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Bay Area Labor and Human Rights Delegation Finds Pre-election Intimidation, Repression in Haiti
The delegation included union members from the California Teachers' Association (CTA), a leader from the African-American Caucus of the San Jose branch of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), and a union member from the health care sector, among others. The delegation spent considerable time on the ground in the popular neighborhoods of the poor and carried out extensive interviews. Interviewees included Haitian labor leaders, neighborhood activists and members of grassroots organizations, educators and journalists, leaders of the country's largest and most popular political party Fanmi Lavalas (FL), and the country's most renowned human rights attorney, Mario Joseph.
The elections were frequently characterized by people on the street as "selections." According to Mario Joseph, the elections are "an extension of the coup" that violently disposed of elected President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, along with thousands of elected Fanmi Lavalas officials across the country. In a move that has provoked outrage across Haiti, the Electoral Council recently banned Fanmi Lavalas-the party most popular with the country's poor majority-- from running candidates in the Senate elections. The Council did this on the basis that former President Aristide's original signature was needed to "authorize" Fanmi Lavalas candidates, a new requirement that was never used in previous elections. Aristide remains in exile in South Africa.
In response, Fanmi Lavalas activists planned a peaceful street protest on April 17th, the day of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's visit to Haiti. Haitian police refused to authorize the protest. Despite this ban, approximately five Fanmi Lavalas activists entered the Senate building that same day and launched a hunger strike in the courtyard. Additionally, activists in popular neighborhoods continued with plans to stage protests and press conferences. One such activist informed the US delegation that he received two anonymous phone calls on the morning of April 17th threatening him to cease and desist with the protest planning otherwise he could be assassinated. This activist explained that the calls came from an individual linked to the Lespwa party of President Preval.
Threats such as these are quite credible. On September 19th, 2007, Haitian human rights leader and Fanmi Lavalas activist Pierre-Antoine Lovinsky was "disappeared"; his whereabouts are still unknown. The US delegation visited one political prisoner, Ronald Dauphin, who has been incarcerated for more than five years without a trial. He is gravely ill and had to be carried out into the courtyard of the National Penitentiary for the visit. According to delegation member Ellen Rollins, a nurse with 35-years experience, "Mr. Dauphin's life is quite possibly in danger unless he receives immediate, outside medical treatment." He was severely dehydrated with evidence of major infection-possibly septic-throughout his body. He reported that he had not urinated for more than a week and collapsed during the visit, lapsing into unconsciousness. His pulse was weak and thready, his respiration shallow. According to another health care professional on the delegation, Tyler Ikeda, "it appears that Mr. Dauphin's vital organs are starting to shut down".
Many Haitians hoped that President Preval-elected in 2006 thanks to the support of Fanmi Lavalas voters -- would free all political prisoners, implement programs beneficial to the poor majority, and arrange for Aristide's return to Haiti. Preval has failed to do this, alienating Haiti's poor majority. Instead, he has been vigorously implementing US-backed economic reforms that punish the poor, such as the privatization of Haiti's ports and mass lay-offs of public sector workers in a country where unemployment already hovers around 80 percent.
During her three-hour visit to Haiti on Thursday, April 16th, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said nothing of the banning of Fanmi Lavalas from the elections, the banning of peaceful protest, the plight of political prisoners, and the ongoing intimidation against Haitian human rights activists. Moreover, she said nothing of the fact that Haitian voters still did not know where to go if they did choose to vote. Apparently, in order to receive information on the location of their polling station, they had to use cell phones to call the authorities over the weekend.
Given these dynamics on the ground in Haiti, it is hardly surprising that voter turnout for the senatorial elections on April 19 was so low. Sources quoted by the Haitian Press Agency put the turnout at less than 3 percent.