27468: Hermantin(News)What kind of Haiti will he leave? (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

lhermantin@hotmail.com


Posted on Sat, Feb. 04, 2006


HAITI | GERARD LATORTUE
What kind of Haiti will he leave?
Haiti's interim government, led by Boca Raton resident Gérard Latortue, has 
gotten mixed reviews as it wraps up two years in power.
BY JACQUELINE CHARLES
jcharles@MiamiHerald.com

PORT-AU-PRINCE - Almost two years ago, Gérard Latortue was plucked out of a 
comfortable retirement in Boca Raton to lead a chaotic Haiti back on a path to 
democracy after a bloody revolt ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.

The former U.N. negotiator and Haitian history buff was sworn in as interim 
prime minister amid promises to return security to this grindingly poor nation, 
revamp a police force that had just about collapsed and reconcile the country's 
bitterly divided political factions.

But as elections for a new government approach on Tuesday, his government is 
receiving decidedly mixed reviews -- credited with some key advancements, 
blasted for missing significant opportunities and at times abusing its powers.

Even his detractors give Latortue and his team of technocrats credit for 
strengthening Haiti's finances through programs that, among other things, 
increased government revenues and got rid of the notorious ''zombies'' -- 
no-show employees.

''The people will need time to realize what has been done,'' Latortue told The 
Miami Herald as he flew back to Haiti after meetings with U.S. State Department 
officials in Washington to discuss the presidential and legislative balloting 
Tuesday.

`FAR FROM A FAILURE'

''We saved the country from a civil war, and a big social explosion, and 
introduced more civility in political life,'' he said. ``It's far away from 
being a failure, but I cannot expect to call it a complete success. It's 
definitely better.''

But others say the Latortue government deserves a mixed report card of ''C's'' 
and ``F's.''

''If the elections take place and we have a legitimate government in power, 
then it was a success. But if they are not done properly and we have new 
insecurities, then it was a failure,'' said Micha Gaillard, spokesman for the 
opposition coalition Democratic Convergence, which helped force Aristide's 2004 
ouster.

The elections were postponed four times amid bickering among members of Haiti's 
electoral council and between them and election experts from the Organization 
of American States and the United Nations.

The security situation has improved in most parts of the country of eight 
million people. But it has remained chaotic and at times worsened in the 
capital, where a surge in kidnappings and violence in the Cité Soleil slum has 
panic-stricken residents afraid to leave home after dark.

''The transition has been a complete failure,'' said Jean-Germain Gros, a Haiti 
expert at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. ``The first mandate is 
security. Is Haiti safer now than before? No.''

Gros acknowledged that Haitian history has long been plagued by political 
violence and noted that the United Nations, which has about 9,000 peacekeepers 
here, ``did not have a robust security presence in the face of the collapse of 
the Haitian National Police.''

''There should have been a much stronger intervention,'' Gros added.

Without the force in fact ''this country would have probably collapsed,'' said 
Juan Gabriel Valdés, the Chilean diplomat who leads the U.N. mission here.

15 MANDATES

Under the political accord endorsed by the political factions after Aristide's 
ouster, the transition government had 15 mandates that ranged from arranging 
the new elections to investigating corruption and human-rights abuses under 
Aristide and his political party, the Lavalas Family.

And it was in carrying out these latter mandates that the interim government 
has been most criticized, with Aristide supporters and independent human rights 
activists accusing it of arbitrarily arresting and jailing thousands of Lavalas 
members.

The most high profile of these cases involved former Prime Minister Yvon 
Neptune, who was eventually indicted for a 2004 massacre in the port city of 
St. Marc, and former Miami Haitian-rights activist Gérard Jean-Juste, a priest 
who was finally freed Sunday under heavy U.S. pressure and was allowed to fly 
to Miami for cancer treatment.

The two men's long detentions caught the eye of U.S. congressional leaders and 
human rights activists, and Jean-Juste was even declared a ``prisoner of 
conscience.''

Allegations of corruption also trailed Latortue's cousin, Youri Latortue, 
described in one French news report as ''Mr. 10 percent'' because of the 
commissions he allegedly demanded while working as the prime minister's 
security chief. The younger Latortue, a Senate candidate in Tuesday's election, 
has vehemently denied the accusations.

Gérard Latortue's own blunders, meanwhile, landed him in diplomatic hot water, 
including his description of rebels who led the revolt against Aristide as 
''freedom fighters.'' He also fired off a letter to Jamaican Prime Minister 
P.J. Patterson and recalled his ambassador from Kingston after Patterson 
invited the exiled Aristide to vacation in Jamaica. Caribbean leaders responded 
by refusing to recognize Haiti's interim government, saying they will revisit 
the issue after elections.

''Latortue did not understand the job,'' said Leslie Voltaire, a moderate 
Lavalas member chosen to help the transition after Aristide's departure. ``He 
did not have a constituency. He aligned himself with the elite and then they 
left him.''

CONSENSUS BUILDER

Latortue, who said he is looking forward to returning to Boca Raton after he 
hands over the reins of power to the winner of the elections, disagrees. He is 
a consensus builder, he insists, whose office was always open to anyone.

The man whose name means ''the turtle'' and became a sharp jab in his first 
months in office, listed a few of his claimed successes as he wound up the 
interview: new roads, increased revenue, a civil service program and an end to 
government-sponsored violence. But the real success, he said, will belong to 
the Haitian people: free and fair elections on Tuesday.

For The Miami Herald's coverage of the Haiti electoral process go to 
MiamiHerald.com and click on the Americas section.