17601: Lemieux: Miami Herald: Haiti's bicentennial: Force a thread of history (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: JD Lemieux <lxhaiti@yahoo.com>

 Posted on Sun, Dec. 28, 2003



Haiti's bicentennial: Force a thread of history
In Haiti's two centuries of independence, this little
nation born of bloody revolt has known great turbulence and
little peace
BY TRENTON DANIEL
tdaniel@herald.com

Haiti's status as the first black republic created by a
slave revolt has remained a source of pride through its
200-year history, even as its people have struggled with
bloody juntas, messy politics and epic poverty -- woes that
have vexed the country since the beginning.

''You cannot deny it took a lot of guts, courage to pull
off this revolution. We have to celebrate the Haitian
revolution. In a way it was a phenomenon,'' says Jocelyn
McCalla, director of the National Coalition for Haitian
Rights.

``But at the same time we recognize it, what we Haitians in
particular have to move away from is this idea you build a
country on the basis of slash-and-burn politics.''

Long before that revolution, Haiti, like the neighboring
Dominican Republic, was the home of more than a million
Arawak Taíno Indians. One of their names for the land was
Ayiti, or ''mountainous'' island. The island's current
name, Hispaniola, was a colonial creation, meaning Spanish
Island.

Columbus ''discovered'' Hispaniola in 1492, speaking
favorably of the Indians. The Spaniards wiped them out
anyway -- with guns and smallpox -- and to replenish the
labor supply for the cane fields, they imported African
slaves.

Later, Spain recognized France's claim to St. Dominigue,
the western third of the island. In time, the region came
to furnish much of the French empire's wealth.

St. Dominigue was so rich that, in 1789, it supplied
two-thirds of the overseas trade of France and was the
greatest individual market for the European slave trade,
noted historian C.L.R. James.

But instead of bowing down, Haitian slaves revolted -- for
12 years -- with former slaves as their leaders. Founding
father Toussaint L'Ouverture, who died before independence
in a French prison cell, remains an icon.

Haiti's independence from French and British conquest was
officially realized on Jan. 1, 1804, when one of
L'Ouverture's successors, Jean-Jacques Dessalines, declared
himself leader of the independent republic and later,
imitating Napoleon, emperor.

And with that, Haiti's people found not only freedom, but
also a future of sporadic world isolation. Led by the
French, the United States and Latin American countries did
not give recognition for decades. Finally France recognized
Haiti in 1825.

The rest of the century and much of the next were
politically tumultuous; between 1843 and 1915, only one of
22 leaders served his full term of office. Haitian society
split along color lines between blacks and Haitians of
mixed descent.

The United States, led by President Woodrow Wilson, invaded
in 1915 to ''protect American and foreign interests,'' and
troops remained until 1934. The United States left a sturdy
infrastructure, but also an army that turned violent.

In 1957, François ''Papa Doc'' Duvalier was elected
president on a platform courting Haiti's black middle-class
vote. He soon created his own private militia, the Ton Ton
Macoutes, and publicly wore the dark wardrobe of a Vodou
spirit, Baron Samdi, as another means of intimidation.

Just before his death in 1971, Duvalier passed the mantle
to his 19-year-old son, Jean-Claude ``Baby Doc.''

The Duvalier dynasty collapsed in 1986. Jean-Claude and his
luxury-loving wife Michle Bennett fled to France aboard an
U.S. Air Force jet. The immediate aftermath was dubbed the
dechoukaj, Creole for uprooting.

Following Duvalier's ouster, Haiti returned to military
rule: strongmen toppled strongmen. But in the late 1980s, a
diminutive Roman Catholic priest named Jean-Bertrand
Aristide rose to power by preaching liberation theology
from a Port-au-Prince slum pulpit. He easily won a 1990
election, surprising the light-skinned elite.

Seven months later, a military junta ousted Aristide. The
new regime and its paramilitary soldiers killed and
tortured thousands, the United Nations responded with an
embargo, and South Florida received an influx of Haitian
``boat people.''

''The country was really deteriorating. The ministries were
not functioning, the gas was so expensive, and the food was
starting to get expensive,'' recalled Mousson Roux, a
restaurant owner and Haitian music promoter at the time.
``The coup was devastating. To me, it is what triggered the
snowball of deterioration.''

Three years later, President Bill Clinton deployed 20,000
troops to Haiti to restore Aristide. Already, the
challenges were formidable, scholars say.

''When he first returned, he had a serious problem -- how
to reconcile his political base and [fulfill] what he
promised to do vis--vis the economy,'' says University of
Virginia professor Robert Fatton Jr.

There were concerns that Aristide would seek to extend his
five-year term, but he relinquished power to handpicked --
and popularly elected -- successor René Préval.

The 2000 elections returned Aristide to power. Then his
Fanmi Lavalas party swept a legislative vote that May, but
the Organization of American States said the electoral
council had to recalculate some Senate seats. The
government refused, the opposition cried foul, and the
international community blocked, and continues to withhold,
millions of dollars in aid.

Today as under the Duvaliers, the one-time ''Pearl of the
Antilles'' is the Western Hemisphere's poorest country.

Still, the island nation -- or ''Haiti Cherie,'' as in a
popular song -- remains defiantly resili,ent and proud.

Said Carol de Lynch, a West Little River-based Vodou
priestess: ``When you love your country so much, you blind
yourself to the situation, even if it hurts you.''

Herald staff writer Jacqueline Charles contributed to this
report.

© 2003 The Miami Herald and wire service sources. :

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Find out what made the Top Yahoo! Searches of 2003
http://search.yahoo.com/top2003