[NYTr] Haiti Report for November 13, 2007

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

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Haiti Report for November 13, 2007

The Haiti Report is a compilation and summary of events as described  
in Haiti and international media prepared by Konbit Pou Ayiti/KONPAY.  
It does not reflect the opinions of any individual or organization.  
This service is intended to create a better understanding of the  
situation in Haiti by presenting the reader with reports that provide  
a variety of perspectives on the situation.

To make a donation to support this service: Konbit Pou Ayiti, 7 Wall  
Street, Gloucester, MA, 01930.

IN THIS REPORT:

- Dominican Republic Officials Criticize UN Report on Racism
- Residents in Cite Soleil Accuse Authorities of Abandoning Them  
  After Noel
- Senator Boulos Faces Dismissal For Deceiving Authorities About  
  Citizenship
- World Bank Announces it Will Make $4 Million Immediately Available
- Gunshots Fired at Radio-Tele Ginen
- UN Peacekeepers Likely to Stay Several More Years
- Carrefour Slums Instead of Beaches
- Wyclef Jean Pledges to Support Young People
- Edwidge Danticat: Don’t let new AIDS study scapegoat Haitians


Dominican Republic Officials Criticize UN Report on Racism:

Discrimination against Haitians and their descendants "only exists in  
the minds of a few sick people" who wish to do the Dominican Republic  
harm, said governing coalition legislator José Taveras in response to  
a critical report by United Nations observers. Foreign Minister  
Carlos Morales also "deplored" the report by U.N. experts, saying  
their activities in the country had been "a prefabricated set-up,"  
according to an official communiqué released in Santo Domingo on  
Tuesday. The preliminary views of the U.N. experts on racism and  
minority issues are that there is "a profound and entrenched problem  
of racism and discrimination against such groups as Haitians,  
Dominicans of Haitian descent, and more generally against blacks  
within Dominican society." "While there is no legislation that is  
clearly discriminatory on the face (of it), some laws have a  
discriminatory impact, including those in regard to migration, civil  
status and the granting of Dominican citizenship to persons of  
Haitian heritage born in the Dominican Republic, the experts said in  
a press release issued in Geneva. Taveras, however, rejected these  
observations, and told IPS that "it’s impossible to get to know the  
national reality in the few days that the U.N. delegation was here."  
"There may be isolated cases, but discrimination is not a general  
problem in this country," said Taveras, of the National Progressive  
Force (FNP), an ultra-rightwing party allied to the governing  
Dominican Liberation Party (PLD).

Doudou Diène of Senegal, U.N. special rapporteur on racism, racial  
discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance, and Gay McDougall  
from the United States, a U.N. independent expert on minority issues,  
made a preliminary presentation on Monday of their impressions and  
the data they had collected since their arrival in the Dominican  
Republic at the invitation of the government on Oct. 23. Their final  
report will be delivered to the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva.  
The experts’ goal was to gather first-hand information about possible  
cases of segregation of and discrimination against Haitian  
immigrants, which have been denounced repeatedly by local and  
international human rights groups. Diène and McDougall confirmed the  
existence of arbitrary policies and practices, which are sometimes  
applied retroactively. For instance, "young people who were born in  
the Dominican Republic of Haitian parents spoke of their concerns  
regarding their ability to attend university since they are unable to  
obtain the required cedula (identity card)," they said. A circular  
put out in March by the office of the civil registrar instructed  
officials to closely examine birth certificates when issuing copies,  
or any document relevant to civil status, in case they were issued  
irregularly in the past to people with foreign parents who have not  
proved their legal residency or status in the Dominican Republic.  
This has led to low level functionaries questioning or confiscating  
documents belonging to people of Haitian descent, the U.N. experts  
found.

In August, the founder and leader of the Dominican-Haitian Women’s  
Movement (MUDHA), Sonia Pierre, accused the civil registry offices of  
demanding that Dominicans of Haitian descent present their parents’  
documents in order to issue birth certificates. And in fact the FNP  
asked registry officials to revoke Pierre’s Dominican citizenship, on  
the pretext that her parents had not been legal residents when she  
obtained it, in 1963. Pierre’s parents came to the Dominican Republic  
in 1954 to work on the sugarcane plantations. After her case made  
international headlines, the investigation into the legality of her  
documents was called off. Racism and discrimination against Haitian  
immigrants and their children or grandchildren born in the Dominican  
Republic are frequent complaints, which have been taken up by local  
and foreign non-governmental organisations.

Foreign Minister Morales, however, rejected the U.N. experts’  
observations outright. In his communiqué, he said that "the report  
given by this lady and gentleman lacks solid evidence and appears to  
echo the voices of those traitors who are only interested in taking  
advantage of the situation." "We do not find it surprising that,  
without being closely familiar with the situation in our country, the  
rapporteurs were able to make their diagnosis in just a few brief  
days, because we know what underlies this," he said. In his view,  
"for a long time there have been unpatriotic Dominicans involved in  
lucrative institutions who have been playing along with foreign  
countries that compete with the Dominican Republic in sectors such as  
tourism, trade and investment in different branches of the economy."  
He stated that the government of the Dominican Republic would not  
tolerate "anyone coming in from outside wanting to judge our laws and  
our constitution. Our border with Haiti has its problems, this is our  
reality and it must be understood. It is important not to confuse  
national sovereignty with indifference, and not to confuse security  
with xenophobia," he said. (IPS, 10/31)


Residents in Cite Soleil Accuse Authorities of Abandoning 
Them After Noel:

Residents of a notorious Haitian slum lashed out at local authorities  
Monday for abandoning them in the recovery from Tropical Storm Noel,  
and said U.N. troops and Haitian officials failed to protect one  
shelter from marauding gangs. Protesters blocked roads and burned  
tires on the outskirts of the Cite Soleil slum to demand the government
clean up after Noel, whose heavy rains and flooding killed 148 people
in the Caribbean and left tens of thousands
homeless. Evacuees who spent four days in the overcrowded National  
School under U.N. protection said international troops abandoned the  
school Friday, leaving them defenseless against outside criminals who
robbed them in the dead of night. U.N. spokesmen said the shelter was
turned over to Haitian authorities shortly after sundown, and that
Friday's incident was a fight over food by evacuees who had not been
fed until that evening. Evacuees said Haitian authorities never
arrived, that attackers came from outside the shelter when they were
left alone in the dark without a generator. The Haitian civil
protection department did not return phone messages Monday. On Monday,
the anger was directed at Cite Soleil municipal officials, who
protesters said were pocketing aid for themselves and ignoring outlying
areas hit hardest by flooding. One group pumped their fists and
shouted, "The mayor is a liar!"    "In the state that the country is in
now, the government can't help us," said Joseph Bernard, a leader at a
church sheltering more than 400 people since Tuesday. "We're asking all
the international organizations to give us whatever aid they
can." (AP, 11/5)


Senator Boulos Faces Dismissal For Deceiving Authorities 
About Citizenship:

A U.S. citizen of Arab decent, who has been elected at Haiti ’s  
senate, now faces dismissal and possible arrest after Haitian  
officials found he had fraudulently obtained a Haitian passport and  
allegedly made false statements before election authorities. Senator  
Rudolph Boulos, who is part of one of the country’s wealthiest and  
most powerful families, was born on April 28, 1951, in Manhattan ,  
New York (USA), according to official documents of which copies have  
been obtained by CMC. Those documents have shown that Boulos had been  
using lately a U.S. passport, confirming that he has U.S. citizenship  
– which disqualifies him to occupy a seat at the Haitian senate. But  
he continues to claim he is Haitian. “I have never renounced my  
Haitian nationality,” Boulos told reporters. “I have been targeted  
for political reasons, because I stand against a plan uttered by  
certain authorities to restore a dictatorship in the country,” he  
said. But Haitian officials maintained Boulos – who is part of a  
family with a long tradition of doing business in Haiti – is a U.S.  
citizen and should leave Parliament. “We have documented evidence  
that Mr. Boulos is a U.S. citizen. Therefore he is not allowed to  
seat at the Haitian senate,” said a high-ranking government official  
who spoke to CMC on condition of anonymity. “

"If Mr. Boulos does not give up the senate seat he has obtained  
fraudulently, he runs the risk of being arrested and prosecuted,” the  
same authorized source told CMC. “He still has time to choose”. The  
Haitian constitution provides any Haitian citizen who has obtained a  
foreign citizenship loses the Haitian nationality and therefore is  
banned from running for parliament offices and for president. In a  
document signed by Boulos before immigration authorities, he admitted  
that the Haitian passport he has obtained in August 31, 2005, was his  
very first Haitian passport. But Boulos – who was born in Manhattan  
( New York ) on April 28, 1951 – had been living in Washington for  
years and has gone on numerous trips during the past years. The  
president of the senate, Joseph Lambert, said he was expecting  
official notification of the fact from judicial and government  
authorities before acting and has announced the senate would launch  
its own investigation. “If it is confirmed that senator Boulos  
possess a U.S. passport, he will be simply dismissed,” said Lambert  
inviting Boulos to voluntarily resign if he really holds a U.S.  
passport. (Caribbean Media Corp, 11/8)


World Bank Announces it Will Make $4 Million Immediately Available:

As thousands of Haitians remain homeless from Tropical Storm Noel,  
the World Bank Wednesday announced that it's immediately making  
available $4 million to the government of Haiti to assist in the  
recovery effort. The funds are being redirected from ongoing projects  
and also include a $7 million grant for long-term rehabilitation and  
reconstruction. ''Bank staff are on the ground assessing the damage  
jointly with the United Nations, the government and other  
organizations, and discussing with authorities how best the bank can  
support their recovery efforts,'' Pamela Cox, the World Bank's vice  
president for Latin America and the Caribbean, said in a press  
release. ''As well as quick assistance to help those most in need  
now, we are increasing support for Haiti in strengthening capacity to  
mitigate and respond to disasters, to reduce the human, physical and  
economic impact of future storms,'' Cox said. Haiti's civil  
protection office is reporting that 10,226 individuals are homeless  
and 18,712 people remain in shelters. Also, there are now 1,853  
destroyed homes and 8,735 others are damaged. In addition to  
infrastructure damages, major losses are being reported in  
agriculture. Meanwhile, the U.S. Coast Guard reported Wednesday that  
since Thursday it has saved 59 lives in neighboring Dominican  
Republic, assisted 22,175 lives, distributed 27,344 rations of food  
and 72,940 rations of water. Tropical Storm Noel is responsible for  
taking the lives of more than 83 Dominicans in neighboring Dominican  
Republic since the storm made landfall on Oct. 31. (MIami Herald, 11/7)


Gunshots Fired at Radio-Tele Ginen:

Gunshots were fired at Radio-Tele Ginen (RTG) during the morning of  
Tuesday, November 6, in Haiti's capital Port-au-Prince. The attack  
injured a female street vendor who was subsequently hospitalized  
according to RTG employees. A front-side window of one of RTG's  
yellow jeeps lay shattered on asphalt in front of the station. RTG is  
popular with both rich and poor in Haiti. The broadcaster is  
respected in poor neighborhoods because it often gave a voice to the
residents of Lavalas strongholds while the de facto government of  
2004-2006 was in power. Delmas Wilson Jeudy, the mayor of the  
community in which RTG is located, visited the station after the  
attack. He denounced the "bandits" responsible, but added that he did  
not believe the attack was part of a campaign to muzzle the press.  
However, he added that an investigation was being carried out to  
determine if anything broadcast by RTG might have provoked violence.

The director of RTG, Jean Lucien Borges, stated that the attack was  
typical of other attacks on journalists in Haiti. However, he could  
not say what, if anything, broadcast by RTG had provoked the attack.  
Asked what impact the attack would have on the morale of RTG  
employees Borges replied by comparing RTG to a boat that takes to sea  
regardless of the weather and "follows its compass" undaunted. RTG's  
appeal across the political spectrum was apparent after the attack.  
The station was visited by members of Fanmi Lavalas but also by  
staunch Lavalas opponents such as RNDDH (Réseau National de Défense  
des Droits Humains) and representatives of privately owned media.  
Another group, Reporters Sans Frontières (RSF), which has ignored  
many deadly attacks on poor pro-Lavalas journalists, immediately  
issued a statement about the attack on RTG.

The attack occurred on the heels of a recent spate of death threats  
that Reuters journalist Joseph Guyler Delva has reported receiving.  
Delva is also the director of SOS, a commission launched to  
investigate the killings of journalists. Delva has suggested there  
may be a link with the threats against him and Senator Rudolph  
Boulos, a founding board member of the Haitian elite's lobbyist  
organization in Washington D.C., the Haiti Democracy Project. Last  
month Delva revealed on Radio Melodie FM that Senator Boulos holds US  
citizenship and that according to Haiti's constitution it is illegal  
for a Haitian senator to hold a foreign passport. Delva has also  
revealed that Boulos, claiming senatorial immunity, has refused to  
respond to questions of Judge Fritzner Fils-Aimé in regards to the  
investigation into the killing of Haiti's most well known journalist  
Jean Dominique of Haiti Inter. (Haitianalysis.com, 11/9)


UN Peacekeepers Likely to Stay Several More Years:

U.N. peacekeepers will likely remain in Haiti for several more years  
because the troubled Caribbean country is not close to managing its  
own security, the mission's new chief envoy said Thursday. Hedi  
Annabi, in his first interview since assuming control of a 7,800- 
member U.N. force and hundreds of international staff in Haiti, told  
The Associated Press that the U.N. mission has made great strides,  
but will not seek to leave the volatile country anytime soon. "The  
security situation is extremely fragile. And if we were to downsize  
dramatically there would be a vacuum that would be immediately  
backfilled by the same people that were there when we got started,"  
said Annabi, sitting in his office in the hills above Port-au-Prince.  
When asked how long that might take, Annabi said: "You don't create a  
security force, a police force, in two or three years. ... It takes  
10, 15, 20 years."

Many Haitians have been calling on the U.N. force to foster  
development in the country, but Annabi said Thursday that is not the  
role of U.N. troops. "What we do is we create the environment in  
which job creation, investment and economic reconstruction can take  
place. We don't do it ourselves," Annabi said. The Tunisian diplomat  
has already had his share of challenges since arriving in Haiti a  
little more than a week ago. On Oct. 28, Tropical Storm Noel began  
dumping water on an already rain-soaked country, killing at least 66  
Haitians and creating thousands of refugees. With the government  
unable to deal with the crisis, U.N. peacekeepers were dispatched to  
set up shelters and manage the flow of displaced people. Annabi paid  
a visit to one overcrowded shelter on Nov. 1 in the Port-au-Prince  
slum of Cite Soleil. Evacuees who just moments before had been  
cursing soldiers erupted into cheers and gathered around the  
baldheaded, bespectacled man. That Annabi could even visit the slum  
was considered a victory of sorts. Little more than a year ago, while  
accompanying then-Secretary-General Kofi Annan, Annabi had to tour  
the slum in an armored vehicle for fear of gang attacks.

Annabi also already had to deal with a sex scandal involving 108 Sri  
Lankan peacekeepers and three commanders who were expelled amid  
allegations that soldiers patronized underage prostitutes. He  
expressed regret for the incident and said a probe is continuing.  
Annabi comes to Haiti after nearly a decade as the U.N.'s assistant  
secretary-general for peacekeeping operations. Though he visited the  
Caribbean nation several times as part of his oversight role, he  
acknowledges he is "not an expert on Haiti." "I learned during the  
period when I dealt with Southeast Asia that you don't necessarily  
become an expert even after 10 years," Annabi said. "The more you  
learn, the more you discover there is more to learn." (AP, 11/9)


Carrefour Slums Instead of Beaches:

Carrefour is one of the most impoverished and populous districts of  
Port-au-Prince, the capital of Haiti. It is located several miles  
from downtown Port-au-Prince, flanked on the west by the bay of La  
Gonave and to the east by the bay of Hospital Mountain. Among  
Carrefour's many slums Souray is the most impoverished, amazingly  
given the wealth generating potential of its beaches. How did beaches  
become slums? Massive migration from the countryside since the second  
half of the 20th century has vastly outpaced the willingness and  
capacity of the public and private sector to provide jobs, education  
and housing. The poor quickly occupy the few abandoned buildings in  
Carrefour. Squatters take up property on the beaches, as did those  
who migrated to other poor communities such as Site Soley, Lasalin,  
Site de Letenel and Site de Dye. Souray residents are often reduced  
to using large rags to divide their shacks up into rooms. They  
subsist as best they can. Old men gather excitingly to play dominos,  
a popular past time amongst the poor.

Relentless population pressure forces people to use the sea as a dump  
so that the slum can expand. Old men try to eke out a living by  
fishing in the polluted sea. These fishermen have no technical or  
economic assistance from the state Agriculture department. Women  
often work as street vendors. They make a little money by selling  
fish or fruit, barely enough to feed their own children. In Carrefour  
the government has not provided them with a decent public market. It  
has become common now for district police to arrest "informal"  
merchants or illegally seize their merchandise, as the poor cannot  
afford a legal vendor permit. The families of Carrefour often live on  
less than one US dollar per day and suffer from malnutrition. The  
lack of access to potable water and basic health care further  
compounds the problem. Few can afford to attend school. With few  
options young people are put at high risk of going into prostitution  
and crime.

Carrefour and its slum of Souray sit obscenely close to the splendor  
of Haiti's National Palace. Residents comment how their community has  
barely ever benefited, as politicians, NGOs and businessmen pass  
their community over. The government's police and UN soldiers seem  
only to take notice when gang violence or popular protests erupt. To  
tackle the increasing poverty and decay of urbanization on  
communities like Souray, the answer lies in a revitalization of
Haiti's agricultural system. Haitian agriculture must be rescued from  
further neoliberal "reforms" and the damage inflicted from previous  
"reforms" must be repaired. Higher tariffs on foreign agricultural  
products and an improved road network could help revitalize Haiti's  
agricultural economy. Only a strong agricultural economy can halt the  
influx of rural populations into urban slums like Souray. The  
residents of Souray say that they do not want indiscriminate
assaults by UN soldiers and the police but instead a sane and  
compassionate policy. (Haitianalysis.com, 11/12)


Wyclef Jean Pledges to Support Young People:

Rap star Wyclef Jean has pledged to support young people in Haiti  
during his first visit since the country's president made him roving  
ambassador. Speaking to the Associated Press, the star said he wanted  
to "teach kids how to move the country forward".  The 35-year-old,  
who was born in Haiti, said his charity Yele-Haiti would help finance  
the youth projects. He aims to offer counselling for jailed child  
gang members, plus football training and computer facilities.  
Lobbying politicians: "If you want to change a country,  
unfortunately, you're not going to be able to help eight million  
people at one time," he said. "But if you can get one or two or three  
and start to make that change, that will make the difference," he  
added. Jean said his next step as ambassador would be to start  
lobbying politicians in Washington to help promote development in  
Haiti. "I'm always going to assist my country in the best way I can,"  
he said. The singer gained fame as a member of the hip hop trio The  
Fugees, who won Grammys in 1996 for their album The Score and single  
Killing Me Softly. Haiti's government credits Jean with successfully  
lobbying the US Congress for a "passage of a trade" bill expected to  
help create textile manufacturing jobs in Haiti.  (BBC, 11/13)

Hip-hop star Wyclef Jean was given a hero's welcome in one of Haiti's  
most destitute slums on Monday, riding the shoulders of his cheering  
countrymen to the site of a small-business project he helped develop.  
On his first trip to Haiti since being named a roving ambassador by  
President Rene Preval in January, the musician met legislators and  
accompanied Czech model Petra Nemcova to a school in the neighborhood  
where he was born. Jean, who moved to Brooklyn as a young boy, then  
changed into a pinstriped suit to ask a luncheon crowd of  
businessmen, the U.N. envoy and nearly every major foreign ambassador  
for aid. "We need all your money, we need all y'all's support, but  
let's put it to programs ... that teach kids how to move the country  
forward," Jean told dignitaries in the hills above Port-au-Prince.

In the port slum of Cite Soleil, Jean, who had success as a member of  
the Grammy-winning group The Fugees and as a solo artist, was carried  
along by a crowd of 1,000 people who yelled his name and danced past  
bullet-scarred shacks. At one point, Jean bowed his head in silent  
prayer. "I asked for benediction upon this place, for all these  
kids," Jean told The Associated Press. Nemcova, who founded her own  
charity after she was injured and her boyfriend killed in a  
catastrophic Indian Ocean tsunami in 2004, joined Jean in visiting an  
adjacent cooperative sponsored by Jean's charity group, Yele Haiti.  
The cooperative restaurant — one of 10 planned for Port-au-Prince —  
will employ 15 local women when it opens in December, selling meals  
from about 70 cents to $1.40. (AP, 11/13)


Edwidge Danticat: Don’t let new AIDS study scapegoat Haitians

A new study on the early path of the AIDS epidemic threatens to  
stigmatize Haitians and Haitian-Americans once again. Late last  
month, a group of researchers published a study that concluded that  
the explosion of the AIDS pandemic in the United States resulted from  
the virus first being brought from the Congo to Haiti around 1966 and  
then to the United States “after a single migration of the virus out  
of Haiti in or around 1969.” Now I am not a scientist and I don’t  
pretend to understand every detail of the research conducted by the  
group, led by Michael Worobey of the department of ecology and  
evolutionary biology at the University of Arizona. (The study was  
published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.)  
But prominent physicians argue that the group’s conclusions are  
highly debatable. And, by pinning the blame on a Haitian “immigrant  
host,” they could have potentially devastating consequences.

Worobey and his colleagues based their study on the blood samples  
taken from five Haitians in the early 1980s, patients who all  
happened to have been treated by a collaborator in the study, Dr.  
Arthur Pitchenik of the department of medicine at the University of  
Miami. Dr. Pitchenik had collected and sent their blood samples to  
the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. The  
Haitians’ blood samples were later compared with 117 other samples  
from non-Haitians, and the Haitians appeared to have the oldest  
strain outside of Africa. The scientific value of the research, we  
are told, is — aside from historical curiosity — to help study  
mutations for a potential AIDS vaccine, which would indeed be good  
news for everyone. But one of the critical problems with the study is  
how sweeping a conclusion it draws from research that involves such a  
tiny group of people. “This is very slender evidence on which to base  
such a grand claim,” Dr. Paul Farmer, a professor of medical  
anthropology who has been fighting the AIDS epidemic in Haiti, told  
the Miami Herald.

What’s more, the study places inordinate significance on its Haitian  
“immigrant host” when other carriers are equally if not more  
plausible. First of all, there were only a relatively small number of  
Haitians working in the Congo, and of these, many chose not to return  
to Haiti because it was under a brutal dictatorship at the time.  
Second, there were plenty of missionaries, aid workers, Peace Corps  
volunteers and revolutionaries returning from the Congo to the United  
States and other parts of the world who also could have spread the  
virus. Previous claims on the origins of the AIDS epidemic have  
proven to be wrong, so we should look at the current one with a great  
degree of caution. The hunter theory that blamed Africans for eating  
bush meat, the vaccine theory that blamed scientists for making  
guinea pigs out of millions of people, and the Patient Zero theory  
that blamed one promiscuous Canadian flight attendant all
have for the most part been abandoned.

The problem with the Haitian hypothesis is that by the time it is  
further elaborated, vetted, debated, clarified and scientifically  
contested, the lives of thousands of people may be irrevocably  
altered, just as they were in the early 1980s, when as the only high- 
risk group identified by nationality, Haitians lost jobs, friends,  
homes and the freedom to emigrate. At that time, a struggling Haitian  
tourism industry was crushed. Children, including myself, were  
taunted or beaten in school by their peers. One child shot himself in  
a school cafeteria in shame. Haitians who tried to donate blood faced  
a ban by the Food and Drug Administration, which eventually realized  
that banning donors by nationality was not the answer as much as more  
thorough screening of the entire blood supply. Already, in one public  
discussion in Miami, a caller on a radio talk show jeered that all  
Haitians should be kept out of the United States. The truth is, as  
long as the pandemic exists, it is all of our problem, however it  
started, whoever carried it, and whoever is now infected by it.  
Stigmatizing Haitians will do nothing to solve that problem. (The  
Progressive, 11/7)