The Doc Is In
Although I wasn't around to comment on it then, about a year ago Haiti had a massive earthquake that left thousands dead and nearly leveled the entire country. Now, a year later, so little aid has flowed in that rebuilding has proven to be next to impossible. Sarah Palin, John Edwards and others have all gone down there to have their moment in the sun and show the cameras what god work each of them is doing. A year later things are not looking much better as Haiti tries to dig itself out and perhaps take its place among the nations of the world. Haiti has been crippled by extreme poverty (they are the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere), few natural resources and atrocious leadership. It is this last one that has hurt Haiti the most. Corruption is not merely part of the way of life down there, it IS arguably the way of life down there For decades, Haitians had to deal secret police, corrupt officials looking for bribes just to do their jobs and every form of bad government imaginable. While Haiti had plenty of dictators since World War II, the most infamous were by the Duvalier family. Francois "Papa Doc" Duvalier came to power after helping fight breakouts of yaws and other diseases since he was a medical doctor. He came to power in 1957 and died in 1971 leaving his son Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier in power. After 15 years of secret police, rumors of zombies and looting the personal treasury for his own gain, the people rose up against Baby Doc and sent into exile. Until now. Two days ago, "Baby Doc" Duvalier returned to his native land and subsequently been placed under arrest. And it might be the best news Haiti has seen in a while.
To understand how little of this actually makes sense, we might need to go back a bit. 1957, Papa Doc grabs power and one of the first things he dis was to start making a detailed study of Haitian Vodoun. It was here he discovered Baron Samedi and Tonton Macoute (Uncle Gunny Sack) who were powerful beings akin to saints who represented death. Tonton Macoute was said to go through the land and kidnap bad children and eat them for breakfast. Duvalier capitalized on these by having his secret police dress like Baron Samedi (black, foreign made suits, black sunglasses, black hats and drive around in black suburbans) and kidnap anyone making trouble for the regime. The locals started to refer to them as "Tonton Macoutes". When Papa Doc died, Baby Doc announced the Tonton Macoutes would still be the personal militia/bodyguards to him. They would routinely kidnap, torture or kill people just for the heck of it. Land was seized, women were raped and any number of atrocities were attributed to them. All told, they murdered an estimated 60,000 people (out of a country that currently has 9.7 million). Baby Doc Duvalier either directly ordered or knew about these atrocities, as well as embezzling millions from the national treasury. During the Reagan administration (which had supported him for being anti-Communist), the American government put pressure on him to step down and leave Haiti (yeah, this might not make sense with the last sentence, but the Americans didn't like him either as a person. If they could keep being anti-communist without Duvalier, it was a win-win). Eventually, he did, taking a lot of money with him and he retired with his mistress to the French Riviera worth about 120 million dollars.
Now, for some reason, Baby Doc has returned. At first people didn't know what to think, then they arrested him. They didn't know exactly what to charge him with, but those charges wil surely be coming shortly. But as to why now, you have to look at the recent presidential elections. Yes, there were just presidential elections in Haiti that are still being sorted out. They first got murky when Haitian born American singer Wyclef Jean announced he was going to run for the presidency. Haiti has a 5 year residency rule, which he claims he should be exempt from since he was Haiti's at-large ambassador (a position appointed to him by the last president). The courts did not agree, but now he's in Haiti to stay and trying to raise money. So there was a general election in Haiti. What this would normally mean is the two top vote getters would have a run-off election to determine who is president. The problem is, the local Haitian government and the UN can't agree on exactly who those two gentlemen are and the election was supposed to take place a couple of days ago. There have been accounts of widespread fraud in the elections and no parties can agree to certify the results. It never happened and there have been no new elections scheduled, despite the Haitian constitution saying there has to be a new president by a day in February. Of course, this is all one big mess and it leaves the people in great confusion. Especially since the elections were supposed to take place LAST year but the earthquake made it impossible to hold elections.
So, amidst all of this election confusion, a former dictator flies home. His intentions are unclear at this point and France is doing their best to say they didn't send him home. Could he be trying to take power? Possibly, but this is a pretty sloppy way to do it. It's not like there are lot of people who loved having him around. Most of the old Tonton Macoutes are dead, locked up or fled for friendlier skies. HE hasn't exactly presented a plan for Haiti and he mostly snuck in rather than try to come home in a flourish of trumpets and popularity. This was smart since the Haitian government still has charges pending against him, as does the US. We were pretty willing to turn a blind eye as long as he kept quiet and out of the way, but now, probably not. If we're smart, we'll let the Haitians have first crack at him. After all, if it all goes well (and it probably will. He'll get a fairer trial than he gave people, but highly unlikely they OJ his ass) then the Haitian government can seize his assets. Between putting a brutal dictator in prison for the rest of his natural born days and getting the millions of dollars in fines he owes, that could be a double windfall for Haiti. It would show the government to be stable and truthful about wanting to punish one of their own, which would help externally as countries decided to invest more in the rebuilding of Haiti as well as internally it would help show people they're still going and can be relied upon. They could solve half their problems at once.
Which is why this might be the best thing Baby Doc has ever done for Haiti.
So it is written, so do I see it.
To understand how little of this actually makes sense, we might need to go back a bit. 1957, Papa Doc grabs power and one of the first things he dis was to start making a detailed study of Haitian Vodoun. It was here he discovered Baron Samedi and Tonton Macoute (Uncle Gunny Sack) who were powerful beings akin to saints who represented death. Tonton Macoute was said to go through the land and kidnap bad children and eat them for breakfast. Duvalier capitalized on these by having his secret police dress like Baron Samedi (black, foreign made suits, black sunglasses, black hats and drive around in black suburbans) and kidnap anyone making trouble for the regime. The locals started to refer to them as "Tonton Macoutes". When Papa Doc died, Baby Doc announced the Tonton Macoutes would still be the personal militia/bodyguards to him. They would routinely kidnap, torture or kill people just for the heck of it. Land was seized, women were raped and any number of atrocities were attributed to them. All told, they murdered an estimated 60,000 people (out of a country that currently has 9.7 million). Baby Doc Duvalier either directly ordered or knew about these atrocities, as well as embezzling millions from the national treasury. During the Reagan administration (which had supported him for being anti-Communist), the American government put pressure on him to step down and leave Haiti (yeah, this might not make sense with the last sentence, but the Americans didn't like him either as a person. If they could keep being anti-communist without Duvalier, it was a win-win). Eventually, he did, taking a lot of money with him and he retired with his mistress to the French Riviera worth about 120 million dollars.
Now, for some reason, Baby Doc has returned. At first people didn't know what to think, then they arrested him. They didn't know exactly what to charge him with, but those charges wil surely be coming shortly. But as to why now, you have to look at the recent presidential elections. Yes, there were just presidential elections in Haiti that are still being sorted out. They first got murky when Haitian born American singer Wyclef Jean announced he was going to run for the presidency. Haiti has a 5 year residency rule, which he claims he should be exempt from since he was Haiti's at-large ambassador (a position appointed to him by the last president). The courts did not agree, but now he's in Haiti to stay and trying to raise money. So there was a general election in Haiti. What this would normally mean is the two top vote getters would have a run-off election to determine who is president. The problem is, the local Haitian government and the UN can't agree on exactly who those two gentlemen are and the election was supposed to take place a couple of days ago. There have been accounts of widespread fraud in the elections and no parties can agree to certify the results. It never happened and there have been no new elections scheduled, despite the Haitian constitution saying there has to be a new president by a day in February. Of course, this is all one big mess and it leaves the people in great confusion. Especially since the elections were supposed to take place LAST year but the earthquake made it impossible to hold elections.
So, amidst all of this election confusion, a former dictator flies home. His intentions are unclear at this point and France is doing their best to say they didn't send him home. Could he be trying to take power? Possibly, but this is a pretty sloppy way to do it. It's not like there are lot of people who loved having him around. Most of the old Tonton Macoutes are dead, locked up or fled for friendlier skies. HE hasn't exactly presented a plan for Haiti and he mostly snuck in rather than try to come home in a flourish of trumpets and popularity. This was smart since the Haitian government still has charges pending against him, as does the US. We were pretty willing to turn a blind eye as long as he kept quiet and out of the way, but now, probably not. If we're smart, we'll let the Haitians have first crack at him. After all, if it all goes well (and it probably will. He'll get a fairer trial than he gave people, but highly unlikely they OJ his ass) then the Haitian government can seize his assets. Between putting a brutal dictator in prison for the rest of his natural born days and getting the millions of dollars in fines he owes, that could be a double windfall for Haiti. It would show the government to be stable and truthful about wanting to punish one of their own, which would help externally as countries decided to invest more in the rebuilding of Haiti as well as internally it would help show people they're still going and can be relied upon. They could solve half their problems at once.
Which is why this might be the best thing Baby Doc has ever done for Haiti.
So it is written, so do I see it.