27922: Fenton: : (reply) Re: 27856: Ferdinand reply Simidor (comment) Re: 27425: Aristide & the Endless Revolution Screenings (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Anthony Fenton <fentona@shaw.ca>

A reply to Anna Ferdinand's comment that, with respect to the "the
huge marches against Aristide" and "quite a swell of Anti Aristide
sentiment" prior to his February 2004 departure, during a public
discussion after a screening of "Aristide and the Endless Reovlution"
in Bellingham, WA, I demonstrated "a very dismissive attitude when
[she] tried to press the idea that there had been quite a swell of
Anti Aristide sentiment" leading to his ouster.

I do not feel that I was dismissive and apologize if this is the
"attitude" that was conveyed. However, Ferdinand's impressions seem
out of place when measured against the feedback that I received from
several other people in attendance. Notwithstanding, I think that
this is a relatively important question. To clarify: I noted that the
"swell" is a relative term that has to be honestly measured against
the evidence that existed at the time for pro-constitution (or, as
they are termed "pro-Aristide" demonstrations).  The demonstration in
question was held on February 7th, 2004. "Aristide and the Endless
Revolution" shows video footage of the rally that was estimated to be
at least 100,000 people by the Haitian government. The press release,
archived here: http://auto_sol.tao.ca/node/view/1817, is accompanied
by a link to a photograph of the rally. A Lexis-Nexis database search
finds not a single mass media reference to the rally in subsequent
days. The closest mass media comment that i could find to referencing
the rally, and it isn't clear if the interviewee attended the
demonstration, was from an NPR transcript, February 9, 2004, during
an interview that was generally apologetic toward the paramilitary
actions and foreign-backed Haitian opposition movement.

"EDWARDS: Aristide was forced from power once before. Is it going to
happen again?

Mr. OTTEY (Miami Herald reporter): Well, things are deteriorating
very quickly here in Haiti and who's to say? He's vowed to remain in
power. There was a rally on Saturday where many of his supporters
came out in Port-au-Prince and he said that he vowed to stay until
2006 and remain in power, but he always feels emboldened when he gets
that kind of support in the streets for him."

One other reference that I found from Haitian Radio Nationale,
broadcast February 9, 2004, along with (at least a partial transcript
of Aristide's speech):

"It is now three years since President Jean-Bertrand Aristide was re-
elected for another five-year presidential term, according to the
1987 Constitution. On 7 February, to mark the occasion, the head of
state inaugurated three public squares at the junction of Airport
Road and Delmas Street. There are three new public squares in this
area. The ceremony took place in the presence of several thousand
people who went to show their support for President Aristide and
respect for his presidential term.

President Aristide condemned discrimination against a part of the
population and condemned violence from wherever it comes. The head of
state seized the opportunity to renew his willingness to fulfil his
presidential term. President Aristide spoke as follows:

Aristide - recording This great work has been done by men and women,
and it is a woman who was in charge of the project so that we could
have these three public squares. So, you can see I cannot prevent
myself from asking you to tell them how proud we are of them. If you
turn this way, you will see another square with a structure that
stands on 11 pillars. Each column represents a geographical
department of Haiti. This means that we now have one more department,
which is Nippes in the Grand-Anse . We still have the Diaspora as the
10th department.

We are all human beings and we all count. And this is the reason why
there is a map of Haiti in the middle of the pillars. And there is a
globe above the map which shows how we are united with the world for
Haiti to continue to make progress. I hail everybody who is working
towards this unity. applause Are you all human beings?

Crowd Yes.

Aristide Does everybody count?

Crowd Yes.

Aristide Those of you who believe that everybody counts, raise your
hands. O la la! Everybody counts. Splendid. There. Thank you. Where
you are now, we call it Honey Pavilion. This means that we have spent
200 years in the wasp of dictatorship, bloodshed and exploitation of
poverty. We celebrated the 200 years of our independence so that
honey may flow in the country. This means that everybody will have
food to eat, a place to live, access to healthcare, education,
security and welfare. Just like sweet honey, life should be sweet for
everybody without distinction. And all of you who agree for us to
work towards 200 years of honey, raise your hands. applause There. A
great people who know what they want, who know what is good and who
know what is nice.

Actually, I have a five-year presidential term. And if they do not
want that then they will get 10 years. applause Five years, if they
do not want me to fulfil the five-year presidential term then I shall
stay in power for 10 years. If they do not want that then I am there
for 10 years. And of these 10 years, there are two years left for me
personally and five years for the person who will replace me after
elections. applause

All the people who are in Cite Soleil words indistinct because they
are people too, and we must respect them and love them. We should not
call them dirty feet people. We should not say that they are poor and
despise them because of prejudice. Each time we think of the size of
the sun, the heat and the weight of the sun, we think of the people
of Cite Soleil, La Saline, Solino, Carrefour, Bel-Air, La Savanne, La
Faucette and people everywhere who are living in poor areas and where
the peasants are in the hills.

Our message today is this: You are all human beings. Everybody counts
and people should not despise you. Rich or poor, people in the
countryside or in town, we want all our people to be loved. That is
what we have come to say today once again to show that everybody
counts, that everybody is important and that people are human beings."


Much smaller opposition rallies, and the paramilitaries incursions
were garnering the most attention in the foreign and elite-owned
Haitian media at the time.

I also made the point in Bellingham that mass media coverage of
demonstrations in the specific case of Haiti but also as a general
rule, is unreliable and tends to be deliberately misrepresentative.
Many in-depth studies of the mass media have proven this point. I
cited the recent case of a February 4th demo that I had covered and
marched in in Caracas, Venezuela, "The Day of Dignity." Easily
several hundred thousand, upwards of one million people marched (see:
http://www.marxist.com/venezuela-historic-demonstration080206.htm).
There was also an opposition march that same day. Many television
channels showed complete overhead coverage of both demos, often
simultaneously. The Venezuelan government learned the dirty tricks of
the Venezuelan elite-owned media in their coverage of counter-
revolutionary demonstrations precipitating the failed April 2002
coup. The devious nature of the elite-owned media at that time is
analyzed in "The Revolution Will not be Televised." Seeing the
videotaped coverage of the two rallies on February 4th showed to any
viewer that it would be impossible to equate the two demonstrations
by way of numbers or importance, and yet this is exactly what all
mass (english-speaking) media did. Equal weight was given to the
opposition rally, equal estimations of numbers in some cases, and a
consistent downplaying of numbers of pro-Bolivarian Revolution
marchers. A good article on this is here: http://www.zmag.org/content/
showarticle.cfm?SectionIDE&ItemID?39.

Partly, I do wish that Rossier could have included such a visual
contrast in his film, if only to better prove the point. But I
disagree with faulting him for only showing images that probably no
other mass media t.v. station ever cared enough to show. But if we
are going to be critical of what Rossier did or did not include in
his film, we have to be prepared to equally be critical of mass media
reporting of these issues. The relatively small size of the
opposition movement was of course proven during the recent
Presidential (predominantly foreign-engineered) elections. The
results bring to mind what the NED program officer for Haiti told me
last December, characterizing NDI/NED perceptions back in 2002:

     "What happened in Venezuela had been happening in Haiti for a
long time. The opposition party had been boycotting elections for a
long time, because they kept saying 'well we don't have the minimal
conditions for running a competitive process, or participating in a
competitive process,' but they kind of withdrew from this and by
doing this they kind of consolidated Aristide's power, and they also
weakened their own organizations. I mean, I think one of the main
problems in Haiti has been a very weak opposition, a very fragmented
opposition with no platform, unwilling to come together and form some
sort of coalition by ideology or program or anything...you know,
Aristide really had 70% of the popular support and then the 120 other
parties had the thirty per cent split in one hundred and twenty
different ways, which is basically impossible to compete [with]."
(http://narcosphere.narconews.com/story/2006/2/15/205828/741)

Now, we know thanks to Freedom of Information Act Requests and the
publication of Eva Golinger's "The Chavez Code" that the NED, IRI,
USAID, OTI, and other agencies played a significant role in
supporting the opposition movement against the Bolivarian Revolution.
I also pointed out to the people gathered in Bellingham that the NED-
IRI-EU-Canada-UNOPS-USAID, etc. group of foreigners are today
providing crucial financial and other material support to many of the
very same people who comprised the G-184/GNB/Democratic Convergence
groups in Haiti. Diplomatic, ideological, and in many cases financial
support for the opposition movement transitioned into support for a
political bloc that could make a serious run at attaining power in
the elections; the elections being just one step the "democracy
promotion" process.

So, far from dismissing the role of the opposition movement toward
elite rule in Haiti and the extent to which foreign entities have
been supporting it, I have gone to great lengths to research it
understand and appreciate it better. I do prefer, however, to
characterize it in context and as accurately as possible given all of
the available information. I think it is especially important, in
this day and age, to look at new modes of political intervention and
how they are carried out. The same organizations that are trying to
engineer Haiti's political future are hard at work doing relatively
similar things in Iraq, Afghanistan, Ukraine, Liberia, Uganda,, and
so many other places...



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