Haiti, a Nation in Fragments, Faces the Future

joy to the world: Children in the Cite Soleil slum, a bastion of support for former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. PHOTO: Isabeau Doucet

By Isabeau Doucet- The Indypendent

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — This tormented nation is about to anoint a new president, but the political leadership is as fragmented as the buildings that collapsed last January and still lie strewn over the capital. Haiti’s social movements are as neglected as the country’s decaying infrastructure. Everything from political alliances to street protests is for sale. People and organizations on the ground compete for — or are undermined by — NGO money that never provides for any cohesive structural change. Fuel prices, for example, have jumped an unprecedented 33 percent in recent weeks. But since unions can’t organize an effective strike of “tap taps” — the outlandishly colorful buses most Haitians use — it means locals are now paying double the previous price for transport.

The Truth About Haiti’s Cholera Epidemic: Interview of Dr. Renaud Piarroux by Dady Chery

 By Dady Chery Axisoflogic

In mid-October 2010, a cholera epidemic flared up in Haiti.  The epidemic continues, and over 6,000 Haitians have died of the cholera.  Until Fall 2010 there had been no record of cholera on the island of Hispaniola.  A United Nations (U.N., MINUSTAH) base was discovered to be dumping raw sewage, and it was immediately suspected of being the source of the cholera.

Photo form Axisoflogic.com

Dr. Renaud Piarroux is a major scientific authority on cholera epidemics, an expert in infectious diseases and parasitology. He holds an M.D. in Pediatrics and a Ph.D. in Microbiology, and he is currently a Professor of Parasitology at Aix Marseille University, Marseille, France.  He was the lead researcher of a scientific article that tracked Haiti’s cholera contamination to the U.N. MINUSTAH Nepalese military camp upstream of the Artibonite River and its Meille tributary.  More details about Dr. Piarroux and his work follow the interview.

Dady Chery:  Dr. Piarroux, first of all I want to thank you for agreeing to do this interview. Your work is highly respected by scientists the world over. Would you please tell our readers what you do?

Renaud Piarroux: I am a specialist in parasitic and infectious diseases, and I’ve specifically studied epidemics that occurred in developing countries. I try to understand how an epidemic can emerge somewhere and how it spreads to neighboring areas. This kind of work is a prerequisite for organizing better to fight against epidemics and to prevent the onset of new outbreaks. In particular, I’ve spent many years studying the dynamics of cholera epidemics in African countries, to provide local sanitary authorities key information to help them set up efficient strategies to fight cholera.

Former Haiti's Pres. Jean-Bertrand Aristide to Speak Next Month About Education, But No Setting Date

 by Wadner Pierre

Haiti's first-twice democratically elected President, Jean-Bertrand Aristide will be speaking about Education next month according to former Sen. Dr. Louis Gerald Gilles. The Senator told Associated Press that the former Head of State's speech  will be focusing on Education. The event seems most likely to be taking place at the University Aristide Foundation for Democracy in commune Tabarre.

In one of his letters written and published by the Guardian UK before his return from his 7-years exile, the former head of State stressed his love for education and will be devoted his time in the field he likes as a professor. He said,"As I have not ceased to say since 29 February 2004, from exile in Central Africa, Jamaica and now South Africa, I will return to Haiti to the field I know best and love: education. We can only agree with the words of the great Nelson Mandela, that indeed education is a powerful weapon for changing the world." 

MINUSTAH’s New Chief: Herve Ladsous Haiti’s 21st Century Gen. Rochambeau

By Wadner Pierre

The monument of Vertieres in the entrance of the City of Cap-Haitien.Photo Wadner Pierre

This year Haiti will celebrate its two-hundred-seventh anniversary of Battaille de Vertieres Battle of Vertieres) in which the former slaves and colored people proudly defeated the French army and broke the slavery chain. Battaille of Vertieres was the last battle after which Haiti proclaimed its Independence and –became the world’s first Black republic in January 1, 1804. This war to liberate the country and ban slavery cost the lives of about 160,000 slaves, 60,000 French.

Garry Conille’s Nomination as Prime Minister:Washington puts its foot down!

Garry Conille: The Neo-Liberal Pedigree of Haiti’s Latest Prime Minister Nominee At Washington’s behest, a liberal technocrat appears poised to take over Haiti’s most powerful executive post

by Kim Ives--- Haitiliberte

It is a common misconception, both in Haiti and abroad, that the country’s president holds executive power. In fact, his main power is to nominate the man or woman who does: the Prime Minister. President Michel Martelly, after shunning consultations with the heads of Parliament’s two chambers (as the Constitution demands), saw his first two hard-line nominees – Daniel Gérard Rouzier and Bernard Gousse – rejected by the Parliament, which must ratify the candidate. This stand-off set off alarms in Washington, which saw the President it had shoe-horned into office still floundering without a government over three months after his May 14 inauguration.

Garry Conille’s Nomination as Prime Minister: Washington puts its foot down!

By Yves Pierre-Louis Haitiliberte

After Parliament’s rejection of two prime ministers nominated by President Joseph Michel Martelly, various sectors in Haiti and the so-called "friends of Haiti" began to express their concern about the president’s inability to appoint a successor to the currently resigned Prime Minister, Jean Max Bellerive. Martelly’s outright refusal to negotiate and divvy up government posts with the Parliament’s majority political platform led the country into a political stalemate for more than three months. President Martelly and his team apparently did not understand the principles of power-sharing, and this has opened the door yet again to the meddling of imperialist and neo-colonial foreign powers. So, on the evening of Wednesday, Aug. 24, six senators from the Senate’s “Group of 16,” controlled by former President René Préval’s Inite party, met with U.S. diplomats led by U.S. Ambassador to Haiti, Kenneth Merten. After that meeting, the Senators would not utter a word to the press. They were apparently holding state secrets to which the Haitian people had no right.

UN Denied Sex Abuse Before Video Came Out in Haiti, Where New DPKO Chief Ladsous Defended Ouster of Aristide

By Matthew Russell Lee

Source Inner City Press

UNITED NATIONS, September 3 -- Video depicting UN peacekeepers committing sexual abuse in Haiti has surfaced, two weeks after the UN asked Inner City Press' August 17 questions about the abuse by saying on August 18 that its "investigation was finalized... these allegations were unfounded."

The UN never retracted this denial, or whitewash, even as the cell phone video Inner City Press asked about became public.

This classic UN cover-up comes at a time when UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has just named as the new head of UN Peacekeeping a French bureaucrat, Herve Ladsous, who was a public face of France's call in 2004 for Haiti president Jean-Bertrand Aristide to leave the post to which he was elected.

Sept. 2, 2011 —U.N. Peacekeepers Accused of Sexually Assaulting Haitian Teen

By ANSEL HERZ, MATTHEW MOSK and RYM MOMTAZ

 

Alleged Assault Caught on Video, Shows Victim Held Down By Uniformed Men:

Exclusive Video:  http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/video/peacekeepers-accused-sex-assault-teen-14437179

Haitians in this remote seaside town are demanding an investigation into allegations that United Nations peacekeeping troops pinned down an 18-year-old Haitian man and subjected him to a humiliating sexual assault.
The alleged assault occurred in July, but graphic cell phone video surfaced in recent days, showing what appears to be the four UN troops in camouflage and some wearing the trademark sky blue berets attacking the man. As the video began circulating through this coastal village, it sparked a growing sense of outrage there and prompted the victim's mother and father to seek criminal charges against the United Nations peacekeeping officers, who are from Uruguay. Both parents submitted written depositions on Wednesday in Port Salut's courthouse.
A medical certificate filed with the court in Haiti and obtained by ABC News, alleges the victim was beaten and had sustained injuries consistent with having been sexually assaulted.