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Wont pi lou pase sak sèl
Shame is heavier than a bag of salt
(Haitian Proverb)
CHAY LA | Main Story
Since Ariel Henry announced that he would step down once a transitional government was formed, a transitional body mediated by CARICOM has been in the works. The mechanism, favored by the main Haitian political parties and civil society organizations, is a Presidential Council of seven voting members and two observers.
There is a heated debate on social media, in the traditional media, and in Haitian homes regarding whether the Presidential Council is the right vehicle to help the country address the dire security situation and organize credible elections. Many are questioning why the option of a judge from the Cour de Cassation isn’t being used as a transitional president for reasons tied to the 1987 Haitian constitution and for simplicity.
Haitians are asking each other a number of questions: (1) Is a presidential council constitutional? (2) Is it a viable governance mechanism in Haiti? and (3) Is a presidential council too little too late to view the security and humanitarian emergency? All of these are valid questions that we need to continue posing and whose answers should inform our actions as individuals who want to see Haiti succeed.
There are various entities represented in the Presidential Council. These individuals certainly don’t represent all Haitians, but they represent many of the main actors who have led this country for the past 30 years—including some of the very folks who brought Haiti to its knees with the support of the international community.
Fanmi Lavalas is represented by Leslie Voltaire, who is an urban planner and was a minister twice, once as Minister of Education and as Minister of Haitians Living Abroad. He is a long-time member of Fanmi Lavalas, who ran as the party’s presidential candidate in 2010. Fanmi Lavalas boasts two Haitian presidents and dozens of legislators. Led by former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, no serious political agreement would be credible without its presence. Fanmi Lavalas was an initial signatory of the Montana Accord, like other parties, but eventually broke away.
Akò 30 Dawout (Montana) is represented by Fritz Alphonse Jean, who is an economist and a former governor of Haiti’s Central Bank (under Préval) and former head of the Northeast Chamber of Commerce in Fò Libète. Akò Montana is a collective of political parties, civil society organizations, and individuals that came together out of a series of negotiations to propose a Haitian-led solution. Over the past 3 years, they’ve consistently tried to propose a more legitimate transitional government with checks and balances. Ariel Henry never seriously engaged in negotiations with the group because of his consistent backing by the international community.
Akò 21 Desanm is an agreement signed between Ariel Henry and a number of political parties proposing a 2-year transitional plan. Henry did not manage to follow through with this plan — failing to organize elections and to transfer power to a new constitutionally elected government this past February. Despite that, he had the backing of the international community up until a few weeks ago. This group from the incumbent government is represented by Louis Gerald Giles. He’s a former senator and an adviser to Henry.
EDE is the political party founded by Claude Joseph, who was prime minister when Jovenel Moïse was murdered. Over the past three years, they have come onto the political stage as defenders of Moise’s legacy. Martine Moise is a member of this party. EDE is represented by Smith Augustin, a former Haitian diplomat in the Dominican Republic who was involved in negotiations on the Wanament canal between Haiti and the DR when Moise was still alive.
Pitit Dessalines is a political party headed by Moise Jean Charles, former senator and mayor of Milot, where the iconic Citadel is located. He claims to be progressive but doesn’t have a real political ideology beyond protecting his self-interest. Over the years, while presenting himself as opposition to the government, he has been shown to be in bed with the government. A few weeks ago, he allied himself with Guy Philippe and rejected this Presidential Council. He recently joined the Presidential Council claiming in a recording that a Russian ambassador advised him to do so. Pitit Dessalines is represented by a former judge from the North, Emmanuel Vertilaire.
The Private Sector is represented by Laurent St Cyr, a board member of a Haitian insurance company called Alternative Insurance Company. He is a member of Ariel Henry’s dysfunctional Haut Conseil de Transition. The largest entity grouping business owners across all of Haiti is la Chambre de Commerce et d’Industrie d’Haiti claims that they were not consulted to tap a representative for their sector, calling into question St Cyr’s legitimacy.
Collectif du 30 Janvier is represented by Edgar LeBlanc, the head of the Organisation du Peuple en Lutte (OPL) political party. OPL identifies as a progressive party. LeBlanc is an engineer and a former senator. This collective consists of several political parties.
Two institutions have members who are only observers, including Pastor Frinel Joseph, representing civil society, and REN, an interfaith entity represented by Regine Abraham. Abraham is an agronomist and is the only woman on the Presidential Council. Women make up 50% of the Haitian population but no effort was made to propose solid female representatives.
So how would these people work together? The Presidential Council proposes to make decisions by votes. From what we understand, the members constitute two main voting blocks within the Presidential Council, spanning the political spectrum from the right wing to the center to the left. One could reasonably predict that Fanmi Lavalas, Akò Montana, and Collectif du 30 Janvier (led by OPL) will function as one block (left to center) within the Presidential Council. Pitit Dessalines is a wild card. The remaining three entities are Ariel Henry’s allies: EDE (a different iteration of PHTK) and the private sector. One could assume that they might vote together. One thing that is important to note is that on the right, the PHTK party that has led the government for more than ten years now has reproduced and multiplied.
Professor Eddy Lucien recently explained during a panel organized by the Haitian Studies Association that the international community’s refusal to drop its support for Ariel Henry not only ensured that they maintained the same interlocutors in the Haitian government (Henry is a former Martelly minister), but it also allowed other iterations of PHTK to come together over the past three years since Moise’s death. EDE is a good example of this.
In the 2022 Haiti Beyond Crisis series for the Society for Cultural Anthropology, D'johensby Siméon warned against people propelling their political careers from the death of Jovenel Moïse a year after his death.
We must develop, as quickly as possible, a politics of recognition to respond rigorously to the multiple memories that seek to transform Moïse into a martyr and erase his acts of violence against Haitian society as well as the violence inherent in the PHTK regime. To avoid history being distorted and appropriated for political ends, we must integrate the memories of violence committed by both PHTK governments (Martelly and Moïse). We must avoid, at all cost, the violation of memory, and we must not allow proponents of Jovenelism to impose their will or to establish themselves as a legitimate arbiters of Moïse’s memory and legacy—because the construction of memory requires a solid base, which can only come from learning the facts of history. (Source: Society for Cultural Anthropology)
ON THIS DAY
Papal visit (March 1983)
The Catholic Church decided not to participate in the Presidential Council. This month also marks the anniversary of Pope John Paul II’s visit to Haiti in 1983, where he denounced the poverty, hunger, and fear reigning in Haiti at the time under the Duvalier regime.
Pope John Paul II flew here today at the end of his eight-day tour of Central America and the Caribbean and condemned what he described as the excessive inequality and misery, hunger and fear suffered by many people in Haiti.
He also demanded liberty for the Roman Catholic Church to carry out social change. His remarks came at a mass at the airport attended by tens of thousands of Haitians and leaders of the Government, headed by President-for-Life Jean-Claude Duvalier, who has ruled the country for 13 years. (Source: NYT)
In a 2020 article, Valerie Jean-Charles discussed the role the Catholic Church can play in sounding the alarm on the plight of Haitians today. Urging Pope Francis to follow in the footsteps of Pope Jean Paul II, considering the state of affairs in Haiti right now and the influence the Catholic Church still has in Haiti and around the world.
CALL TO ACTION
Help Furnish Homes for Haitian Families in Philadelphia
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