10Power
Haiti Tech Summit is Back for its Second Go Round
Haiti Tech Summit, founded by Forbes 30 Under 30 entrepreneur, mother, and wife, Christine Souffrant Ntim, is back and will be even bigger than last year. The 13-year initiative of the Global Startup Ecosystem (GSE), which brought together hundreds of entrepreneurs, investors, digital marketers, and creatives, will be taking place June 21–23 and like last year, Black Enterprise will be in the building.
In case you missed the first annual tech summit, Haiti hosted 100 global speakers from around the world including Silicon Valley tech titan Ben Horowitz. Additionally, the summit welcomed over 500 guests for two historic days—turning it into the region’s largest tech gathering and Haiti’s first major international global summit ever.
“Hosting an event of this magnitude in Haiti not only aimed to revitalize economic activity in the country but to also provide a new narrative for Haiti and emerging markets,” stated founder, Souffrant Ntim. “Haiti is not open for business. Haiti is open for disruption.”
Founder, Christine Ntim (Image: Haiti Tech Summit)
Companies present last year included Google, Facebook, Uber, Airbnb, Facebook, PayPal, Mastercard, LinkedIn, Github, Dropbox, Sendgrid, YouTube, and Adobe and in addition to Horowitz, spotlight speakers included, the President of Haiti, his excellency Jovenel Moïse and celebrity influencer, Vicky Jeudy from Netflix series, Orange is the New Black.
The conference also provided resources and tools for entrepreneurs, like access and information to high-end ecosystems like Steve Blank’s Launchpad, Galvanize, Puerto Rico’s Parallel 18, Pivotal Labs, Angel Hack Accelerator, WIN Lab, Startup Grind, Forbes 30 Under 30 listmakers, Brazil’s Laiob-Latin America Institute of Business, and Alter Ventures.
So what resulted from all of this? Airbnb was able to close a 5-year agreement with the Ministry of Tourism; Facebook launched the country’s first internationally recognized developer community, and Google Launchpad launched an accelerator program to source and support the country’s leading startups. Furthermore, the president of Haiti announced the country’s first national incubator for entrepreneurs to be located in the nation’s capital—Port-au-Prince. The incubator launches the first week of June.
With all of that said, what can we expect this year? Well, the summit will return to the luxurious Royal Decameron and will kick off the event, none other than Twitter’s own co-founder and CEO, Jack Dorsey. Dorsey will be discussing his experiences launching and scaling two globally recognized tech startups that both aim to “simplify complexity’—Twitter via communication and Square via financial inclusion.
By: Sequoia Blodgett for Blackenterprise.com | June 1, 2018
Solar Startup Brings Renewable Energy To Haitian Households
One of the most exposed countries in the world to natural disasters, Haiti, an independent island state in the Caribbean with a population of close to 11 million, has been hit by hurricanes, floods and earthquakes with increasing ferocity and frequency. In 2016, Hurricane Matthew wiped out agricultural farms in South Haiti, which prior that year brought 74% of the country’s new jobs.
Although sharing the island with neighboring Dominican Republic where everyone has access to electricity, Haiti has limited access to electricity - where only 38% of Haitians in 2016 have a connection to the electrical grid, a small improvement from 28% of Haitians in 1990. Even those with access to the grid today still experience frequent blackouts and unreliable power quality.Despite dealing with natural disasters and energy poverty, Haiti has optimistically made hard commitments to create a renewable energy economy.
10PowerHaitian Solar Installers
In September 2017, the Haitian Parliament eliminated import tariffs and duties on solar equipment (the US, moving in the opposite direction, imposed a 30% import tariff on Chinese solar panels only a few months later in January 2018). Economy and Finance Minister Jude Alix Patrick Salomon stated in an interview with Haiti newspaper Le Nouvelliste, "we wanted to encourage, as part of this budget, the acquisition of equipment from alternative sources of energy."Haiti is also positioned well for solar. A study by Worldwatch calculated that Haiti receives a comparable amount of average annual sunlight (calculated in global horizontal radiance) to sunny Phoenix, Arizona, making Haiti ideal for solar power. With the high cost of imported diesel, solar is cost competitive and with financing is immediately cost advantageous in Haiti.How will large-scale solar be implemented in Haiti?Leading the charge, millennial female social entrepreneur, Sandra Kwak, and founder of social venture 10Power, is pioneering the way in Haiti by fostering the collaborative support of the public and private sectors. Working in frontier markets, 10Power partners with local installers, providing and financing project developments for commercial-scale solar and energy storage solutions. In turn, this builds market ecosystems. “Our goal is to provide affordable, reliable renewable energy that will save businesses money and create jobs,” says Kwak.10Power estimates the addressable market for commercial-scale solar in Haiti is currently over $500 million . The company has a current sales pipeline of over $100 million. “Haiti has the potential to quickly become a renewable energy powerhouse,” says Kwak. “The steps that are being taken in this direction are encouraging.”
10PowerFounder & CEO of 10Power, Sandra Kwak (on the far right) at Solar Project
Launched in 2016, the company has financed and installed solar power for two water purification centers, providing clean drinking water to surrounding schools and communities and supporting over 600 micro-enterprises, majority women-led. 10Power is continuing its work with plans to implement a large-scale solar energy project with an undisclosed international NGO in the coming months.Kwak’s efforts to date have been recognized, from being awarded an Echoing Green Fellowship to most recently receiving investments from LIFT Economy Force for Good Fund and SheEO.10Power's enthusiasm for solar in Haiti is shared and supported by the local government. The Haitian Ministry of Public Works, Transportation and Communications (MTPTC) is working with the World Bank to develop a framework to deploy sustainable mini-grids. “It is exciting to see private sector and international development partnerships taking off,” says Nicolas Allien, Senior Energy Specialist and SREP-CTF Projects Coordinator at MTPTC. “We are implementing well-targeted financial instruments and policy measures in order to attract private sector investments in both on-grid and off-grid renewable energy solutions.”
10PowerHaitian Solar Installers
Haitian President, Jovenel Moïse has set a goal of 24-hour electricity, which he announced in June 2017. His government has formed a National Regulatory Authority for the Energy Sector (ANARSE) led by Evenson Calixte, who is tasked with “facilitating the transition [of the energy sector] from a quasi-monopoly to unprecedented openness to the participation of other state actors…from the private sector."So what?Haiti, despite dealing with natural disasters and energy poverty, is committed and positioned to achieve a renewable energy future. Emerging nations, such as Haiti, should not be underestimated in their potential to shift rapidly to a green future, leapfrogging the fossil fuels industry , with long-term investment and support from the public and private sectors. “Distributed renewable energy has the potential to increase resiliency, prosperity and power sustainable development,” says Kwak, and to achieve this at scale social ventures, such as 10Power, are critical.By: Neil Yeoh for Forbes.com| April 30, 2018
In Haiti, Golden Hopes in a Yellow Grain
(Featured image by Jean Marc Hervé Abélard/Round Earth Media)
Some entrepreneurs in the Caribbean nation are finding that there is money to be made growing rice.
GONAIVES, Haiti – As the sun starts to set on Haiti's most fertile valley, a silent group of women sweeps grains of newly harvested rice into large, yellow mounds, unfazed by the acrid smoke of nearby wood fires.From there, the rice is placed in barrels, where it will be cleaned over those fires. Then, in a small back room on a winter afternoon, it will be packed in bags and shipped from this mill in west-central Haiti's Artibonite Valley, ending up in the kitchens of Haitian expatriates and other discriminating cooks across the United States.This was once a common scene in Haiti. Now it's a rarity. A few decades ago, Haiti was self-sufficient in rice, a crop so important here that the U.N. estimates it makes up about a quarter of people's daily diet. It even grew enough to export. But production collapsed after the U.S. and international lenders forced the country to dramatically lower tariffs that protected local farmers, from 50 percent to 3 percent in the last three decades.A quarter-century later, about 80 percent of Haiti's rice is imported, and the country is a major market for U.S. exporters. Faced with cheap imports, the country's dire poverty, natural disasters, lack of investment and collapsing infrastructure, production is still dropping in Haiti despite government efforts to halt the slide. Last year, the government reported a rise and a subsequent drop because of bad weather.Some Haitian entrepreneurs say there is money to be made growing rice. Skeptics, however, say hopes to resurrect the rice industry are misplaced and, with too few resources and little international support, represent the challenges that many poor, underdeveloped countries face in turning their economies around.Fabias Voltaire, 37, one Haitian trying to boost rice production, was able to reach an agreement to process his rice at a cooperative that is funded by the aid group Oxfam. He said there is a strong foreign demand for high-quality organic rice. It may cost more, but many regard it as healthier and better-tasting than American varieties. Plus, Haitian émigrés in the States love it, he says: "Haitians are … very sentimental about eating rice from home."In 2015, Voltaire and two cousins launched Caribbean Grains LLC. Three years later, they are shipping to Florida, Alabama and other U.S. states.Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. About three-quarters of its 11 million people live on less than $2 a day and about half the population lives in rural settings. In 2010, following a magnitude 7.0 earthquake that devastated the country, former U.S. President Bill Clinton publicly apologized for forcing Haiti to drop its import tariffs and damaging the economy.
A worker at the Caribbean Grains production facility shows off the production of Haiti’s most fertile region, the Artibonite Valley. Experts say the government could dramatically improve yields by fixing the area’s irrigation canals. (Jean Marc Hervé Abélard/Round Earth Media)
"It may have been good for some of my farmers in Arkansas, but it has not worked," said Clinton at the time, according to news reports. "It was a mistake."Since then, hurricanes Sandy in 2012 and Matthew in 2016 cost Haiti hundreds of millions in agricultural losses, making it even harder to recover.Jovenel Moise, who became Haiti's president in February 2017, has an agricultural background and pledged to relaunch the industry by fixing irrigation canals, financing infrastructure projects and other initiatives. By May 2017, the government had unveiled its program "La Caravane du Changement" – The Caravan of Change – to fund such infrastructure repairs. Although government estimates of the program's cost are difficult to obtain, Haitian news media reports say $55 million was spent in 2017 to repair the country's agriculture infrastructure.
Still, the challenges to boosting the country's rice industry are great. Production costs are high, and farmers have almost no access to loans or insurance to protect them from the ravages of insects and plant diseases.The facts on the ground keep skepticism high that the initiatives will substantially boost rice production. Thousands of acres in the Artibonite Valley are waterlogged, making them prone to disease, especially around the time of harvests. Other parts of the valley aren't getting enough water.Travis J. Lybbert, an economist and professor at the University of California-Davis who has done extensive research in the region, says the government's focus on better irrigation could make a big impact on rice production.
"It is relatively easy to make this happen," he says, adding that it would be much harder to provide access to inputs such as seed and fertilizer or create a better market for farm products.The government can prioritize spending on agriculture without a lot of scrutiny, shortchanging other sectors of the economy in a country that is in desperate need of just about everything."These are very important and heavy costs that are easy to sweep under the rug as many other projects get delayed," Lybbert adds. "That could be a real drag on development in other parts of the country."Looking out over a nearly dry river and irrigation canals that need to be cleaned and rebuilt, Agriculture Ministry representative Renaud Gene says Haiti has the political will to fix the problem, but not the means."There is a serious problem of water management, and it requires a lot of investments," he says.
The government has been fixing roads and canals but doesn't have the resources to make dramatic improvements. Instead of feeding Haitians in need with their own excess production, Gene says rich countries could assist Haiti more by helping develop its infrastructure, and then buying the rice from Haitian farmers to distribute.
In contrast with Voltaire, many in the region say a long history of failure leaves them pessimistic that anything will change. They regard the government initiative as at best populist and naïve. While not questioning the president's intentions, many simply aren't optimistic about the feasibility of breaking through the obstacles that exist.
"Jovenel is struggling like a poor devil but I am not sure where he's going," says Franklin Benjamin, an engineer and rice producer who has dedicated his career to finding ways to supply Haitians with locally produced rice.For decades, attempts to develop the sector have failed, he says, because farmers never get the incentives and solid support system they need."Haiti doesn't interest Haitians. They are all looking to get a visa to go somewhere where they are despised," he adds. "There is still a hope, but we will be disappointed like always."In the midst of such pessimism, Voltaire hopes that his success might inspire the next entrepreneur. And he has even bigger dreams."I want to create an agricultural bank for farmers," he says. "The objective is to make Haiti the economic capital of the Caribbean."He splits his time between West Palm Beach, Florida, and Haiti and still plans to continue growing his business despite the challenges. He says he spent $10,000 to fix the irrigation canals he needed for his own production.
On his farm, Voltaire's workers take a pause to laugh and joke a bit around a broken-down tractor. The fact that the rice mill exists at all is a small miracle.Additional reporting by Jean Pharès Jérôme. This story was produced in collaboration with Round Earth Media.By Aida Alami, Contributor for USNews.com | April 9, 2018
Haiti PM Shuffles Cabinet After Ultimatum
Port-au-Prince (AFP) - Haitian Prime Minister Jack Guy Lafontant, a political novice just over a year into governing the impoverished Caribbean country, has made his first cabinet shuffle after pressure from legislators.
Following his appointment in February 2017, Lafontant, a doctor by profession, nominated his first cabinet of 18 ministers overnight Monday, including five women.
They lack political experience except for a few technocrats.
On Thursday, a lawmaker who backs President Jovenel Moise -- a banana exporter who is also a newcomer to politics -- issued a 72-hour ultimatum for him to make ministerial changes.
The demand came after more than a month of pressure from lawmakers who publicly support the president.
Moise's spokesman had said Friday that the president was not acting "under either pressure or threat from another power," but in the end a shuffle took place.
State television overnight broadcast a recorded message from Lafontant announcing the cabinet changes, but there was no official explanation as to why the reshuffle occurred.
The changes are:
- Jean-Marie Reynaldo Brunet named minister of interior and territorial community. Until 2016, he was an acting mayor appointed by former president Michel Martelly in the absence of local elections.
- Jean Roody Aly appointed justice minister. He was previously the ministry's director general.
- Joubert Angrand, who was coordinator of the national coffee institute, became agriculture minister.
- Guy Andre Junior Francois was named minister responsible for Haitians abroad. He is a former consul in Miami, which is home to most of the diaspora.
- Guyler C. Delva, a journalist, will head the Ministry of Culture and Communication, where he served as secretary of state for communication between 2012 and 2013.
Haiti is still recovering from Hurricane Matthew, which struck in 2016, and almost 40,000 people remain in makeshift camps eight years after an earthquake killed more than 200,000 people.
Since 2010, about 10,000 people have died from a cholera epidemic in Haiti.
By: AFP.com | April 24, 2018
Venezuela and Haiti Sign New Bilateral Deals
The agreements will see Venezuela and Haiti deepen their collaboration in agricultural production as well as in joint infrastructure projects
Caracas, November 28, 2017 (venezuelanalysis.com) – Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his Haitian counterpart, Jovenal Moise, held bilateral talks in Caracas Monday where they signed fresh agreements in the areas of energy and agriculture.Known as the Energy and Agriculture Cooperation Agreement, the deal will see Venezuela and Haiti deepen their collaboration in agricultural production as well as in joint infrastructure projects. Further details have yet to be released.Both leaders also reaffirmed their governments’ commitment to the PetroCaribe program, an initiative created by former President Hugo Chavez Frias which sees Venezuela export oil to Haiti and other Caribbean and Central American nations at 40 percent of the market cost, with the remainder payable via 25-year low interest loans.The trip marks President Moise’s first visit to Venezuela since taking office in February on behalf of the right-wing "Bald Heads" (PHTK) party. The businessman was elected to office last November to replace fellow PHTK member, Michel Martelly, as president - though the elections were marred by accusations of fraud.Speaking during a meeting at Miraflores Presidential Palace, the Haitian leader paid tribute to the historic bonds uniting the two countries.“We have been in permanent partnership since the beginning of our history and we thank the people and the Venezuelan president,” he said, alluding to Haiti’s support for Venezuelan independence leader Simon Bolivar, who subsequently abolished slavery in the South American country.President Maduro, for his part, pledged his solidarity with the Caribbean island, which has been rocked by severe natural disasters in recent years.“We will always be together, Haiti and Venezuela. I ratify all of our support, love, and solidarity [for the Haitian people],” he declared.Under the leadership of Chavez and Maduro, the Venezuelan government has moved to strengthen ties with Haiti in recent years via PetroCaribe and other regional integration initiatives. Nonetheless, bilateral agreements between the two countries have been dogged by reports that the Haitian government has embezzled millions of dollars in Venezuelan aid.Between 2011 and 2014, Venezuela helped finance 234 projects in Haiti to the tune of US$1.2 billion.By:
Haiti: Massive rallies call for Jovenel Moise to step down
Thousands of people have taken to the streets in Haiti calling for President Jovenel Moise to step down.It's the latest of ongoing protests against Moise that began two months ago.It comes on the day Moise officially reintroduced the national army, some 22 years after it was disbanded, and a week after an investigation revealed millions of dollars in earthquake relief had been stolen.By Teresa Bo for Aljazeera.com |November 19, 2017
We Want To Stay': Haitian Immigrants In U.S. Fear End Of Temporary Protected Status
For decades, the United States has provided immigrants from 10 countries, mostly in Central America, what’s known as Temporary Protected Status. Under this status, temporary visas allow them to stay and work in the U.S. and prevent them from being forced to return to home countries at war or devastated by natural disasters.The Trump administration says it plans to end the special status. For 50,000 or so Haitians in the U.S. under the program, that means their Temporary Protected Status would expire Jan. 22.Joana Desir is one of those Haitians. On a recent day in Manhattan, the 32-year-old home health care provider is racing between patient visits.By midday, she already has helped transport one of her regular patients, a young girl with a severe respiratory disease, to school, and visited two senior patients in their homes. Soon she’ll head back to the girl’s school and make sure she gets home safely.“It’s a hard job, but rewarding,” says Desir.On weekends she picks up a few extra patients — just for fun, she says with a laugh.“Most of immigrants that I know, they have a busy life like me,” she says. “I leave home like 5:45 [a.m.] and sometimes I get home by like 9 p.m.”Desir came to the U.S. in 2008 to help out her aging parents, both legal residents. She overstayed her visa and was still in the U.S. when a powerful earthquake struck Haiti in 2010.Hundreds of thousands were killed, and the Obama administration granted Haitians temporary protected status. They were shielded from deportation and given work permits.Critics say the temporary program for Haiti and for others from countries where disasters and wars took place decades ago has become permanent and amounts to a backdoor immigration policy.During her years in the U.S., Desir put herself through nursing school, got a job and rose to supervisor. But she hasn’t forgotten those back home, who she says are still hurting.“We have that connection in Haitian families,” she says. “Since you succeed, you have to help others — it is a must.”It’s estimated by the think tank Inter-American Dialogue that all Haitians abroad this year will send home $2 billion. That’s nearly equal to Haiti’s annual operating budget.In May, citing improved conditions in Haiti, the Trump administration signaled it no longer would extend the temporary visas. It warned Haitians to prepare to go home in January, when the program expires.Desir is devastated — and as the news gets back to Haiti, concern is growing there too. Desir has 19 relatives who depend on her for financial support.In a hillside neighborhood above downtown Port-au-Prince, Desir’s cousin Daniele Joseph shows me around her three-room home. Seven people live here, including her husband, son and four of her sisters — all Desir’s relatives.Joseph says all but the youngest cousin remember Desir. Last month, Desir paid for the young cousin’s First Communion.As two of the girls cook dinner — spaghetti with a few onions and chiles — Joseph ticks off everything Desir helps with. After the earthquake, there was money sent to rebuild their home, preschool tuition for Joseph’s two-year-old son, multiple shipments of clothes — and the list goes on.Joseph says it will very difficult if Desir is sent home.In the same neighborhood Desir’s godmother, Margaret Estefan Altas, paints a much more dire prediction of what will happen to her family without assistance from abroad.“I call Joana and tell her I have a problem, we have no food — and she’ll say, ‘I’ll do what I can,’ ” says Altas. “She always comes through.”Her husband, who hasn’t worked since the earthquake and now has cancer, says it’s clear to him the family would starve without Desir’s help. Desir pays their annual rent, about $1,300 dollars, and tuition for the youngest son’s high school.Altas says she helped raise Desir and considers her a daughter. “These days, I feel more like she is the mother and father,” says Altas.Haitian officials have appealed to the Department of Homeland Security to extend TPS. Several U.S. lawmakers, including a bipartisan group from south Florida, have introduced legislation that would let the immigrants stay permanently.Haiti’s president, Jovenel Moise, told NPR in an interview that he is worried about stability in the region if 50,000 Haitians are sent home.“If they have to return, we have no other choice — they are our brothers and sister and we will receive them,” says Moise — but he is concerned about the loss of U.S. remittance dollars sent to families in Haiti, and the effect of that on the stability of the economy. He said that 25 percent of Haiti’s GDP comes from those remittances.Back in New York, Joana Desir says she can’t imagine giving up the life she’s built there.“I will always be grateful for America,” she says, “but please, we are professional — we want to stay.”For now, Desir has been giving away most of her possessions and reducing her belongings to what will fit in two big suitcases. She says she doesn’t want to leave — and if the U.S. tells her to go, then they’ll have to come get her and drive her to the airport.By Carrie Kahn | Nov. 5, 2017
Police Use Teargas as Demonstrations Continue Against Budget Proposals in Haiti
Haitians demonstrating against budget proposals presented to Parliament by President Jovenel Moise last month (Photo: CMC)
PORT AU PRINCE, Haiti (CMC) — Police used teargas to disperse hundreds of people demonstrating against the measures contained in the 2018 budget that has been presented to Parliament by President Jovenel Moise last month.The Parliament has approved the fiscal package, but Moise hinted at the possibility of reviewing some of the measures as demonstrators took to the streets again on Saturday in Pétion-ville demanding his removal from office.The demonstration planned by the political parties, Fanmi Lavalas, Pitit Desalin as well as other organisations and students attracted thousands of people, and despite the presence of members of the Body of Intervention and Maintenance of Order (CIMO), the protestors broke several storefronts and windshields of several vehicles.Stones and bottles were also thrown at some buildings even as the security agents fired gunshots into the air in a bid to disperse the crowd.The protesters also erected several barricades, blocking traffic and sporadic shooting was reported in the Juvénat neighbourhood, with media reports indicating that the damage “seemed considerable”.The police had to use teargas to disperse the crowd with several reports of being injured and there were several arrests.Commissioner Frantz Lerebours, spokesman for the Haitian National Police (PNH), was however, unable to give details.
Some of the demonstrators tried to reach the city centre but were met with a strong resistance from the CIMOs on the Champ de Mars.The opposition parties condemned the violence saying that the demonstrations had been infiltrated by people who wanted to provoke troubles and accuse the opposition of disorder…Last week, the Haitian Customs Association (ADH), gave the General Administration of Customs (AGD), of the Ministry of Economy an eight-day ultimatum to meet their demands or face work stoppage island-wide from Thursday.Customs officers, whose salaries are GOURDES17, 000 (One Gourdes=US$0.01 cents) after a nine-month training are demanding an 80 per cent wage increase.In addition, customs officers are demanding special status because of the importance of their mission and responsibilities: fiscal, economic and security.Meanwhile, the Council of Ministers last week adopted a preliminary draft law to amend article 149 of the Decree of 29 September 2005 on income tax.President Moise has since announced that he will convene an extraordinary session the Chamber of Deputies, once the draft bill has been ratified by the Senate.By: Jamaica Observer | October 01, 2017
Positive Meeting Between Moïse And The IDB
On Tuesday, on the sidelines of the 72nd Ordinary Session of the United Nations General Assembly, President Jovenel Moïse received in audience Luis Alberto Moreno, President of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) to discuss the priorities of the Government of Haiti.President Moïse insisted on the Caravan of Change as a strategy to bring the State closer to the population by providing basic services and giving it the tools it needs to develop its environment. A medium-term strategy aiming to attract investment in the region; to build road, energy and social infrastructures.For his part, the President of the IDB welcomed initiatives to deconcentrate public services, fight corruption and reform public administration.Moreno indicated that he intended to take steps to support the implementation of the priorities of the Moïse Administration and announced that he will visit Haiti on October to inquire about the progress of the Caravan of Change and assess its needs.This meeting is part of President Moïse' determination to find more opportunities for the country and to attract potential investors to Haiti.By: HL/ HaitiLibre | September 21, 2017
Marchers Demand Haiti's President Step Down
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AFP) — Thousands took to the streets of Haiti's capital Wednesday to demand President Jovenel Moise step down following the publication of a national budget viewed as unfavorable to the country's poor."We do not agree with what Jovenel does: he is crushing the country," said Jean-David Senat, among a throng of demonstrators stretching down a main avenue."He said he would put money in our pockets, he did not. He said he would put food on our plates; we do not even have dirt to eat. So he and this team of thieves must leave," the protester said, referring to the president's campaign slogans.Since it was released in July, opposition lawmakers have decried the budget for fiscal year 2017-2018, saying it would balloon the debt of the poorest country in the western hemisphere.On Tuesday, protesters brought parts of Port-au-Prince to a standstill, setting vehicles alight and damaging local businesses.Protesters directed their anger toward senators who voted for the 2017-2018 budget last week and the deputies who approved it Saturday.Despite popular opposition, the government published the document in the official gazette late Tuesday.The lack of dialog has infuriated demonstrators.That the president "published the budget is a provocation to the Haitian people and to us the political leaders," said Moise Jean-Charles, an opposition leader who spearheaded the demonstration."The people will decide his fate," he said."An alternative is being prepared," Jean-Charles said. "This time we take our fate in our hands.""No one will be able to divert our movement to satisfy the bourgeoisie."The Haitian leader left the country Sunday to attend the UN General Assembly in New York and was due to deliver his speech Thursday and return to Haiti the following day.New anti-government demonstrations are already planned for Thursday and Friday in the capital.By: Jamaica Observer | September 20, 2017
Haiti in crisis: What next after the stolen election?
Addressing an overflow audience in Oakland in late April, Dr. Maryse Narcisse, presidential candidate of Fanmi Lavalas, the party of former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide, spoke about the necessity of reforming the justice system, investing in education and health, and the decisive role of women in the fight for democracy. Reflecting on the devastation wrought by both the 2010 earthquake and Hurricane Matthew, she focused on the growing threats posed by climate change to the island nation and the need for a vigorous environmental campaign to meet that threat. She emphasized that the Lavalas movement “places human beings at the center.”Dr. Narcisse spoke in the wake of the selection of Haiti’s new president, Jovenel Moise, a right-wing businessman and protégé of former president Michel Martelly, who took office via an electoral process so replete with fraud and voter suppression that opposition forces called it an “electoral coup.” She denounced the stolen elections and the corrupt electoral commission that validated the outcome.But she reiterated that the deteriorating economic and social conditions in Haiti would be the catalyst for renewed protest in the days and months ahead. “There is no choice,” she stated, “but for the people to resist. And Lavalas will be there to support them.”We can see the truth of this throughout Haiti. Market women – the very heart of Haiti’s economy and the foundation of so many Haitian families’ ability to survive – have been targeted by police trying to move them off the streets of Port-au-Prince, where they have been selling their goods for generations. When the women organized themselves and refused to move, police burned down their stalls.
She reiterated that the deteriorating economic and social conditions in Haiti would be the catalyst for renewed protest in the days and months ahead. “There is no choice,” she stated, “but for the people to resist. And Lavalas will be there to support them.”
On July 10-12, 2017, during three days of peaceful protest for an increase in the minimum wage, Haitian police attacked the workers from the industrial park in Port-au-Prince with tear gas, batons and cannons shooting a liquid skin irritant. They beat a woman who had recently returned to work from giving birth. A few days later, a young book vendor was shot to death in Petionville, on the outskirts of Port-au-Prince, by a police officer in front of horrified witnesses, who tried to prevent the police from quickly removing the body and covering up the crime. They were attacked with batons and tear gas.There has been a 35 cent increase in the price of gasoline – which was already higher than what we pay here in the United States. The government has also announced plans to reduce government subsidies for oil and gas, which will send the price even higher. The rise in the cost of transportation combined with a hike in the price of food has made already untenable living conditions even worse for the vast majority of Haitians.Former president Michel Martelly came to power in 2011 touting his plan to build new schools and make education free for all. Instead, investment in public education has remained stagnant while tuition for private schooling has skyrocketed. Teachers have been on strike for months, demanding that they be paid after not receiving their salaries for up to two years. This despite the fact the Haitian government adds a surcharge to every international phone call and money transfer, supposedly to fund education.Students have also protested, both in support of their teachers and to denounce the failure of the government to invest in their education. They too have been met with violent repression, exemplified by a recent incident when the rector of the National University of Haiti used his SUV to run over a student protester, landing the student in the hospital in critical condition. A video captured the gruesome sequence. No charges have been filed in the case.The Haitian government has a solution for the crisis in education – more prisons. There are now more than 10,000 Haitians locked up in prison, the majority of whom have never been charged or sentenced. Prisoners are frequently beaten, receive no health care, and live in overcrowded cells, where epidemics spread rapidly.
Cascading catastrophes since the 2004 coup forced Lavalas out of power have not entirely destroyed Haitians’ hope and confidence they can once again exercise the full power of the people. Their constant marching in the face of mortal danger – Haitian police are notorious for firing live ammunition into a marching crowd – demonstrates that power … and their trademark joie de vivre.
When United Nations soldiers from Nepal introduced cholera to Haiti in 2010, the disease swept through Haiti’s prisons, killing hundreds. At the recent opening of a new prison in Haiti’s central plateau, the head of Haiti’s national police, Michel-Ange Gedeon, boasted about the increase in prison construction, saying: “In every society, whenever schools fail in their mission, prisons are built in a cascade to try to right the ship. If offenders are to be neutralized, then prisons are needed to contain them.” This is Haiti’s version of mass incarceration, so well known to Black and Brown communities here in the U.S.Now there are new political prisoners – many of them associated with the Lavalas movement – who were arrested during the sustained wave of protests over the stolen elections. As living conditions worsen and protests sharpen, the prisons will fill even more.All of this, added to the impact of Hurricane Matthew – the biggest storm to hit Haiti in 50 years – has led more Haitians to flee the country. In early July, the Coast Guard intercepted and sent back to Haiti 107 Haitians in a small, dangerously overcrowded boat south of the Bahamas.There are over 4,000 Haitians right now in Tijuana, living in refugee camps. Recruited by occupying forces of Brazil to work in the Rio Olympics, they were pushed out after the games ended. Hoping for Temporary Protected Status (TPS) in the United States, which has been granted to Haitians since the 2010 earthquake, they instead have been deported or placed in detention camps if they cross the border.When Haitian president Moise traveled to the United States and met with Vice President Mike Pence in June, he refused to meet with Haitians worried about the changes in their TPS status, telling them to “calm down.” In their joint communiqué, Pence and Moise did not mention the migration crisis but did pledge to jointly pursue “an economic reform agenda to attract investment and generate growth.” Moise’s handshake with Pence symbolized just how much of a compliant partner his regime is with the U.S. government as it seeks even more control over Haiti’s economy and future.
When Haitian president Moise traveled to the United States and met with Vice President Mike Pence in June, he refused to meet with Haitians worried about the changes in their TPS status, telling them to “calm down.”
The United Nations Military Occupation Forces (MINUSTAH), which has functioned as a colonial overseer since the 2004 coup, is set to scale down its operation but will remain in Haiti under its new acronym MINUJUSTH (United Nations Mission For Justice Support). MINUJUSTH will consist of 1,185 police officers, and will continue to train and support the Haitian National Police – the same police who beat, tear-gassed and shot pro-democracy protesters during the last electoral cycle.Lt. Gen. Cesar Lopes Loureiro, the head of the Brazilian forces that have been in command of MINUSTAH since the beginning of the occupation, recently issued a glowing report on the accomplishments of MINUSTAH. But he was silent about U.N. responsibility for the cholera outbreak, and failed to mention the numerous cases of rape and other sexual assaults by U.N. soldiers.The U.N. has still not compensated the victims of the cholera epidemic, and it has given impunity to the many soldiers charged with raping Haitians during the long occupation. And there was not one word about the killings by U.N. soldiers of people in pro-Lavalas neighborhoods like Cite Soleil and Bel-Air or in the Port-au-Prince prison.Whether the U.N. calls its operations MINUSTAH or MINJUSTH, the continued presence of its forces, even in the guise of a reframed mission, is a clear assault on Haiti’s sovereignty.
The documentary film “Black in Latin America: Haiti & the Dominican Republic” will be shown on Sept. 14, 7 p.m., at La Pena Cultural Center, 3105 Shattuck Ave., Berkeley. The screening is co-hosted by La Pena and Haiti Action Committee. Pierre Labossiere, co-founder of Haiti Action Committee, will lead a community discussion after the film. For more information, visit https://lapena.org/event/black-latin-america-haiti-dominican-republic/.
What now looms on the horizon is the resurrection of the Haitian military. This has been a key goal of right-wing Haitian forces since President Aristide got rid of the army in 1995. Jovenel Moise has stated that he wants the army in place within two years. The beginnings of that new army have been in the works for years, training at military bases in Ecuador.In a statement to the Miami Herald, the president of the Haitian Senate, Yuri Latortue, who was a central organizer of the 2004 coup, said, “In Haiti we are used to having an army.” Referring to the U.S. occupation of Haiti from 1915-1934, which created the modern Haitian army, Latortue went on to say, and “the Americans understood that if we have the police but not an army, we will not get anywhere.”
What now looms on the horizon is the resurrection of the Haitian military. This has been a key goal of right-wing Haitian forces since President Aristide got rid of the army in 1995.
When Haitian activists speak of the Haitian Army, there is a chill in the air. Before Aristide disbanded it, 40 percent of Haiti’s budget went to the military. In a country with fewer than two doctors per 10,000 people, there was one soldier per 1,000 people.The Army has long been Haiti’s central institution of repression; the main organizer of coups against elected officials, helping to enforce the Duvalier dictatorships and those that followed before the rise of Lavalas. It was the Haitian Army that overthrew Aristide in 1991 and initiated a reign of terror that took over 5,000 lives before Aristide returned in 1994.The goal of the 2004 coup, like the 1991 coup that preceded it, was not only to topple the Aristide government, but also to rid the country of the powerful grassroots movement that has activated, energized and given voice to Haiti’s poor. That goal has not been accomplished. A stolen election cannot hide this reality.Throughout her campaign, Dr. Narcisse, often accompanied by former President Aristide, was greeted by tens of thousands of supporters in the poorest communities of Haiti. A vibrant Lavalas presence was evident across the country.In the face of decades of COINTELPRO-style counterinsurgency, including imprisonment, the killing and exile of thousands, attempts to buy off activists and encourage internal strife, Lavalas once again showed its significant base among Haiti’s majority population. In or out of government, this strength will serve as a bulwark against the harsh austerity program already being put into place by Moise and his U.S. sponsors.At the end of her speech in Oakland, Dr. Narcisse highlighted the grassroots work of the Aristide Foundation for Democracy. In the midst of the cholera epidemic, mobile health clinics from the Foundation treated patients who had nowhere else to go.After the devastation caused by Hurricane Matthew, President Aristide and Lavalas activists went to Les Cayes, Jeremie and other hard-hit areas to provide medical support, food and clothing. On Haitian Mother’s Day, hundreds of women filled the Foundation to get medical care for themselves and their children.Other clinics took place in mid-July, including on President Aristide’s birthday, July 15. And the University of the Aristide Foundation (UNIFA) continues to grow, providing higher education for over 1,200 students, most of whom could never afford other universities in Haiti.This is a movement that is not going away. As Lavalas digs in for the long haul, those in solidarity with Haiti have to do so as well.by Robert Roth/San Francisco Bay View - September 10, 2017