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In fact, most of them are not run by politicians. It's the civil society because there's a wave of kidnappings that have taken hold of the country, because Haiti, like most of these countries, have urban violence. You know, you have the favelas in Colombia, etc. you have in Rio. Well, we used to have this kind of violence in Port-Au-Prince, but what we've observed in the last 10 years is that this has become a phenomenon that affects the whole country.
There are places in the countryside that never had banditry problems. And now you have these young men who are walking around with clothes that don't look that fancy, but each of them are carrying AK-47s and Uzis and weapons that cost seven thousand dollars apiece, and how does that happen? Haiti is an island. We don't produce weapons. That's clear. OK, so the ports have been privatized. And who owns the ports, those same families? OK, and so they've been investing in arming gangs of young men and women and they spend a lot of resources on creating a climate of fear in certain strategic areas, including the waterfront in Port au Prince where there are slums right now.
And it has always been a project of these 11 families to displace that population from these areas and some other areas within the country so that they can take it and do their own idea of development. And so there is a climate of fear that has been created with these guns. People were saying, well, it doesn't make sense. These guys are kidnapers and they're kidnaping street vendors and they're asking a million dollars. How does it make sense? I mean, what street vendor has million dollars?
Are the gangs going after the protesters at all?
JafrikayitiYes, that is happening as well, but this has happened with a specific gang, there's a specific gang that they created in the Delmas area that's near the national palace, and there's a former police officer named Jimmy Cherizier. His nickname is Barbecue, and that's because he kills people and burns them. Now, this guy, you will see if you follow, if you Google his name, you'll find that all kinds of governments, Canada, U.S., everybody has been asking for his arrest, but he is like the road runner in Bugs Bunny, they can never find him. They say that there is a police warrant after him and he's doing Facebook lives almost every Sunday, but they cannot find him.
But the reason is and yesterday there was a live message from a Haitian musician who was very close to Michel Martelly, who admitted that this guy and these gangs in particular are armed by Michel Martelly, the former president who was imposed by Hillary Clinton on the Haitians, and so what they're doing is using those gangs to terrorize the population, the base of support for Lavalas, president Aristide's party, so that when and if elections are organized, people in the impoverished neighborhoods will not be able to go and vote.
So they can claim another easy victory like the last two elections where they will come and say, oh, well, that's too bad. There was low voter turnout, but that's Haiti it cannot be perfect, we'll accept it. Jovenel Moà ¯se was supposedly elected with an election that involved five hundred thousand votes in a nation of over 12 million people. OK, so obviously this wasn't a real election. The population has realized that if they allow it to happen, no matter how it happens, they can scream bloody murder as much as they want the core group of the so-called international community, the white powers are going to say sorry it's good you had an election, this is your president, live with it.
And so that's why people are in the streets and they're saying they're not going to have it. You've done this game a couple of times. You're not going to do it anymore. And people are using a new term now. They're saying that they're not calling for one puppet to be removed and replaced by another puppet.
They're asking for the system to collapse, and so that if these 11 families want to stay in Haiti, they're going to have to become citizens and behave like citizens, pay their taxes, and behave like normal people in the country, and so people are calling for a transition government that doesn't involve the political party of Jovenel Moà ¯se and Michel Martelly. For these guys to face justice for the embezzled funds and for real elections to be organized in Haiti.
Paul JayYves just finally, what should Canadians and Americans demand of their governments? What should be Canadian and American policy towards Haiti?
Yves EnglerWell, I think in the long term, there could be some real transfer reparations and stuff like that, but in the short term, I think we need to stop propping up the repressive dictator, and there's a petition being presented in the House of Commons on Monday calling for a release of all the documents around the Ottawa Initiative on Haiti and its connection, the Ottawa Initiative on Haiti's connection to the core group, which Jean mentioned, are the foreign powers, the real power behind Moà ¯se. So that's looking backwards into what Canada has done in Haiti with the coup in 2004 and subsequent policy
But I think the first thing people should do is inform themselves of a very good film called Haiti Betrayed. It looks at Canada's role in the 2004 coup and subsequent policy. That's a nice introduction. And get involved. There's some Haiti solidarity groups that have been created here in Montreal, in the Maritimes, and a little bit of activity in Toronto.
Paul JayAll right, well, we'll do this again soon. Thank you both for joining me.
JafrikayitiWe appreciate it Paul.
Yves EnglerThank you.
Paul Jay
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