27650: Lemieux-News-Haiti's calm elections thrill prime minister (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

JD Lemieux  lxhaiti@yahoo.com


Haiti's calm elections thrill prime minister
By Tania Valdemoro

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

Friday, February 10, 2006

Haitians voted in droves Tuesday during
presidential and legislative elections amid
little violence, a fact that elated Prime
Minister Gerard Latortue.

Tapped as Haiti's interim leader, Latortue, a
Boca Raton retiree, came under tremendous
pressure to organize free and fair elections
after an insurgency led by criminal gangs and
former soldiers ousted President Jean Bertrand
Aristide in March 2004.

Haitians go to polls

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Underlying the election's relative calm is the
political stability Latortue said he worked to
create as head of a transitional government.

A newly elected government will assume power
March 29, and Latortue will return to suburban
Boca Raton in April.

Critics, however, say that under Latortue's
watch, Haiti has plunged further into disarray,
misery and division.

"His government has been a fiasco," said Jean
Robert Lafortune, chairman of the Haitian
American Grassroots Coalition in Miami. "Under
his leadership, there has been more kidnappings,
rapes and violence against civilians, as well as
repression against the masses."

A Haitian history buff, Latortue said Wednesday
during a phone interview that he believes
"history with a capital H" ultimately will
determine his legacy.

Still, the prime minister's assessment of his
time in office clashes with the accounts of many
people.

"Latortue was seen as being put in power by the
United States, not by the people in general,"
said Robert Fatton Jr., a professor of political
science at the University of Virginia.

The U.S. government, which backed the interim
government, always has denied that it forced
Aristide from power.

Foremost among his accomplishments, Latortue
said, was stanching the violence that
historically erupts after changes in Haitian
political power.

"I helped my country avoid civil war," he said.

When he arrived in Haiti, Latortue promised to
end the violence. Security has improved in most
parts of the nation, according to the government,
but civilians and human rights groups disagree.

Illegal armed groups and former military officers
are using 170,000 small arms "to kidnap, sexually
abuse and kill Haitians with absolute impunity,"
Amnesty International reported in July.

"There have been promises to disarm groups, but
nothing has been done," Fatton said. "If
anything, there are more weapons now than there
were before."

David Wimhurst, a spokesman for the U.N.
Stabilization Mission in Haiti, disagreed, saying
limited progress had been made.

"I'd say it's very difficult to offer people with
guns an alternative, like a career or long-term
job prospect where the economy is pretty
tattered," Wimhurst said. "It's a long-term
program to disarm the civilian population."

The understaffed and poorly equipped Haitian
National Police still cannot provide security,
human rights groups say.

Amnesty International accuses the force of
killing civilians and committing other human
rights abuses.

A surge of recent kidnappings in the Cite Soleil
slum and around other areas of Haiti's capital,
Port-au-Prince, has unsettled people like
Alexandra Fevril, a university student living in
the city.

"They kidnap whatever person," Fevril said. "I
take many precautions. There are certain barrios
I must avoid because they are more dangerous than
other barrios."

Good political governance, another accomplishment
Latortue cited, is also in dispute.

"We have established the civil service," the
prime minister said, noting he did not fire and
replace government officials who had ties to
Aristide's Lavalas Family Party.

The decision enraged Haitians opposed to
Aristide.

Lavalas accused Latortue of persecuting its
members while ignoring the actions of criminal
gangs and other groups. It said Latortue jailed
former Prime Minister Yvon Neptune and the Rev.
Gerard Jean-Juste for political, not criminal,
reasons.

Arrested in June 2004, Neptune later was indicted
for masterminding a massacre in the town of St.
Marc.

Jean-Juste was jailed in July on charges of
murder and conspiracy against the state. A judge
last month dropped the charges against him.

Under pressure, the interim government last month
allowed the priest, who has leukemia, be treated
in Miami.

Latortue replied that his government is not
holding political prisoners.

He said Neptune was arrested on a judge's
warrant. He said Jean-Juste was released because
of his illness, not political pressure from
Washington.

Lesly Jacques, a close friend of Latortue, called
those cases "irregularities."

"When you arrest someone, you should go before a
judge right away, but it didn't happen because
the judicial system is not working," Jacques
said. "Latortue has tried to change it, but you
can't change something like that in two years."

One thing that did change is Haiti's finances,
though the country continues to rank as the
poorest in the Western Hemisphere. The interim
government is collecting taxes while fighting
corruption and contraband.

"We have more money to do work in public health
and education now. We don't misuse money,"
Latortue said.

The interim government built more new roads in
the past two years than in the past 10, he said.
Electricity is available as long as12 hours a day
now, up from just two hours in 2004.

Still, Elirend Jean Charles, a professor in
Port-au-Prince, complained that the price of
beans, rice and corn has quadrupled since
Aristide left.

Latortue replied that his government cut a
40-percent inflation rate to 15 percent.

As for reconciling Haiti's divided society,
Latortue said he has tried to bring people
together, but the process is incomplete.

"In Haiti, people always criticize those in
power," he said. "How could you solve the
divisions in two years?"

Others said the interim government has not even
tried to unify the country.

"Haiti needs to be healed and repaired," said
Wimhurst, the U.N. spokesman. "This government
never pursued that seriously. We would have liked
to have seen that effort."

Haiti's next leader faces many of the same
problems Latortue encountered.

"He needs to form a government that is acceptable
to everyone. After that, there needs to be a new
political order, an end of violence and new
legitimate institutions, like a functioning
police force," Fatton said.

The prime minister offered no advice to his
successor. He said he is looking forward to
retirement, though he would work to change the
Haitian Constitution, which prevents those living
outside the country from voting or running for
political office.

"We have the most talented people in the Haitian
diaspora," Latortue said.

Critics say it is ironic that Latortue would
champion this cause now because he upheld a
controversial decision to exclude Dumarsais
Simeus, a Haitian businessman from Texas and U.S.
citizen, from running for president.

Fatton offered a possible legacy for the prime
minister: Haitian leaders have historically clung
to power. Latortue will teach Haitians about
political transition because he will exit as
promised.


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