Haiti in Perspective:
Sunday, January 13, 2008
An Anonymous Writer
Haiti has such a tradition of no elected president that we often find ourselves lost as to what to do with one, and are even more mystified when something is being done but not what we want-- What are we to do, what are we to say?
I have been lucky enough to travel to the country on many occasions (at least 8 times in the past year and ½, with some long stay on some of those trips (over 2 months at times). As luck will have it also, my experiences have encompassed a broad range of activities: from my first trip where I went to the funeral of my deceased father who was murdered by kidnappers, to several trips to handle estate affairs, to deciding to create a life in the country for a more permanent presence.
All my trips have been eventful in many respects. It is those experiences, plus the interactions I have had with folks, some low ranking civil servants, some high level Government Officials, some Parliamentarians, and not less some power behind the scene individuals that gave me a sense of the state of the country. Here is what I see on the streets, what I think is being done, but also what I hope would/should but am not sure will take place during the course of this administration.
In my first trip of this two-year span (Nov. 2005 to Nov. 2007), the level of Kidnapping was so high that I never spent much time outside the house but for the viewing and later to the funeral of my dad. This trip was my first since before the fall of Aristide and the transformation was markedly great on the face of the people, on the face of the country. The streets were dirtier than before, and they were dirty during Aristide’s time. There were more beggars, something that seemingly had disappeared when I had visited in 2003. More disappointing was the look on the average person in the street: stressed and fearful of being kidnapped (at the time, even shoe shiners were being taken). So, one is to say that my visit was a terror trip; I too was very stressed, very on edge, all this is adding to my distress in morning my loss.
In early 2006, I made another trip. This time, I had worked through my grief, was willing to face the terror in the country. This is the same trip that saw the elections of the current Government. Politics put aside, right or wrong, the people went to the poles and deposited a majority vote for Préval in the urns. He created a coalition government to restore and maintain the peace in the country. His first “hundred days” proved a major test for this coalition. In the end, we can say it survived as they are still around. But the critics of that time highlighted the major problems facing the country, facing this new government and I ought to remind us my first hand account of their truth: Insecurity, poverty (two sides of the same coin in many respects—the lather often breeds the former), deterioration of the National Infrastructures—Roads, buildings and Service institutions like telecommunication, etc, with major Corruption in those Gov Institutions. Their work seems too overwhelming for the time at hand. We must not forget the semi-occupational force from the UN in the country. This minefield at the beginning was ready to blow at any given occasion.
So we find the country at this serious impasse. We must not forget the people in their misery; a large section of the population is unemployed with no prospect in sight. The government being the second largest employer in the country does not help the situation. To that point, we look in the streets and see the first big employer, the “informal sector.” This powerhouse employment machine contains the “Racketeers—these are the people who will promise or do anything to either get you something or get your money in the promise of something from the Gov more expediently or by illegal means: things like your official document extracts, your passport or something the like,” the little vendors by the street side, the kids vending water in the middle of the streets or wiping dust off the cars while moving in the dead lock traffic. These little businesses are what drive the poor. There is regular commerce, but the taxes they pay are surely not enough to neither drive the government institutions nor establish a solid economy, not to mention the power to hire the massive number of unskilled, unemployed. We are not forgetting the support from the Haitian Diaspora, but in no home grown production/economy, they fill-in for the money the meager work one can find cannot provide.
In the Streets then you would see a very congested mixed of man and machine bustling while around certain governmental institutions like the Direction General des Impôts or DGI (the IRS building in Haiti), filling the sidewalks are a large population of Racketeers. This segment is part of the corruption that plagues the country. They know or have an employee in the system working with them to provide them with faster service, a service that should have been given to a person standing in line for hours some times. In the last months of 2005 to early 2006 then, this was my experience.
Getting the estate issues resolved was a major headache that is still ongoing. The major failures are due in part to the corruption, but in greater part to the lack of infrastructure that seemed designed by the previous administrations. Records are not kept in secured areas, nor are they electronic. As a result, they are lost, damaged, changed, or mismanaged. This problem still exists in the country to this day and needs to be improved.
On my following trip which was the summer of 2006, I saw a major cleanup of the Racketeers next to the DGI and the National Archives. They may have gone underground, but the visible presence was reduced almost to none. Also, there were Public trash receptacles placed at strategic locations around Port-au-Prince that seem to reduce trash to a significant level. This was such a pleasing sight that I could not stop talking about it for days.
But the Kidnappings were still very high. No jobs were being created, no hiring, but no firings either at the Gov Institutions. The UN mission still had not done much to assist with the crime rate; the fledgling Gov was stumbling to find its way.
A couple of trips later, the first year in office (Feb 2007), there seems to be a structure in place. Kidnapping has gone down significantly, arrests are being made of known gangsters, and publicity and media communications are put in place to notify the public of their capture. The government seems to be fighting the war on two fronts and appears winning. Yet, no jobs, no hiring, however, firings have begun. Major firing took place at the Teleco where the repercussions are felt even by some higher ups.
The streets remain cleaner and toward the end of the year 2007, traffic lights are installed in Port-au-Prince, new police officers are deployed and they are friendly; they are not asking for bribes and know how to regulate the Haitian traffic. There is good public relation at work where they are remaking the face of the national police, making friends with the people is working. There is a new license plate released for automobiles.
But while the traffic is being regulated by new officers, the old drivers who never learned properly to follow traffic codes, the old police officers who do not know, have never known a traffic signal throughout their career have not been trained. In short, this system is installed without preparation for the users and the older enforcers; a recipe that proved difficult to manage when an older police officer comes to enforce a traffic violation. What’s worst is the officer is the only party to determine fault as there is no court or review system established to oversee this process. There is traffic light, but poor planning.
To speak of traffic, we cannot leave out the “TAP TAPS” and the Taxis. Tap-Tap is the main form of transportation in Port-au-Prince . Much has been done to regulate this area. The government demanded that the drivers identify the course of their service. This is a major improvement. Yet, there is no regulation on how the cars should be maintained for they are very dirty for the most part and they carry too many people at once. A maximum load capacity should be in effect for this type of sardine packing transportation is dangerous.
There is a little more electricity in the country at this point, where the blackouts are reduced from weeks, to days, to having electricity on a regular basis for several hours during the day, and later in the wee hours of the night. Power plants have been announced to start functioning during the later part of 2008 in many of the big cities of the country. That remains to be seen, but we are optimistic on this point.
To be continued…
Haiti has such a tradition of no elected president that we often find ourselves lost as to what to do with one, and are even more mystified when something is being done but not what we want-- What are we to do, what are we to say?
I have been lucky enough to travel to the country on many occasions (at least 8 times in the past year and ½, with some long stay on some of those trips (over 2 months at times). As luck will have it also, my experiences have encompassed a broad range of activities: from my first trip where I went to the funeral of my deceased father who was murdered by kidnappers, to several trips to handle estate affairs, to deciding to create a life in the country for a more permanent presence.
All my trips have been eventful in many respects. It is those experiences, plus the interactions I have had with folks, some low ranking civil servants, some high level Government Officials, some Parliamentarians, and not less some power behind the scene individuals that gave me a sense of the state of the country. Here is what I see on the streets, what I think is being done, but also what I hope would/should but am not sure will take place during the course of this administration.
In my first trip of this two-year span (Nov. 2005 to Nov. 2007), the level of Kidnapping was so high that I never spent much time outside the house but for the viewing and later to the funeral of my dad. This trip was my first since before the fall of Aristide and the transformation was markedly great on the face of the people, on the face of the country. The streets were dirtier than before, and they were dirty during Aristide’s time. There were more beggars, something that seemingly had disappeared when I had visited in 2003. More disappointing was the look on the average person in the street: stressed and fearful of being kidnapped (at the time, even shoe shiners were being taken). So, one is to say that my visit was a terror trip; I too was very stressed, very on edge, all this is adding to my distress in morning my loss.
In early 2006, I made another trip. This time, I had worked through my grief, was willing to face the terror in the country. This is the same trip that saw the elections of the current Government. Politics put aside, right or wrong, the people went to the poles and deposited a majority vote for Préval in the urns. He created a coalition government to restore and maintain the peace in the country. His first “hundred days” proved a major test for this coalition. In the end, we can say it survived as they are still around. But the critics of that time highlighted the major problems facing the country, facing this new government and I ought to remind us my first hand account of their truth: Insecurity, poverty (two sides of the same coin in many respects—the lather often breeds the former), deterioration of the National Infrastructures—Roads, buildings and Service institutions like telecommunication, etc, with major Corruption in those Gov Institutions. Their work seems too overwhelming for the time at hand. We must not forget the semi-occupational force from the UN in the country. This minefield at the beginning was ready to blow at any given occasion.
So we find the country at this serious impasse. We must not forget the people in their misery; a large section of the population is unemployed with no prospect in sight. The government being the second largest employer in the country does not help the situation. To that point, we look in the streets and see the first big employer, the “informal sector.” This powerhouse employment machine contains the “Racketeers—these are the people who will promise or do anything to either get you something or get your money in the promise of something from the Gov more expediently or by illegal means: things like your official document extracts, your passport or something the like,” the little vendors by the street side, the kids vending water in the middle of the streets or wiping dust off the cars while moving in the dead lock traffic. These little businesses are what drive the poor. There is regular commerce, but the taxes they pay are surely not enough to neither drive the government institutions nor establish a solid economy, not to mention the power to hire the massive number of unskilled, unemployed. We are not forgetting the support from the Haitian Diaspora, but in no home grown production/economy, they fill-in for the money the meager work one can find cannot provide.
In the Streets then you would see a very congested mixed of man and machine bustling while around certain governmental institutions like the Direction General des Impôts or DGI (the IRS building in Haiti), filling the sidewalks are a large population of Racketeers. This segment is part of the corruption that plagues the country. They know or have an employee in the system working with them to provide them with faster service, a service that should have been given to a person standing in line for hours some times. In the last months of 2005 to early 2006 then, this was my experience.
Getting the estate issues resolved was a major headache that is still ongoing. The major failures are due in part to the corruption, but in greater part to the lack of infrastructure that seemed designed by the previous administrations. Records are not kept in secured areas, nor are they electronic. As a result, they are lost, damaged, changed, or mismanaged. This problem still exists in the country to this day and needs to be improved.
On my following trip which was the summer of 2006, I saw a major cleanup of the Racketeers next to the DGI and the National Archives. They may have gone underground, but the visible presence was reduced almost to none. Also, there were Public trash receptacles placed at strategic locations around Port-au-Prince that seem to reduce trash to a significant level. This was such a pleasing sight that I could not stop talking about it for days.
But the Kidnappings were still very high. No jobs were being created, no hiring, but no firings either at the Gov Institutions. The UN mission still had not done much to assist with the crime rate; the fledgling Gov was stumbling to find its way.
A couple of trips later, the first year in office (Feb 2007), there seems to be a structure in place. Kidnapping has gone down significantly, arrests are being made of known gangsters, and publicity and media communications are put in place to notify the public of their capture. The government seems to be fighting the war on two fronts and appears winning. Yet, no jobs, no hiring, however, firings have begun. Major firing took place at the Teleco where the repercussions are felt even by some higher ups.
The streets remain cleaner and toward the end of the year 2007, traffic lights are installed in Port-au-Prince, new police officers are deployed and they are friendly; they are not asking for bribes and know how to regulate the Haitian traffic. There is good public relation at work where they are remaking the face of the national police, making friends with the people is working. There is a new license plate released for automobiles.
But while the traffic is being regulated by new officers, the old drivers who never learned properly to follow traffic codes, the old police officers who do not know, have never known a traffic signal throughout their career have not been trained. In short, this system is installed without preparation for the users and the older enforcers; a recipe that proved difficult to manage when an older police officer comes to enforce a traffic violation. What’s worst is the officer is the only party to determine fault as there is no court or review system established to oversee this process. There is traffic light, but poor planning.
To speak of traffic, we cannot leave out the “TAP TAPS” and the Taxis. Tap-Tap is the main form of transportation in Port-au-Prince . Much has been done to regulate this area. The government demanded that the drivers identify the course of their service. This is a major improvement. Yet, there is no regulation on how the cars should be maintained for they are very dirty for the most part and they carry too many people at once. A maximum load capacity should be in effect for this type of sardine packing transportation is dangerous.
There is a little more electricity in the country at this point, where the blackouts are reduced from weeks, to days, to having electricity on a regular basis for several hours during the day, and later in the wee hours of the night. Power plants have been announced to start functioning during the later part of 2008 in many of the big cities of the country. That remains to be seen, but we are optimistic on this point.
To be continued…
