On March 18, 2011, former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide and his family returned to Haiti after seven years in exile.  He was greeted at the airport by tens of thousands of Haitians who then accompanied him to his house in Tabarre.  In an outpouring of unrestrainable joy, they made his house their own, as you can see from the photos here.

People in the courtyard of Aristide's house surrounding the car as he emerged. Photio Paul Burke

People welcoming Titid and his family at their house in Tabarre, photo Paul Burke

photo Paul Burke

From the airport just after he landed, Aristide addressed the Haitian people in a speech carried live on Haitian radio.  He emphasized the need to move from a politics of exclusion to a one of inclusion of all social classes in the political, economic and social life of the nation.  We reprint here the full text of speech as it was delivered primarily in Creole, with section in English, Spanish, Zulu, Swahili, and French.

Speech of Jean-Bertrand Aristide just after his arrival in Port-au-Prince, March 18, 2011

Sè m, Frè m, Onè ! Respè !
Otorite ki nan Leta Peyi d Ayiti,
Reprezantan Gouvènman Afrik Du Sud,
Anbasadè Matu ak Sè nou Matshidiso,
Otorite ki nan òganizasyon
Nasyonal kòm entènasyonal,
Sè m ak Frè m
Ki nan kat kwen peyi a ou aletranje,
Mwen kontan salye n nan lonbraj
Ayeropò Toussaint Louverture.

Sè m, Frè m,
Onè ! Respè !
Onè pou ou !
Respè pou Ayiti !
Ala kontan m kontan fè youn avèk
Minouche, Christine, Michaëlle pou
Salye ou e anbrase ou fratènèlman !
Sè m, Frè m,
Si w te ka poze men w sou kè mwen,
Ou ta santi kijan lap bat pi vit, pi plis
Pou di w : Bravo! Mèsi! Bravo! Mèsi!
Bravo pou kouraj ak entèlijans Pèp la !
Mèsi mil fwa pou akèy san parèy sa a !
Bravo pou tout bèl leson Pèp la deja bay !
Mèsi mil mil fwa pou bèl solèy solidarite
Ki pa te janm kouche dèyè mòn egzil sa a.

A warm welcome to :
Ira Kurzban, Dany Glover, Laura Flynn,
James Early, Selma James, widow of
CLR James, Margaret Prescod, Paul Burke.
Greetings to:
Honorable Deputy Maxine Waters,
Randall and Hezel Robinson,
Brian Cancanon, Claude Ribbe.
Peace to:
John Maxwell and the victims of
the disaster in Japan.

Onè ! Respè !
Onè pou ou e respè pou memwa
300.000 viktim tranbleman tè a !
Respè pou memwa tout moun ki
Viktim kolera ou katastwòf politik.
Men nan la men, bradsou bradsa,
Ann trese yon bèl kouwòn onè respè
Pou Rev Pè Gérard Jean-Juste ak
Tout lòt ewo ki sakrifye lavi yo nan
Defann diyite Ayiti ki malad grav.
Sè m, Frè m,
Pèmèt mwen pataje chalè remèsiman an
Ak anpil zanmi ki pa fèt an Ayiti, men
Ki renmen Pèp Ayisyen ak tout kè yo.
An 2004, gen nan yo ki te al chèche n
Nan peyi Afrik Santral pou akonpaye n
Rive nan peyi Jamayik an natandan
Prezidan Tabo Mbeki te chwazi depeche
Pwòp avyon prezidansyèl Lafrik Di Sid
Pou n te retounen nan bra manman Lafrik.
Yon gwo gwo mèsi pou Prezidan Zuma,
Prezidan Mbeki, Prezidan Mandela ak Tout lòt sè n ak frè n k ap viv nan peyi
Afrik Santral, Jamayik ak Afrik di Sid.
Jan m te di l, anvan n kite Afrik di Sid
Nan lang isiZoulou ak lang Swahili :

(IsiZoulou)
Yize iHaiti ikude naAfrika, asisoze sazikhohlwa
izimpande zamasiko ethu. Ngesikathi zonke
sizobatshela abantwana nezizukulu zethu :
Manikumbule lapho okoko bethu bazalelwe khona.
Niqubele ngokubona lendawo eya eAfrika.
Niqonde ngqo ngalo mgwaqo.

(Swahili)
Umoja ni nguvu,
Utengano ni udaifu.
Mtu ni watu.

Sa vle di :
Menm si Ayiti lwen l Afrik,
Nou pap janm bliye rasin kilti nou.
N ap toujou di pitit ak pitit pitit nou yo :
Sonje kote Zansèt nou yo te fèt.
Kontinye gade nan direksyon l Afrik.
Kenbe wout sa a drè, nèt ale.
Linyon fè lafòs, divizyon fè lafeblès.
Ki di youn nan nou di nou tout.
Sè m, Frè m,
Jan nou konnen, rekonesans fè sans.
Pou tout lòt vrè zanmi etranje nou yo
K ap viv nan divès lòt peyi sou latè,
Nou pwofite voye yon mèsi espesyal.
Vrè zanmi etranje ki la avè n jodia
Ak anpil lòt ki prezan nan lespri yo
Se moun ki toujou chèche konprann
Ni mwèl soufrans, ni mwèl diyite
K ap sikile nan langaj Pèp Ayisyen.
Pou m konprann kijan sèvo moun
Ki pale 8 a 10 lang fonksyone,
Mwen anrejistre ond sèvo a ak yon
Aparèy yo rele elektwoansefalogram.
Pou vrè zanmi sa yo konprann kijan
Langaj Pèp Ayisyen chaje ak di plis
Tankou mwèl diyite, mwèl soufrans,
Yo fè ni kè yo ni brenn pa yo mache
Jis yo konn tonbe damou pou Ayiti.

To understand how the human brain processes 8 to 10 languages, I use an EEG machine and record the brain waves. But to understand the Haitian meta-linguistics, true friends of Haiti such as the members of this prestigious delegation, use both their brain and their heart. I think that the bonds linking them to Haiti are deeply rooted in a real love story. What a clear reflection of true love and true friendship! A friend in need is a friend indeed. Thank you so much.
As the brain takes only 100 ms to detect happiness, you may already realize how your presence contributes to make the Haitian people so happy today. In 1804, the Haitian revolution marked the end of slavery. Today, may the Haitian people mark the end of exile and coup d’état while peacefully we must move from social exclusion to social inclusion. Once again, thanks from the bottom of our hearts.

Un saludo muy caloroso y un abrazo fraternal a nuestros hermanos y hermanas de Cuba, especialmente los médicos que se han entregado sin cansancio en la lucha en contra del cólera? Quién sabe cuantas víctimas del cólera ya hubieran muerto, si no fuera por su asistencia médico?
Rechazando la propaganda y acercándose cada día más a los enfermos, Uds cristalizan una fuente de vida y un tejido de solidaridad humana. ! Ojalá que la luz de este testimonio guíe los pasos de tantos hombres hacia un mundo mejor ! A Uds todos, gracias, muchíssimas gracias!

Sè m, Frè m,
Si w te ka panche tèt ou sou kè mwen,
Ou ta tande aklè kijan li ap chante
Yon melodi konsolasyon pou Ayiti.
Ayiti manman nou ki bezwen respire
Oksijèn diyite pou lawont pa toufe l.
Tank mwen kontan pou wè nou tout,
Se tank dlo soufrans nou yo ap koule
Tankou yon larivyè doulè nan tout kòm.
Tank mwen kontan pou wè nou tout,
Se tank larivyè doulè viktim yo anvi
Dechire kè m pou l vin ponpe nan je m.
Si mwen menm ki fenk retounen lakay,
Se konsa m santi m, ou pa bezwen di m
Kijan manjezon doulè sa a rèd pou ou.
Depi tranbleman tè goudougoudou a,
Si m te ka transfòme chanm kè m an
Chanm kay, tout viktim tap jyenn kay
Pou sispann dòmi nan lari, nan labou,
Anba tant chire kole pyese moso prela ,
Moso dra, moso katon IMILYASYON.
Wi, imilyasyon yon Ayisyen,
Se imilyasyon tout Ayisyen.
Lè diyite you Ayisyen blese,
Se nou tout Ayisyen ki senyen.
San nou se san Tousen Louvèti,
Nou pa ka trayi san nou. Non !
San nou se san Tousen Louvèti,
Nou pa ka trayi san nou. Non !
Sè m, Frè m,
Jodi a, akouchman retou a fèt
Anba lonbray Tousen Louvèti.
Lè yo te kidnape l pou egzile l
Nan mwa jen 1802, li te deja di :
Rasin libète yo anpil e yo plante fon.
Koupe pye libète sa a se youn, men
Rive elimine tout rasin yo, se jamè.
Ochan pou Jeni sa a ki te leve lonè
Tout pitit zantray Manman Lafrik !
Ochan pou tout rasin libète ki fleri
Anba dekonm pou n te ka retounen.

Jodi a, anba lonbray Tousen Louvèti,
Nou kontan vin kanpe ak tout jèn yo,
Nou menm nouvèl jenerayon ki vle :
Edikasyon nan diyite ,san esklizyon.
Nou gen rezon paske
Si n pa sove diyite nou,
Diyite n ap sove kite n.
Wi, nou gen rezon paske
Pwoblèm nan se esklizyon,
Solisyon an se enklizyon.
Esklizyon Fanmi Lavalas
Se esklizyon majorite a.
Esklizyon majorite a egal
Koupe egzakteman branch
Ke nou tout chita sou li a.
Pwoblèm nan se esklizyon,
Solisyon an, se enklizyon
Tout Ayisyen san patipri
Paske tout moun se moun.
Donk,vòt tout moun konte.
An 1804, apre lendepandans,
Te gen 20 medsen ak 2 dantis
Pou 400.000 moun nan peyi a.
Jodia, pa menm gen 2 doktè
Pou chak 11.000 Ayisyen.
Sa a, sa a se youn nan rezilta
Mòd edikasyon esklizyon an.
Pou lonè Papa Jan Jak Desalin,
Nou vin pote ti konkou pa n.
Si balon edikasyon an santre
Sou teren diyite, fòk wè pa wè,
Nou mete esklizyon awoutsay.
E lè sa a nouvèl jenerasyon an
Pra l kòmanse benefisye nan
Richès k ap dòmi nan zantray
Peyi d Ayiti nou an, kidonk :
Lò, kwiv, iranyòm, boksit,
Ajan, poutzolan, mab elatriye.
Kabonat kalsyòm ki nan Payan,
Miragwan, depase $ 23 milya.

Rezèv petwòl la, san dout,
Pi plis anpil pase sa nou kwè.
Dayè nou menm menm Ayisyen,
Nou se pi gwo, pi gwo richès la.

Sè m, Frè m,
Pandan 7 an, nou kominike a distans.
Jodia, nou la pou ansanm ansanm,
Nou simen lapè toupatou, tout tan,
Tout kote pou tout fòm vyolans kaba.
Nou menm Ayisyen ki renmen lapè,
Nou kondane tout kalite fòm vyolans
Pou edikasyon jenès la ka debouche
Sou lapè nan tèt ak lapè nan vant.
Sè m, Frè m,
Pandan 7 an, nou kominike a distans.
Jodia, nou la, nou la ansanm, kòtakòt.
Nou la, lakay, paske lakay se lakay.
Nou la ak nou tout ki la pou nou al la :
La kote mizè, grangou, chomaj,
Ensekirite, kidnaping, koripsyon,
Dwòg, vyolans, trayizon, enjistis,
Rasis, esklizyon ak esklavaj modèn
Pap toujou kanpe la pou fè n delala.
Ayiti nou an malad grav anpil.
Soti 29 Fevriye 2004 rive jodia,
Maladi a malerezman vin pi grav.
Men, byen mal pa vle di lanmò :
Pi gwo espwa Ayiti, se Ayisyen.
Pi gwo remèd Ayiti, se lanmou.
Apre 7 ane egzil sa yo, nou deklare
7 fwa 77 fwa 7 fwa se Mèm Amou.
Mèm Amou pou ou ki isit an Ayiti.
Mèm Amou pou ou ki aletranje.
Si jodia nou youn retrouve n
Nan bra lòt, isit, isit la menm,
Se gras a ou ke m renmen amò.

Jeunesse de mon Pays,
Vous, Jeunes Héros et Héroïnes d’Haïti,
Vous, amoureux, amoureuses de la liberté,
Soyons tous présents au rendez-vous
De la Première République Noire,
Tapie sous le poids de ces 25.000.000
De tonnes métriques de décombres.
Si l’éclosion du crocus dépend des rayons du soleil,
L’éclosion d’Haïti dépend du soleil de notre amour.
Haïti nous unit à cette terre comme le pétiole relie le limbe à la tige.
Tige de liberté conquise, combattue, battue mais jamais abattue.
Tige de liberté dont la nervure principale symbolise notre dignité.
Tige de liberté dont la sève est et demeure l’amour par excellence.
Si l’éclosion du crocus dépend des rayons du soleil,
L’éclosion d’Haïti dépend du soleil de notre amour.
Haïti, Haïti, plus je m’éloigne de toi, moins je respire.
Haïti, Haïti, je t’aime et je t’aimerai toujours. Toujours!

Sè m, Frè m,
Lè w tande deklarasyon damou sa a,
Se bò sèvo goch ou ki kapte pawòl la,
Pandan bò sèvo dwat la kapte emosyon
Ak mizik ke pawòl la pote pou ou a.
Kidonk, chak pati nan kò a gen wòl li.
Wòl pa m se sèvi ou nan lanmou.
Wòl pa w se viv pou Ayiti pa mouri.
Wòl bon patriyòt se renmen peyi l.
Bon tan, move tan:
SE MEM AMOU !
An egzil ou lakay :
SE MEM AMOU !
Avè w pou toujou :
SE MEM AMOU !

On the roof at Arsitide's house March 18, 2011, photo Paul Burke

photo 1997©Jennifer Cheek Pantaléon

By Jean-Bertrand Aristide

Haiti’s devastating earthquake in January last year destroyed up to 5,000 schools and 80% of the country’s already weak university infrastructure. The primary school in Port-au-Prince that I attended as a small boy collapsed with more than 200 students inside. The weight of the state nursing school killed 150 future nurses. The state medical school was levelled. The exact number of students, teachers, professors, librarians, researchers, academics and administrators lost during those 65 seconds that irrevocably changed Haiti will never be known. But what we do know is that it cannot end there.

Published on the Huffington Post January 24, 2011, Commentary by AFD board menber, Laura Flynn

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/laura-flynn/not-even-the-past_b_813172.html

In Haiti, Reliving Duvalier, Waiting for Aristide
January 25, 2011

In the 1980s, when the armed forces of Jean-Claude Duvalier’s regime set about exterminating “Haiti’s Creole pigs”, they would come to Haiti’s rural villages, seize all of the “pigs”, pile them up, one on top of the other, in large pits and set fire to them, burning them alive.

A Haitian friend recounted this story to me this week. It was an image that she could not get out of her head since Jean-Claude Duvalier returned to Haiti. Because that’s what it was like for her, to watch Duvalier be greeted like a dignitary at the Port-au-Prince airport, and then escorted to his hotel by UN military forces — like being burned alive.

In 1968, when my friend was 3 years old, members of Duvalier’s Tonton Macoutes came to her home at 3 o’clock in the afternoon as her extended family shared a meal in the courtyard of their house in the Port-au-Prince neighborhood of Martissant. The Macoutes dragged her father and two of her uncles away. They then went to two other houses on her block, and took away all the men from those families as well. Her father and the other men in the neighborhood were members of MOP, the mass political party of Haitian populist leader Daniel Fignolé, which Duvalier wiped out, along with all other forces of opposition in the country.

None of the men taken from Martissant that day were ever seen again. They disappeared, perhaps perishing in the Duvaliers’ infamous prison, Fort Dimanche, after enduring torture, beatings, and starvation. The families could not even hold public funerals, and they never recovered the bodies of their loved ones. With the help of a sympathetic nun, my friend’s mother did manage a clandestine a mass for her husband, and later she consecrated an unmarked, empty tomb for him in Haiti’s National Cemetery. To this day, she visits that empty tomb on All Spirits Day each year to honor the husband she lost over 40 years ago.

The common wisdom, repeated endlessly in the international press since Duvalier’s return, is that Baby Doc’s regime was less repressive than his father’s. But my friend’s mother does not remember it that way. Left to raise six children on her own, she lived for nearly 20 years –until the fall of Baby Doc in 1986 — in constant terror that she or her children would be targeted again. Each day, the children rushed straight home from school and didn’t leave the house again. Each summer as soon as school ended, she packed them off to the countryside to breathe a sigh of relief.

Under Baby Doc the most spectacular violence, the murdering of whole families, mass purges of the military, and especially violence targeting Haiti’s wealthy families, abated. But the intimate terror the Duvalier regime exercised over every aspect of daily life continued. In Martissant, as in most Port-au-Prince neighborhoods, there were active members of the Macoutes in every other home. With almost unlimited power, they spied on and policed their neighbors, attacking, arresting, even killing people for such infractions as wearing an Afro, not wearing shoes, or leaving a light on after dark. Since the Macoutes were not formally paid, and since the economy was in a free fall, they enacted daily violence and extortion on the population to survive.

The children of those taken in Martissant that day in 1968 never forgot what happened to their fathers. As soon as they were old enough — just kids really, 12, 13 years old — they found themselves drawn into, and then propelling forward, a movement for change. Each Sunday morning, a chain of young people from Martissant set off across the city, jen pase pran jen, young people gathering more young people, until they numbered in the hundreds, arriving at doors of St. Jean Bosco in La Saline where a young priest was saying out loud what they had been saying in their hearts all their lives: Fok sa Chanje. This must change. These young people, joined by thousands of others in church and grassroots organizations across the country, ignited a movement that after long struggle and many lost lives, finally overthrew a 30-year dictatorship.

For the veterans of this struggle to have to watch Jean-Claude Duvalier return a free man to the scene of his crimes now — on the heels of the one-year anniversary of the earthquake, after losing 300,000 countrymen; while a cholera epidemic rages, having already taken 4000 lives; while a UN military mission occupies the country, at a cost of over $500 million a year, while the UN cannot even raise a third of that to fight the cholera that its troops brought to the country in the first place; while more than a million people live in the streets of Port-au-Prince under nothing more than shredded tarps; after an “election” that was an insult to democracy (excluding Fanmi Lavalas Haiti’s largest political party, drawing less that 25 percent of eligible voters, and riddled with fraud and irregularities even for the limited voting that did take place); and while Haiti’s twice democratically-elected former President, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, is in forced exile in South Africa — under these circumstances watching Duvalier return was excruciating.

The fact that Duvalier himself appears ill, and rather feeble is no great comfort. The fact that he was questioned by prosecutors on Tuesday and then released back to his luxury hotel, while far better than nothing, is still not reassuring. The presence of Jodel Chamblain, the founder of the notorious death squad FRAPH, which terrorized Haiti from 1991-1994, at Duvalier’s side as he went to court, was flat out terrifying. The traumatizing symbolism of Duvalier’s return at Haiti’s weakest hour, is an insult to the dead and an assault on the living.

If the response of Haitians to Duvalier’s return has so far has been muted, it is in part because people are still in shock. This has been a week of intense resurgent memory, private at first, but more and more communal, as people gather to recount and retell, as parents share new details with their children, as the radio waves fill with the voices of survivors. By week’s end the flood of memory was transformed into the first half dozen of what will likely be a flood of formal legal complaints against Duvalier for torture, forced exile, rape, and murder.

All week rumors flew that Aristide was on his way — will come Tuesday or Thursday or next week — this offset some of the anger. Last Thursday, the teledyol (rumor) had it that CNN was reporting Aristide had purchased a one-way ticket home. Hearing this, willing it to be true, some Haitians, began making painful concessions in their heads. One former parishioner of St. Jean Bosco put it this way: “OK, Duvalier, he’s old, he’s dying, we’ll stomach him, if that’s what it takes to bring Aristide back.”

On Sunday The Miami Herald ran a full-page letter (Sunday, January 23, 2011) sponsored by the Haiti Action Committee in California, echoing the call of Haitians for the return of Jean-Bertrand Aristide from exile. The statement is signed by politicians, activists, and other prominent figures, including Dr. Paul Farmer, founder of Partners in Health, Danny Glover, actor and activist, and Reverend Jesse Jackson.

What does the U.S. government say?

Regarding Duvalier:

“this is a matter for the Government of Haiti and the people of Haiti.” (from State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley)

Regarding Aristide:

“today Haiti needs to focus on its future, not its past” (Crowley again).

In case there were lingering doubt about who is preventing Aristide’s return.

The U.S. government is always quick to urge others to forget the past. But memory is long, bodies bear scars, the murdered father gives birth to the life long militant, and the coup d’etat of 2004 is not even the past. As long as Aristide is in exile that coup remains an open wound. The divisions the State Department is so concerned Aristide will somehow seed, are there in plain view for everyone to see. Have and Have not. Moun Anba Tant, Moun Nan Kay. The people living under tents, the people who have homes. The earthquake, and especially the disastrous international response, seem only to be further entrenching the chasm between rich and poor. Aristide didn’t create this chasm, nor can his return transform it in a day. But his presence would be a sign of hope to Haiti’s poor who’ve had precious little of that in the last year.

“Build back better,” Bill Clinton said last year. A house built on impunity and exclusion will fall again. The rubble must be cleared first. Let Duvalier face justice for his crimes. Stop trying to hobble together a government from an election that everyone knows was a sham. Let all parties participate; let the Haitian people vote freely. And let Aristide come home again

Watch a New Video on the work of the Aristide Foundation since the

January, 2010 Earthquake Together We Are Strong

A Democratic Debate in the auditorium of the AFD, photo Paul Burke

While the international press on Haiti has been abuzz with stories about Haiti’s upcoming Presidential elections, there is not much enthusiasm on the ground, where over a million and half people are still living in tents settlements across Port-au-Prince and the other areas hit hard by the quake.

Nearly every Saturday the Aristide Foundation holds a democratic debate were ordinary Haitians can gather and voice their views.  These gatherings continue to draw participants from across the metropolitan area, the majority of whom are living under tents.  What we hear from those coming to the AFD is disinterest in elections from which the largest political party in the country Famni Lavalas has been excluded, anger at the recovery process which has made almost no visible signs of progress in over 7 months and which offers no role for the majority of Haitians to participate, and a sustained call for the return of former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide and his family to his country.

For a full analysis of the political situation please see  Haiti Elections: Unfair  and Undemocratic by Ira Kurzban (Miami Herald September 8, 2010).  To support Haitians call for the return of President Aristide add your name to this petition.

As we enter the eighth month since the quake the Foundation has begun to switch gears from the immediate relief efforts (mobile schools and mobile clinics)  which we activated in response the catastrophe.  We’ve begun to focus on more durable long-term projects including:

• An agriculture project on the grounds of the UniFA campus which will put formerly agricultural land near the city back into productive use, and which will provide children from the mobile schools we operated in the wake of the quake a chance to learn agricultural skills and raise food for their families.

Farmers meet on the campus of UniFA, Photo by Paul Burke

• A micro-lending project to enable market women who lost their goods and businesses during the quake to restart their businesses and support their families.

Market Women in Downtown Port-au-Prince after the quake, photo curtesy of Unicef

• The reopening of UniFA, the University of the Aristide Foundation.  The main classroom building, which sustained minor damage in the quake, has now been fully repaired.  On September 1, 2010 computer science and Spanish language classes resumed inside the building.  Over 300 young Haitians are now studying computer science on the campus.   During the second week of September, 296 students how began their studies in the Spring of 2009 will complete their one-year Spanish language program.  For the past several months, while the building was being repaired classes were held in open-air classrooms on campus, allowing students to continue their studies. For more on the reopening of UniFA please see the article which appeared in the Nouvelliste on Spetember 8, 2010 (French-language)

Computers Class at the AFD, Photo by Paul Burke

All the students currently studying at UniFA, and the thousands more who would like to join them, along with everyone connected to the Foundation, look forward to the day when UniFA can offer a full range of University-level programs to the children of the poor, including the reopening of the Faculty of Medicine which functioned from 2001-2004.   With twenty-eight of thirty-two institutions of higher education in the country reportedly destroyed, the urgency of reopening and expanding the University to meet the incredible demand of Haiti’s youth could not be greater.  We hope you will join us in finding the resources to making this dream a reality.

If you would like to support the work of the Aristide Foundation for Democracy tax-deductible donations can be made here:

Or mail checks to: Aristide Foundation, PO Box 490271, Key Biscayne, Florida 33149

All donations are tax deductible and will be acknowledged.

]]> http://www.aristidefoundationfordemocracy.org/2010/09/09/only-haitians-can-rebuild-haiti/feed/ 0 http://www.aristidefoundationfordemocracy.org/2010/06/05/fet-manman-mothers-day-in-haiti/ http://www.aristidefoundationfordemocracy.org/2010/06/05/fet-manman-mothers-day-in-haiti/#comments Sat, 05 Jun 2010 20:37:31 +0000 lauraflynn http://aristidefoundationfordemocracy.org/?p=627

Every year on the last Sunday of May (Haitian Mother’s Day) the Aristide Foundation for Democracy, holds a special event to honor mothers. Sunday May 30 the AFD welcomed 3,500 women to the auditorium of the Foundation for a very special day of communion and solidarity– to offer solace, and encouragement, and a chance to speak out to women representing mothers across Haiti.

The event was planned for 2,000 people, but an overflow crowd filled the balconies, hallways and rear of the auditorium.

The event opened with a multi-denominational religious ceremony – including a presentation by Pastor Eddie Hebron, an African-American Minister from Savannah, Georgia.

Three mothers, Gladys Delouis, a long time AFD staff member and women’s organizer, Merry Roche, the coordinator of the AFD Mobile Schools Program, and Madame Florence Agenor, a community organizer from Cite Soleil who spoke in the name of the mothers of Cite Soleil, rallied the crowd.  All of them spoke of the hardships faced by Haitian mothers today.  After losing family members, children, their homes, and whatever small businesses they might have had, are now suffering in the “tents of humiliation” where they have to sleep standing up when it rains.  They also spoke of the courage and the endurance that women are showing in the face of this crisis.

Madame Agenor thanked Titid’s mother for giving them this “gwo garcon.”   Everyone present was thrilled to have the opportunity to say loudly and clearly in the presence of several foreign delegations that they want an end to injustice, that Jean-Bertrand Aristide must return to his homeland to continue to work with them for social peace and justice for all Haitians.

To this end Gladys Delouis read a petition which was launched one week ago calling on President Barack Obama to return Jean-Bertrand Aristide to Haiti.  The petition has already been signed by 15,000 Haitian women. In the coming weeks those present committed to gathering the signatures of thousands more women across Haiti.

Then Kolonb Dor the 120-person dance and music troupe of the AFD took to the stage.  They performed the Haitian National anthem and offered a prayer for everyone present — then asked for one minute of silence in memory of the thousands of mothers who were lost on January 12.    Kolonb Dor performed several traditional Haitian dance pieces accompanied by Haitian drumming.

The heart of their performance was a theatrical, musical and dance piece commemorating the events of January 12, which closed with a Requiem for the earthquake dead.  It is hard to describe in words the kind of emotion and catharsis that this piece once again evoked.  The pictures below offer some sense of the creative response these young people are offering to a nation in need of outlets to mark and to mourn losses that remain incalculable.

After the cultural presentation Toussaint Hilaire, the Director of the AFD  greeted all present in the name of the Foundation and of President Aristide.  He then introduced a representative of the Mexican Embassy who made a surprise announcement that they were donating  1,500 tents to be distributed to those present.

The event ended with a massive distribution of tents to 1,500 people and food kits to an additional 2,000.  The food kits contained rice, beans, cooking oil and sardines — provisions for a family for one week.  The distribution took 3 hours – but went smoothly due the hard work of 50 volunteers who formed a human chain to keep order and make sure everyone received something.

We wish to thank everyone who made this extraordinary event possible:  the staff and volunteers of the AFD and the young performers of Kolonb Dor who all worked for weeks to prepare the event; the government of Mexico who contributed 1,500 tents, and Pastor Eddie Hebron, of the Christian Revival Center and the Hosea Feed the Hungry Project, who contributed half of a container of food and some medical equipment which will be used in the weekly clinic at the AFD.   Most of all we thank the 3,500 mothers who made their way to the Foundation from across a devastated city to declare with us once again - Nou pap bay legen nan batay la. We will not give up this struggle.

“We are living in the mud.  We are wet and we are hungry.  Those in charge have left us without hope. If they have a plan we do not know it.   We are asking about the future.   And we want our voices to be heard, ” Suzette Janvier, a resident of  St. Martin (a neighborhood of central Port-au-Prince)

Each Saturday for the past two months a thousand or more Haitian earthquake survivors have met in the auditorium of the Aristide Foundation for Democracy to talk about the future of their country.   Since its founding in 1996 the Aristide Foundation, whose auditorium seats up to 3000 people, has provided a place for grassroots activists and ordinary Haitians to come together to debate and discuss national issues.  In response to the earthquake the Foundation is sponsoring weekly public forums in which participants tell their stories, talk about the conditions of their lives, and describe their needs; they receive training or information on the current situation and on their rights under the Haitian constitution, and the United Nations principles on Internally Displaced People; and together presenters and participants brainstorm and discuss actions that can be taken to make their voices heard.  Each forum has drawn between 900-1500 participants; the majority of those attending are living in spontaneous settlements across the earthquake zone–as are the majority of the citizens of Port-au-Prince.   Delegations come from other parts of the country as well, particularly the South and Southeast – Jacmel and Les Cayes –which were also hit hard by the quake.

Participants at AFD forums have offered vivid testimony about conditions of life in Port-au-Prince since the earthquake. Now that the rains have begun, people describe spending the nights “domi pandeye,” (sleeping while balancing upright), standing under their plastic sheeting because there is no room for everyone to be sheltered and lie down, and because water floods the tents.  During the rainy season, which has already begun, but will intensify in May, it rains nearly every night.  In the morning the sun blazes, the heat under the plastic sheeting—which is all most people have to protect themselves—is stifling.  They are now living in “labouye” (the mud) 24 hours a day, in camps almost uniformly lacking in latrines, or other sanitation.

They describe the struggle to feed their families.   The price of basic foodstuffs  (rice, beans, cornmeal, cooking oil, and charcoal for cooking) have risen 15-30% since the earthquake, while incomes have all but disappeared.  Only those receiving funds from family overseas are able to purchase food.  For those dependent on international aid, finding food for their families is an unending labor.  Coupons for food might be distributed in the camps once a week, though not to everyone and not with predictability.   Women who were able to get the coupons must then go to a different site, often miles away, and line up long before the sun rises.  If they are lucky, by noon they might receive a 50lb bag of rice, which must then be carried or transported back to where they are living.   The next day the same struggle might begin again this time to find cooking oil—one day spent in line waiting for the coupons, another day to travel to where the oil is being distributed, in a completely different location than the rice.   Often these ventures yield nothing: there aren’t enough coupons to go around, the rice runs out, the distribution center has been relocated, or it does not open due to security concerns.  And with the rains bags of rice get wet and spoil.

Participants describe with horror a dramatic rise in prostitution—young women and girls selling their bodies to feed themselves and their families.

They describe the dire health conditions in the camps where infectious diseases are poised to run rampant.  Each Wednesday since March 10, 2010, the Aristide Foundation has held a large free clinic in the auditorium of the Foundation, providing primary care services to 1,200 people every week.   What AFD doctors see and hear from patients in the clinics confirms the testimony in the forums—that is, high rates of illness that result from the conditions in which people are living: malnutrition, diarrhea among children, urinary tract and other infections.

The first demand of those who have gathered at the AFD in the forums is for temporary housing in safe and sanitary locations.  The second is for food.  Beyond this jobs, education, healthcare, and—despite the fact that most of the participants are urban—they are demanding real investment in agricultural for food production that can one day offer food security to the country.

Underlying all of this, participants in the forums are asking to participate in the planning of the nation’s future—the necessary precondition for real recovery.   Those gathering at the AFD, feel more intensely than ever before, a profound sense of exclusion.

Certainly there was no attempt at consultation or participation with Haiti’s vibrant and engaged grassroots organizations in the preparation of the PRND  (the Post-Disaster Needs Assessment) put forward by the Haitian government to the international donors conference on March 31^st.   On the eve of the donor meeting, on March 27, over 1,200 people met at the AFD for a debate focused on the constitution – specifically the constitutionality of the creation of the 20-person  Interim Commission for the Reconstruction of Haiti, dominated by foreigners, which will oversee all international funding.  The next, even larger, forum focused on the GOH plan to extend its emergency powers for 18-months in order to allow the Interim Commission to be created and to exercise extra-constitutional powers.  Fourteen hundred people gathered, and most expressed deep concern over the repercussions for Haiti’s sovereignty.  This was followed by three days of sit-ins of 500-600 people, at the Haitian parliament, to protest the passage of the law.

In addition to preparing the plan and creating this Interim Commission without participation, there has also been almost no communication about what might be in that plan. People coming to the forums at the Foundation have all heard there’s a plan.  They have no idea what is in it.  They hear billions of dollars were pledged in New York.  They have little faith this money will be given, and no faith that what is given will be spent in their interests.

The issue at the top of everyone’s mind is the question of temporary resettlement, of moving people out of the way of the clear and present danger that the coming more intense rains represent.  But three months after the quake, no clear message or plan has been articulated by the Haitian government or international NGOs.

In early April there were several reports of forced removals of people encamped on the grounds of private schools, private property, and from the soccer stadium.  At some sites bulldozers arrived without notice to tear down shelters and families were left with no a place to go.  To date it appears the only voluntary relocation which has had any success is at Corail, where over the last week or two the Haitian government in collaboration with international NGOs has begun to move people from the Petionville golf course (where more than 45.000 people are encamped) to a relocation center at Corail, but this camp is only intended to hold 7,500 people.   Over one million people are estimated to be homeless in the metropolitan area.  If there are plans for temporary shelter for anyone other than those on the Golf Course they are not being communicated to the general public. Those gathering at the AFD express fear that they will be forcibly evicted from the camps where they are living.  They are also skeptical about plans to relocate people to remote areas, which would leave them cut off from the economic life of the city, meaning cut off from the mutual aid provided by families, communities, neighborhood associations etc, and the informal economy.  Mutual aid and the informal economy are the only things that keep Haitians alive.  That was true before the quake and it is still true.

Efforts to assist must empower Haiti’s powerful networks of mutual aid and the informal economy—not dismantle, not ignore them.  What would it mean to empower them?  Community kitchens in the camps, loans to women to restart “ti komès” (informal sector commerce), relocation for those in imminent danger with their participation, finding way of keeping people close to the city if that is what they desire.  There are thousands of community organizations across Haiti to carry out projects like these.   And if, as we hear, decentralization is a goal for Haiti’s future, then who is talking to the residents of Port-au-Prince about lives they might imagine outside the city?   And why out of $12.2 billion dollars requested in the Post Disaster Needs Assessment (the plan) was only $41 million or .3% allocated for agriculture and fisheries, i.e. for local food production?

Forums at the Aristide Foundation, held on March 13, March 20, March 27, April 3, April 17, and April 24, along with the International Women’s Day event on March 8, 2010 (attended by 3000 women) represent the largest indoor gatherings of Haitians to discuss and debate the country’s future since the earthquake.  We are not aware of any occasion since January 12 where the Haitian government, the UN or any international NGO planning Haiti’s future and the distribution of aid funds, have brought large groups of Haitians together to ask for their opinions, their input, or their stories.

Finally, those attending the forums at the AFD are unanimous in their call for the return of former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide to Haiti. It is best summed up by Jean Vaudre, a community organizer from Bel Air, who said at the forum on April 17, “If Aristide were here even if he had no money to help us, he would be with us, in the rain, under the tents.   If he were here we might believe, we might have hope that we will be able to participate in the future of the country.”  Hope is a commodity in short supply right now in Haiti. Is there some way of rebuilding the country without it?

Laura Flynn is a member of the board of the Aristide Foundation for Democracy-US, which supports the work of the Aristide Foundation in Haiti.  AFD-Haiti was founded by Jean-Bertrand Aristide in 1996 on the principle that to bring real change, democracy must include those at the margins of society: street children, market women, landless peasants, restaveks (children living in Haitian households as unpaid domestic laborers), and the urban poor. For 14 years the Foundation has dedicated itself to providing educational opportunities, and opening avenues of democratic participation for those who traditionally have had no access to education or voice in national affairs. Since the earthquake the AFD has mobilized its staff, doctors, volunteers and supporters–nationally and internationally.  The AFD is operating Mobile Schools in 5 refugee camps, participating in mobile clinics, and providing medical care to 1,200 people at the AFD each week.

Online Donations to Support the Earthquake Relief Efforts of the Aristide Foundation for Democracy can be made here:

Or mail checks to: Aristide Foundation, PO Box 490271, Key Biscayne, Florida 33149

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Yves Marie Stuart Roche, coordinator of the AFD Mobile School Project speaks at Women's Day Event

On March 8, 2010 three thousand women gathered at the Aristide Foundation to mark International Women’s Day, under the banner “Women of Haiti say, Haiti will not Die”.   These women, coming from all over the greater Port-au-Prince area, mobilized both to honor those who were lost in the quake, to affirm life for those who survived, and to affirm their right to participate fully  in the rebuilding of their country.

3000 women gathered at the AFD for International Women's Day

Dr. Jessie Pierre Louis, the Medical Director of the University of the Aristide Foundation noted that in the wake of this massive disruption in the lives of all Haitians, it was the time as never before for the women of Haiti to bond together for their liberation.  Far from being powerless victims, she called upon them to be ingenious and courageous, to become the engine of Haiti’s rebirth.   She called on the women of Haiti, and women around the world, to echo the call of those  gathered at the Foundation for the return of former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide and his family to their homeland at this time of national need.  (the full text of her remarks in French and Creole is below.)

An ecumenical service honoring the victims of the earthquake was led by Father Freddy Elie of the Parish of Fleuriot de Tabarre and Pastor Evens Dorelien of the Baptist Church of Lillavois.  The program featured music by COLOMBE D’OR, the choir of the Aristide Foundation, made of of young people from the Tabarre area.

As part of the program the Foundation announced the beginning of a series of free  primary care clinics, the first of which was held in the auditorium of the Foundation on Wednesday March 10th.

After the ceremony all the women present received a bag of food supplies to take home.  Most of these women are living in refugee encampments around Port-au-Prince–all of them are struggling to feed their families under these incredibly  difficult circumstances.

Discours de Dr. Jessie Pierre Saint Louis, Director Medical de UniFA (Universite de la Fondation Aristide)

C’est sur que le moment n’est pas a la fete mais plutot aux reflexions, aux mures reflexions, a de nouvelles reflexions sur nous memes haitiens, haitiennes, sur nous memes femmes d ‘Haiti, sur notre devenir.

Une pensee d’amour et de lumiere a l’endroit de toutes les femmes haitiennes tombees le 12 Janvier 2010, a l’endroit de tous les hommes et de tous nos enfants. Paix, amour, lumiere,  qu’ils se reposent en paix.

Aujourd’hui 8 Mars 2010, c’est une journee de manifestations a travers le monde,  c’est l’occasion de continuer a revendiquer l’egalite, de faire un bilan sur la situation des femmes dans la societe. Pour nous autres femmes haitiennes, c’est le moment plus que jamais a travers ce recul, cette descente dans le bas fond de la vie en commun pour que nous fassions le bond liberateur, le bond de la deliverance.

Femmes d’Haiti, loin d’etre des victimes impuissantes, nous devons etre des femmes ingenieuses, resistantes et courageuses face aux epreuves. A ce stade, la vie doit forcement continuer, la vie doit aller vers plus. Ainsi, va la vie.

Haiti, au moment ou nous parlons est sous les levres de tous les citoyens du monde. Nous avons une formidable occasion de repenser Haiti. Et, si du coup, on ecoutait les femmes ? Ne pourraient-elles pas etre de veritables moteurs du developpement durable ?. Et le developpement durable ne pourrait-il pas etre une chance pour les femmes? Le moyen de mieux les reconnaitre et de leur donner la place qu’elles meritent.

Fanm dayiti debou !  Nou se fos Ayiti, Ayiti pap mouri !  (Bis)

Mwen sonje 8 Mas 96  sa fè 14 lane,  3 Mil fanm te koupe  kod lonbrit Fondasyon Aristide, yo ede l mache, yo ede l grandi. Chapo ba nou medam. Bondye ap retire n nan soufrans. Delivrans  lan pa lwen. Pa gen pèn san sekou.14 lane aprè, se avèk fyète nou akeyi menm 3 Mil fanm yo ki prezan Jodi Lendi 8 Mas 2010 la pou di : Fanm se fos Ayiti, Ayiti pap mouri. (Bis)

Menm ane a Prezidan Aristide mennen ba nou yon fanm ayisyèn, bèl tèt fanm, konpetant, disipline, kourajez, familyal. Bravo Mildred, Chapo ba pou ou.

Jodi a nou mande tout fanm peyi dayiti ak Fanm lot bo dlo sonnen konn lanbi nan zorèy pwisans entènasyonal la pou retounen Doktè Jean Bertrand Aristide nan peyi li. Peyi dayiti gen yon vid politik k ap travèse l menm pwofondè ak vid tranbleman tè a lese pou nou. Prezidan Aristide plas pa w la toujou li rele tenn fas.  Mildred nou ba ou yon manda tou louvri : pase pran Madan Jakob Majluta, Madan Tabou Mbeki pou rive jwenn Madan Obama ak Madan Clinton konsa, wa mande yo de ki mannyè Doktè Jean Bertrand Aristide ak Fanmi l poko ka tounen lakay li pou vin sipote, ankadre pèp ayisyen an nan soufrans tèt chaje n ap sibi la a.

Mwen menm, mwen se fanm, mwen se Medsen, mwen santi m fyè akote 45 lot kolèg mwen yo paske anpil ladan yo te pran fomasyon nan Fakilte Medsin Inivèsite Fondasyon Aristide. Prezans nou sou podyom nan genyen anpil siyifikasyon sitou lè nou pataje bèl moman sa a ak 3 Mil fanm djanm, 3 Mil Fanm vanyan,  nan reflechi sou sitiyasyon lavi nou, lavi fanmi nou ak lavi peyi dayiti. Gras pou Granmèt la ki te ede n pran konesans nan domèn lasante. Jodi a,se avèk kontantman nou deside pote sèvis lasante bay pèp ayisyen an. Konsa, apati Mèkredi demen an, n ap komanse yon seri de klinik pou evalye Fanm yo,  Timoun, Granmoun  ak lot moun nan Oditoriyom Fondasyon Aristide.

Kidonk, Mèkredi 10 Mas la apati 8 tè nan maten n ap resevwa tout moun kita renmen fè yon evalyasyon medikal. Ap gen Doktè tout kategori : Entènis, Pedyat, Doktè Zye, Chirijyen, Dantis ak anpil Jeneralis. Konsiltasyon an gratis, medikaman gratis, Tès nan laboratwa gratis, linèt gratis tou. Pandan klinik la, n ap mete 2 Sikolog osèvis moun ki pi twomatize yo pou fè seyans gratis pou yo.

Fanm se sous lapè ! fanm se fos Ayiti, Ayiti pap mouri ! (Bis)

Je vous remercie.

Taba, 8 Mas 2010.                                    Dr Jessie Pierre Saint Louis.