Bill Clinton offers Haiti encouraging words

[Judi Lynn]

Posted on Tuesday, 03.10.09
Bill Clinton offers Haiti encouraging words

By JACQUELINE CHARLES
[e-mail]

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti -- A smiling Bill Clinton on Monday walked up to the group of school children dressed in red and white checkered uniforms, lost in a game.

Unaware of the magnitude of the man cheering them on, they followed their teacher's instructions to jump and sing along while the former U.S. president quietly watched, smiling.

For Clinton, no words were needed to convey the importance of what he was seeing: children once so malnourished they could barely stand, now laughing and shaking their tiny hips because their hunger has been quelled by daily morning snacks and a hot meal -- courtesy of foreign donors.

~snip~
Clinton's many handlers carefully crafted the visit. He did not make any political statements and was largely isolated from the anticipation of his visit here by some who still regard him as a hero for returning former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide to power in 1995 after he was ousted in a military coup and forced to spend three years in exile.

An estimated 6,000 marchers showed up at Port-au-Prince's international airport, wearing President Barack Obama T-shirts and waving signs welcoming Clinton and asking him to return Aristide once gain. But they arrived long after Clinton and his delegation had left.

More:
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/americas/story/941341.html

~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Take the time to remember what we discussed here only last year:

Haitians trick empty bellies with dirt cookies
Rising food prices forcing many poor to desperate tactic


Yolen Jeunky sold mud cookies in Cite Soleil last fall. Even the prices for the
edible clay, collected in Haiti's central plain, have risen as oil costs have
driven up agricultural basics. (ariana cubillos /associated press)

By Jonathan M. Katz
Associated Press / January 31, 2008

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti - It was lunchtime in one of Haiti's worst slums, and Charlene Dumas was eating mud.
more stories like this

With food prices rising, Haiti's poorest can't afford even a daily plate of rice, and some take desperate measures to fill their bellies.

Charlene, 16 with a 1-month-old son, has come to rely on a traditional Haitian remedy for hunger pangs: cookies made of dried yellow dirt from the country's central plateau.

The mud has long been used by pregnant women and children here as an antacid and source of calcium. But in places like Cite Soleil, the oceanside slum where Charlene shares a two-room house with her baby, five siblings, and two unemployed parents, cookies made of dirt, salt, and vegetable shortening have become a regular meal.

"When my mother does not cook anything, I have to eat them three times a day," Charlene said. Her baby, named Woodson, lay still across her lap, looking even thinner than the slim 6 pounds, 3 ounces, he weighed at birth.

More:
http://www.boston.com/news/world/articles/2008/01/31/haitians_trick_empty_bellies_with_dirt_cookies/

[magbana]

1. Judi - thanks for posting BOTH Haiti articles. Here's an entry I posted to my blog today.

"March 11, 2009...12:24 pm
Ban and Bill or Jack and Jill? In Haiti, It Depends on the Hill

With great fanfare,the UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-Moon, and former US president, Bill Clinton, paid a visit to Haiti this week. In light of the US intention to deport 30,000 Haitians currently living in the US back to Haiti, this high-powered duo should be viewed very suspiciously. It is tough to keep a straight face about a deportation order when you consider Haiti’s extreme poverty and hunger. But, Ban and Bill are in Haiti to put a pretty face on the country so that the order is executed without a hitch. Yet, even this kind of star quality cannot erase 200 years of the US’ predatory policies towards Haiti. Ban and Bill no doubt will pronounce Haiti “fit” for more hell, but the irony that they represent Haiti’s prime abusers –the United Nations and the United States — is inescapable.

And so, like Jack and Jill, let’s go up the hill to see what lies on the other side. The US, upon Haiti’s declaration of independence from France in 1804, refused to recognize the new country and promptly coordinated a worldwide embargo against it. When the US finally recognized Haiti, it was not until 1862 and only because Lincoln was contemplating sending slaves from the US there. As World War I erupted, the US, under the guise of stopping German infiltration into the Caribbean, invaded Haiti in 1915 and occupied it until 1934. During those nineteen years, the US stole all the gold out of the Haitian treasury, enslaved Haitians into work gangs known as “corvees,” and slaughtered thousands in what is known as the “Cacos” wars.

Beginning in 1957, the US found a Haitian diamond in the rough — Francois Duvalier — otherwise known as Papa Doc Duvalier. Here was a leader who kept the people of Haiti in line via the vicious “Ton Ton Macoutes,” attaches who wielded machete terror wherever they roamed. But, Duvalier earned his keep even more by being the US’ anti-communist beacon in the Caribbean keeping tabs on socialist movements such as that in Cuba. Duvalier was rewarded handsomely by the US with loans from international lending institutions — unfortunately, a totally improversihed Haiti is paying back thoses loans to this day.

Finally, two US-inspired coups (1991 and 2004) lodged against the only Haitian leader that ever gave a damn about the people, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, sealed Haiti into perpetual poverty and dissolved its sovereignty. Approximately 10,000 UN peacekeepers were sent to Haiti in the wake of the second coup. Ostensibly, their mission was to bring peace and security to Haiti, but as Kevin Pina states in his documentary film, “Haiti: We Must Kill the Bandits,” their mission was to prop up the highly unpopular and illegal government installed by the US after Aristide’s departure. Pina maintains that had the UN not been in Haiti, the illegal government would have fallen in a week.

So Ban and Bill went up the hill in Haiti to apply band-aids to cover the scars, to cover the truth. No doubt the press releases will be cheerful and full of hope with pronouncements about Haiti’s readiness to welcome home 30,000 of its citizens. And, as has become customary,will be accompanied by the usual promises of more loans, yet nary a word about debt relief.

Ban and Bill went up the hill, but never saw Haiti — they could have accomplished their mission from their offices in New York.
"
http://hcvanalysis.wordpress.com/2009/03/11/ban-and-bill-or-jack-and-jill-in-haiti-it-depends-on-the-hill/

[Judi Lynn]

2. You're so damned right. Why bother, even? Seems sadistic.

Is it because they depend upon their subordinates to do their legwork for them, and summarize to them what they need to know, then hire people working against democratic purposes secretly? Or are they corrupt themselves.

Very, VERY damned sad. So disappointing.

The only thing that appears likely to bring change is more awareness, consciousness, and soldiers in Congress like the few brave ones there now.

Thanks for the reference to the blog, too. It's a good site to visit regularly.