland.
More than two-thirds of the labor force does not have formal jobs.

Aristide was exiled a first time after a 1991 military coup that sent
thousands of Haitians crammed onto rickety boats seeking escape.

The U.S. Census Bureau puts the number of Haitians living in the nine-
county Bay Area at about 1,600. Though some leaders say the actual number
is close to double that, it is still a relatively small group when compared
with Haitians living in Miami, Boston and New York.

Most Bay Area Haitians are in Oakland, San Rafael and Novato. The first
wave came in the 1960s to study in area schools. In the 1980s and 1990s,
many refugees came after fleeing political and economic turmoil, said Max
Blanchet, a leader of the Bay Area Haitian American Council.

While some local Haitians still support Aristide, others have lost
confidence in him and his Lavalas party, which was wildly popular among the
country's poor.

"I was a great supporter of Aristide," said Blanchet, who moved to Berkeley
in 1968. "(But) the elections in the year 2000 were a turning point; they
were badly conducted. (Aristide's) position had become untenable."

But Labossiere said many people still support Aristide and consider him the
rightful ruler of the country.

"President Aristide happens to be the choice of the Haitian people. He was
democratically elected by the Haitian people," said Labossiere. "He must
return to his rightful place."

Regardless of their position on Aristide, members of Haiti's expatriate
community have been working to send relief supplies and money to their
native land. Groups like Fonkoze and the Lambi Fund support micro-lending
projects, business literacy programs, reforestation, grain processing and
sugar cane production.

For more information on Pina's appearances, call: (650) 723-6150.

E-mail Jason B. Johnson at jbjohnson@sfchronicle.com.

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