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Le ministre de l’Intérieur, Paul Antoine Bien-Aimé, a été urgemment
dépêché sur les lieux pour constater les dégâts
“If Aristide was here, Sarkozy
wouldn’t be able to come like that;
there would have been conditions,”
Junior said. “The French stole from
us. They took all our labor and our
natural resources and then on top
of that, they made us pay for our
independence. Today they don’t
want to pay that back. If they paid
the restitution and reparations that
Aristide asked for, we wouldn’t need
the pittance of aid they are offering.
Instead of giving reparations, they
gave Aristide a coup.”
The demonstrators’ other principal
call was for Aristide’s return.
Despite President René Préval’s
election in Feb. 2006 (thanks to the
base of Aristide’s Lavalas Family
party) and Barack Obama’s election
in Nov. 2008, neither president has
made any move to facilitate Aristide’s
return.
return.
“If Aristide returned, that
would be a second earthquake for
Haiti because it would be a deliverance
for us,” Junior says. “He is
the number one leader for Haitians.
Others might come along later and
develop, but for the moment, it’s
Jean Bertrand Aristide.”
Junior offers trenchant analysis
of Haiti’s current situation, very
similar to that of several other young
men interviewed in the camp.
On the foreign military occupation:
“The soldiers come in here with
all their guns, but they do nothing
to help the country. I know that the
earthquake was God’s work, but
they are trying to take advantage
of it by deploying their forces so by
2012 or 2014 they might take our
country from us. We ask for aid, but
we don’t want aid from a bunch of
guys with guns, coming to intimidate
people again.... Haiti needs
people to help it rebuild, to give it
aid. It doesn’t need guys with guns.
Because we are not violent. They
say we are violent, but we’re not....
The international community is
abusing us by sending soldiers here.
They are not needed. The Brazilians
in the MINUSTAH [U.N. Mission to
Stabilize Haiti] do so many abuses
to us Haitians. What problem does
Haiti have that it has to have this
force occupying it? Are they trying
to use this earthquake to send more
troops here?
On Barack Obama: “As for the
US president – and I regret saying
this because he is black – but everything
he says is a lie. He doesn’t
speak the truth.... What he says,
only the people fi lling their pockets
with money like it. We Haitians
don’t. He’s not the real president.
He’s a subaltern. He’s out there,
trying to reconcile the US with the
world, but he’s not the president of
the US.”
On NGOs: “They have people
from lots of nations arriving here,
without visas or passports, but
they never offer us that right... They
don’t give the aid to us. They give
it to NGOs. The NGOs spend it the
way they want and don’t deal with
people. They deal with bandits,
people with guns in their hands.”
The Haitian government is
now working to move people out
of the Champ de Mars because it
“hurts the image of the country,”
in the words of one government offi
cial. One government relocation
camp consists of 88 tents on a treeless
gravel lot in front of the ruins of
the National Cathedral in downtown
Port-au-Prince. “The new site is in a
more crime-prone area, and it’s not
as nice,” said Armand Dieuseul, 40,
who is unemployed, after a Sunday
mass held in front of the Cathedral.
(Most of Haiti’s big Catholic churches
– Sacré Coeur, St. Gérard, St. Joseph
– were destroyed by the quake,
but Haitians massively attend Sunday
masses in or near the ruins.)
“I don’t think people are going to
want to move to it,” he concludes,
ruefully gazing at the empty camp’s
orderly rows.
While the Haitian government
handles the thankless tasks of rubble
removal and relocation, foreign contractors
are rushing to Haiti to get a
piece of the action in the country’s
multi-billion dollar reconstruction.
“It should be Haitians who rebuild
Haiti, not the usual suspects,
contractors linked to the Pentagon
like Halliburton, DynCorp, and
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