On July 8, one day after the assassination of Haiti President Jovenal Moïse, Pierre Labossiere from Haiti Action Committee and Margaret Prescod from Women of Color Global Women's Strike (GWS) and the GWS working group on Haiti, spoke on a panel hosted by Africans Rising entitled “Haiti, The Continuing Struggle for Liberation”. You can watch the recording:
We also recommend these two recent statements:
In the Wake of Jovenel Moïse's Assassination: Building Solidarity with Haiti's Popular Movement by Robert Roth, co-founder of Haiti Action Committee
“Today’s crisis in Haiti has its roots in the 2004 U.S.-orchestrated coup against the democratically elected government of Jean-Bertrand Aristide and his Fanmi Lavalas Political Organization. Lavalas means “flash flood” in Creole, signifying the gathering together of people’s power. The Lavalas movement emerged in the struggle to rid Haiti of the U.S.-backed Duvalier dictatorships in the 1980’s, and brought Aristide into office in 1991 and then again in 2001. Under Lavalas administrations, more schools were built than in Haiti’s entire history, funding was dramatically increased for public health and literacy projects, the minimum wage was doubled, and the brutal Haitian Armed Forces was abolished. This was all laid waste when the U.S. organized a coup d’etat against Aristide and then orchestrated a UN occupation to derail this process of progress and change…”
“As mass protests grew and his government teetered, Moise turned to full-scale terror, weaponizing criminal elements and turning them into death squads backed by sectors of his police force (financed and trained by the United States), and using them to attack opposition neighborhoods. The most horrific example was in Lasalin in November 2018, where hundreds were killed, women were gang raped, and people’s homes were burned to the ground, forcing a mass exodus out of the community. Operating with impunity, paramilitary forces tied to Moise’s government, including the so-called G-9 led by ex-police officer Jimmy “Barbecue” Cherizier, unleashed a wave of violence throughout the poorest communities of Port-au-Prince, making life in the country unlivable…”
“We need to demand the following:
1. Cut off all US aid for the Haitian police once and for all.
2. Stop the Biden Administration’s support for the PHTK regime regardless of what new figurehead becomes president.
3. End US support for sham elections in Haiti
4. Support the right of the Haitian people to form, through their own popular movement, their own transition government free from US interference. No more US/UN military intervention in Haiti.”
Solidarity with Haiti Will Strengthen the Struggle for Racial Justice Everywhereby Nia Imara, The Progressive Magazine
“As we approach July 28, the anniversary of the first U.S. invasion of Haiti in 1915, we might consider that the U.S. government has no moral authority to make decisions about what happens in Haiti today. This first invasion took place after the assassination of a president, under the pretext of protecting Haiti against “insecurity.” U.S. troops occupied the country for nineteen years, leaving behind a legacy of Jim Crowism. Rather than repeating history, the Biden Administration should terminate the U.S.-led coup and occupation and take the further step of making reparations for exploiting Haiti’s resources and labor and for supporting dictatorships.
For many Black people in the United States, Haiti’s history has a special significance. When we realize that Haiti’s present is as important, it will be clear that its future is linked to our struggle for racial justice here. Ultimately, the struggle for racial and other forms of social justice in the United States stands only to benefit from our commitment to solidarity with Haiti. If we say that we value Black lives, our integrity demands that we educate ourselves about the history of U.S.-Haiti relations. For how can we, as Black people, expect that our human rights will ever be truly respected by the same government that applies racist tactics against Black people elsewhere?
A movement for racial justice in the United States will be successful only when it recognizes that people of color around the world share a common struggle.”
And this coming Saturday, July 31, tune in to an afternoon of soul-nourishing poetry and an opportunity to support Haiti’s movement for democracy (register here). Haiti Emergency Relief Fund gives concrete aid to Haiti’s democratic movement and grassroots community groups organizing to meeting Haitians’ needs directly. See http://haitiemergencyrelief.org
