April 17, 2008 at 05:39:38

Peter Hallward's "Damming the Flood" - Part II

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The 2006 victory was profoundly important, but as would be seen, equally compromised. It emphatically rejected the 2004 coup, yet got Preval to govern tactfully and timidly. More on that below.

By summer 2006, international donors pledged $750 million in aid. Initially, Preval announced plans for significant amounts of social investments. He also got commitments from Venezuela and Cuba (in spring 2007) in health care, electricity, other infrastructure and low-cost oil. Around the same time, he announced initiatives in education, literacy, road-building and tourism.

All the while, he had little room to maneuver. He was constrained by not having a legislative majority. He had it in Haiti's Senate but not in the lower Chamber of Deputies that was controlled by a pro-coup - pro-army majority. Even worse was the constant pressure he faced from dominant elitists and the long shadow of Washington always in the wings.

It made Preval extremely cautious, and it showed in his prime ministerial appointment - elitist Jacques Edouard Alexis to lead an eclectic cabinet having five CD members. The result - almost nothing of consequence was accomplished in his first year of office and, even so, the opposition wanted Alexis replaced by a still more "acceptable" alternative.

Preval was indeed hamstrung and it showed in his actions. He's done little for social change, and by spring 2007 was prepared to announce a new round of privatizations, including selling off Haiti's telecommunications company. One year into his second term, a Haiti Progres editor "conclude(d) that so far the government has done nothing at all." Preval was either "diplomatic" or "indecisive" on Lavalas election demands of "justice for (coup) victims, release of political prisoners, return of exiles, (and ending) militarized assault(s) on the popular neighborhoods."

Point of fact - Preval cut a deal with the devil. To win a first round victory (even though he won overwhelmingly), he agreed to painful concessions. Many prominent FL leaders, including Yvon Neptune, judged his indecisiveness damaging and "indefensible." Some Lavalassians called his Lespwa coalition "nothing" and would only be supported if it moved "in the right direction."

In fall 2006, it did the opposite when Preval and Alexis yielded to US and elitist pressure for more direct action against activist neighborhoods. To counter pro-Aristide/Lavalas rallies in Cite Soleil, they authorized a full-scale December Blue Helmet assault that "missed its targets but left around twenty innocents dead." More incursions followed with many more deaths. So far, Preval was colluding with the enemy instead of representing the people who elected him. Moreover, three years post-coup, some movement veterans believe conditions are "more discouraging than ever before."

Hallward notes that by March 2007, "there was little popular enthusiasm for a government whose hands were so firmly and so obviously tied by international constraints." Yet its existence is impressive proof that efforts to crush Lavalas haven't succeeded, and (even though near-impotent), "Preval's own fidelity to Lavalas remains strong. Whoever succeeds him (assuming a comparable election) will in all likelihood share a similar fidelity." Lavalas, even in disarray, "remains the most powerful political force in the country." It endures in spite of immense repression, is less dependent on one charismatic leader, is "less contaminated by opportunists (and has) fewer illusions about what must be done next."

Conclusion

At the time of his reelection, Aristide and FL were so popular, they threatened the old order with real progressive change. They had to be contained, and they were by a coalition of "first world diplomats, IFI economists, USAID consultants, IRI, (NED and) CIA (functionaries), media specialists, ex-military personnel, (security forces), NGO('s)," and more who declared victory on February 29, 2004. They ousted the people's government and "discredited the most progressive (one) in Haiti's history." And they used a familiar formula to do it:

-- starving the government of aid;

-- applying enormous economic pressure and obliging it to adopt unpopular policies like cutting public services and jobs;

-- tainting the government's democratic legitimacy by equating it with former dictatorships;

-- controlling security forces and co-opting opportunistic elements of the popular movement;

-- forcing the government to be defensive against paramilitary attacks and calling it intolerant of dissent;

-- presenting government opposition as diverse and inclusive and calling oppressors victims and victims oppressors;

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