Sep.
30, 2015 was a joyous day this year, although it marked
the 24th anniversary of the sad and bloody 1991 coup
d’état led by former Haitian Army Gen. Raoul Cédras and
Lt. Col. Michel François against the democratically
elected president, Jean-Bertrand Aristide. The coup
killed some 5,000 people, according to some estimates,
and over 20,000 according to others. Occurring five
years after the Duvalier dictatorship’s overthrow, the
Sep. 30, 1991 coup temporarily trampled the democracy
that had begun to take root in Haiti.
Justice, transparency, and participation were the
ideals of the movement which culminated in the Dec. 16,
1990 election that brought Aristide, a former priest at
St. Jean Bosco church, to power.
Twenty-four years later, the struggle for
justice, participation, accountability, and democracy
continues. If Sep. 30, 1991 symbolizes the crime and
despair which came with the killing of democracy, could
Sep. 30, 2015 promise the Haitian people change and hope
for strengthening democracy?
To commemorate Sep. 30 this year, two major
events occurred in Port-au-Prince. First, the Lavalas
Family Political Organization brought together thousands
of people from all walks of life in a massive
demonstration. Second, Dr. Jean Bertrand Aristide made
his first public address since returning to Haiti from a
seven year exile on Mar. 18, 2011.
Excitement grew in the days before Aristide’s
statement as Lavalas leaders announced it would happen
in meetings and on radio shows. But previous promises
that Aristide would make a public appearance had been
broken, and many remained skeptical.
The plan was for him to speak on the runway of
the former military airport located at Delmas 2 in the
capital, near a vast shanty town which sprang up after
the Jan. 12, 2010 earthquake.
Early on the morning of Sep. 30, crowds began
gathering, chanting "the mute one will speak, those who
aren’t happy about that, get ready, hypocrites will be
surprised.” A jubilant crowd sang and danced in the
streets, hoping to glimpse their charismatic leader’s
arrival. They held up blue and red Haitian flags, as
well as photos of Aristide and of Dr. Maryse Narcisse,
Lavalas Family’s presidential candidate in the upcoming
Oct. 25 election.
The suspense grew until about 1:00 p.m. when Dr.
Narcisse arrived at the head of a large delegation and
made her way to the stage prepared for the occasion.
Accompanied by Sen. Jean Baptiste Bien-Aimé and several
other dignitaries, she announced that Aristide would not
come to the former airport but was waiting outside the
gates of his home in Tabarre.
Immediately, the vast crowd streamed towards
Aristide’s residence, four miles away, via the National
Road # 1, Cazeau, Clercine, and then Boulevard October
15. Once there, the crowd packed densely in front of the
house, with people sitting in trees and on walls to get
a view. Thousands in homes and streets around Haiti
followed the event on radio and television.
Standing next to Dr. Maryse, Aristide, in a
prepared but emotional seven-minute speech in Kreyòl,
saluted the memory of the victims of the Sep. 30, 1991
coup d’état. He called the first round of Aug. 9
legislative elections an "electoral coup, a selection
and not an election." The authors of this “electoral
coup” were “mentally ill,” suffering from a disease
called "unilateral spatial neglect," Aristide said.
“That means,” he continued, “this category of
sick people sees only one side of reality.”
“An X-ray of the Aug. 9, 2015 electoral coup
d’état” also reveals that the “ill refuse to accept that
they are ill,” he said, and “in such a case, the
solution is above all mobilization, the mobilization of
all who don’t want the country to fall into this
unprecedented seismic political whirlpool.”
Aristide closed by calling on the Haitian people
to vote for “Dr. Maryse and all the Lavalas candidates”
because “the plot is put together with so much money,”
however “a plot carried out with money’s power can be
undone by the force of our dignity.”
This show of force 11 years after the
kidnapping-coup of Feb. 29, 2004 reveals the Haitian
people’s strength and that of the Lavalas Family party.
It is in this sense that Aristide said: "The
mobilization must continue against the electoral coup
until the Lavalas Family has returned democratically to
the National Palace with Dr. Maryse Narcisse as
president of Haiti."
In recent weeks, thousands of Lavalas Family
militants have demonstrated in the streets of the
capital against the electoral coup of Aug. 9, calling
for its annulment and the resignation of the Provisional
Electoral Council (CEP) and, sometimes, even President
Michel Martelly.
On Oct. 6, demonstrators again took to the streets to
protest against the visit of U.S. Secretary of State
John Kerry. He traveled to Haiti in an effort to shore
up political support for the Oct. 25 U.S.-financed
elections, which are increasingly in doubt as a national
uprising, much like that in Guatemala, grows against
Martelly and his CEP following the Aug. 9 polling
plagued by
violence,
fraud, and
abstention.
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