Stand
With The People Of Haiti! What The U.S. Government Isn't
Telling You
15 January 2010ANSWER Coalition
We at the ANSWER Coalition extend our heartfelt
solidarity to all of our Haitian sisters and brothers,
as well as to all those who have friends and family
there, as Haiti copes with the destruction and grief
of the massive 7.0 magnitude earthquake that struck
yesterday.
All of us are joining in the outpouring of solidarity
from people all over the hemisphere and world who are
sending humanitarian aid and assistance to the people
of Haiti.
At such a moment, it is also important to put this
catastrophe into a political and social context.
Without this context, it is impossible to understand
both the monumental problems facing Haiti and, most
importantly, the solutions that can allow Haiti to
survive and thrive. Hillary Clinton said today, "It is
biblical, the tragedy that continues to daunt Haiti
and the Haitian people." This hypocritical statement
that blames Haiti's suffering exclusively on an "act
of God" masks the role of U.S. and French imperialism
in the region.
In this statement, we have included some background
information about Haiti that helps establish the real
context:
Haitian Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive stated today
that as many as 100,000 Haitians may be dead.
International media is reporting bodies being piled
along streets surrounded by the rubble from thousands
of collapsed buildings. Estimates of the economic
damage are in the hundreds of millions of dollars.
Haiti's large shantytown population was particularly
hard hit by the tragedy.
As CNN, ABC and every other major corporate media
outlet will be quick to point out, Haiti is the
poorest country in the entire Western hemisphere. But
not a single word is uttered as to why Haiti is poor.
Poverty, unlike earthquakes, is no natural disaster.
The answer lies in more than two centuries of U.S.
hostility to the island nation, whose hard-won
independence from the French was only the beginning of
its struggle for liberation.
In 1804, what had begun as a slave uprising more than
a decade earlier culminated in freedom from the grips
of French colonialism, making Haiti the first Latin
American colony to win its independence and the
world's first Black republic. Prior to the victory of
the Haitian people, George Washington and
then-Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson had supported
France out of fear that Haiti would inspire uprisings
among the U.S. slave population. The U.S. slave-owning
aristocracy was horrified at Haiti's newly earned
freedom.
U.S. interference became an integral part of Haitian
history, culminating in a direct military occupation
from 1915 to 1934. Through economic and military
intervention, Haiti was subjugated as U.S. capital
developed a railroad and acquired plantations. In a
gesture of colonial arrogance, Franklin D. Roosevelt,
who was the assistant secretary of the Navy at the
time, drafted a constitution for Haiti which, among
other things, allowed foreigners to own land. U.S.
officials would later find an accommodation with the
dictator François "Papa Doc" Duvalier, and then his
son Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier, as Haiti suffered
under their brutal repressive policies.
In the 1980s and 1990s, U.S. policy toward Haiti
sought the reorganization of the Haitian economy to
better serve the interests of foreign capital. The
U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) was
instrumental in shifting Haitian agriculture away from
grain production, paving the way for dependence on
food imports. Ruined Haitian farmers flocked to the
cities in search of a livelihood, resulting in the
swelling of the precarious shantytowns found in
Port-au-Prince and other urban centers.
Who has benefited from these policies? U.S. food
producers profited from increased exports to Haitian
markets. Foreign corporations that had set up shop in
Haitian cities benefitted from the super-exploitation
of cheap labor flowing from the countryside. But for
the people of Haiti, there was only greater misery and
destitution.
Washington orchestrated the overthrow of the
democratically elected Haitian President Jean-Bertrand
Aristide—not once, but twice, in 1991 and 2004. Haiti
has been under a U.S.-backed U.N. occupation for
nearly six years. Aristide did not earn the animosity
of U.S. leaders for his moderate reforms; he earned it
when he garnered support among Haiti's poor, which
crystallized into a mass popular movement. Two hundred
years on, U.S. officials are still horrified by the
prospect of a truly independent Haiti.
The unstable, makeshift dwellings imposed upon
Haitians by Washington's neoliberal policies have now,
for many, been turned into graves. Those same policies
are to blame for the lack of hospitals, ambulances,
fire trucks, rescue equipment, food and medicine. The
blow dealt by such a natural disaster to an economy
made so fragile from decades of plundering will
greatly magnify the suffering of the Haitian people.
Natural disasters are inevitable, but resource
allocation and planning can play a decisive role in
mitigating their impact and dealing with the
aftermath. Haiti and neighboring Cuba, who are no
strangers to violent tropical storms, were both hit
hard in 2008 by a series of hurricanes—which, unlike
earthquakes, are predictable. While more than 800
lives were lost in Haiti, less than 10 people died in
Cuba. Unlike Haiti, Cuba had a coordinated evacuation
plan and post-hurricane rescue efforts that were
centrally planned by the Cuban government. This was
only possible because Cuban society is not organized
according to the needs of foreign capital, but rather
according to the needs of the Cuban people.
In a televised speech earlier today, President Obama
has announced that USAID and the Departments of State
and Defense will be working to support the rescue and
relief efforts in Haiti in the coming days.
Ironically, these are the same government entities
responsible for the implementation of the economic and
military policies that reduced Haiti to ruins even
before the earthquake hit.
The ANSWER Coalition has called for a mass national
march and rally in Washington, D.C., on March 20 to
oppose the wars and occupations in Afghanistan, Iraq
and Palestine. We will also demand an end the foreign
occupation of Haiti and reparations to Haiti for the
vast wealth that has been looted from the country by
foreign imperialist countries.
Help build the March 20 March on Washington!
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