24747: Hermantin(News)Bush lauds Haiti aid report

[sak-pase@bimini.ws]

leonie hermantin <lhermantin@hotmail.com>

Posted on Tue, Apr. 12, 2005
Bush lauds Haiti aid report
The governor's Haiti Advisory group called on Florida to take a more active 
role in helping Haiti move forward by offering expertise and technical 
assistance in three key areas: economic development, security and disaster 
preparedness.
BY JACQUELINE CHARLES
jcharles@herald.com

Six months after convening a group of Haitian Americans and Haiti supporters 
to advise him on how Florida can best support Haiti's road to recovery, Gov. 
Jeb Bush welcomed the group's final recommendations Monday, calling them 
``embedded in the real world.''

The 25 recommendations focus on three key areas: security, economic 
development and disaster preparedness. Far from controversial, they mostly 
call for Florida to provide technical assistance to some existing programs, 
tweak others and play a more active role in helping those who want to assist 
Haiti.

The recommendations were presented to Bush and interim Haitian Prime 
Minister Gerard Latortue at a luncheon to mark the opening of the 
Haitian-American Chamber of Commerce of Florida.

''These are doable recommendations,'' Bush told a packed room of nearly 400 
Haitian business professionals and others including Miami Mayor Manny Diaz, 
who enlisted his police department's support in possibly helping to train 
Haitian police.

''These recommendations . . . tap the greatest resource Haiti has,'' Bush 
said. ``The greatest resources Haiti has are its people.''

Latortue said Haiti needs business people to help spur economic recovery and 
job growth because the root of the ongoing violence, he believes, ``lies in 
poverty.''

Latortue declined to discuss Haiti's political problems, other than to 
re-emphasize that neither he nor anyone in his interim government will 
accept a post in the new government following planned elections later this 
year. Instead, he took advantage of the gathering at the JW Marriott, 1109 
Brickell Ave., to offer his own progress report on the job his government 
has done.

He cited as successes audits of government-owned enterprises like the 
telephone and electrical companies, curbs on government corruption and cuts 
to unnecessary spending such as paying ``extravagantly for lobbyists in 
foreign countries.''

Latortue continues to be the target of some critics who say his government 
has failed to improve life after former Haitian President Jean-Bertrand 
Aristide resigned on Feb. 29, 2004.

Outside the gathering, about 100 pro-Aristide supporters demonstrated 
against Latortue and U.S. Ambassador James Foley, who also attended the 
event. ''Latortue is an assassin,'' they shouted while carrying life-size 
posters of dead Haitians, victims of the country's ongoing violence. 
``Arrest him.''

Ignoring the protests, Latortue said he wants to foster a national dialogue 
among Haitians to help erase the divisions and to get Haitians out of the 
mentality of demanding the resignation of a government every time they 
become dissatisfied.

''Haitians [have] to learn that when a government comes to office they come 
for a certain time . . . You don't make them leave before their time,'' he 
said.

Asked whether this means he disagreed with the calls for Aristide's 
resignation, which led to his appointment as interim prime minister, 
Latortue said Aristide was different.

''The entire country stood up against him,'' he said. ``Aristide is in the 
past.''