Monday, December 6, 2010

ARTICLE - GOVERNMENT DIVIDES

PAST GOVERNMENTS 'HAVE DIVIDED US', MARTELLY SAYS
(Toronto Star) - By Jennifer Wells

PORT AU PRINCE—The carefully crafted presence that is Michel Martelly — blue Oxford cloth shirt, red tie, dark suit, the Michael Ignatieff look — leans forward in the dimly lit room. “What I’m saying is that the power is doing everything in its favour to make sure that Jude Celestin reaches a second round,” Martelly says. “We are being forced to swallow Celestin.”

In an interview with the Star following a press conference Monday, Martelly was in his I-Knew-This-Was-Going-to-Happen mode. “I knew there was going to be fraud,” he says. Hence the press conference and hence the promise that he and his team “Will not stand with our mouths closed” should Celestin’s name appear on the run-off ballot, due to be released by the end of the day Tuesday.

What actions will be taken? That, Martelly says, is up to his strategists, meaning Antonio Sola, who is seated closely by his side.

When asked if his team will play hardball with Celestin’s character — money, mistresses etc. — Martelly takes a pass.

“People want a rupture with the past,” is what he will say, which could prove a prophetic choice of words as Port-au-Prince nervously awaits the short list from the national electoral council.

Thinking of visiting here? Wait a while.

No question that Martelly has generated enormous emotional buzz in the capital. Late Sunday night I watched him conduct a Hail Caesar walk through the kitchen of the Karibe Hotel, striking a Sweet Micky pose here, blowing a kiss there.

No question that he is impassioned about his hunt for the country’s top office.

“Young boys are selling their bodies to get a visa to get out of Haiti. Young girls are selling their bodies to pay their rent. We don’t want that. We want change.”

He has been to the tent cities, recalling a mid-day trip. “I will tell you that getting into a tent at one o’clock is like freeing a fish into boiling oil.”

He walks among the people, albeit these days with a hefty security detail. And he’s got the cred of the Carrefour boy who promises a revival in this country he calls home: tourism, culture, agriculture, education.

“I do not accept the fact that because you are born from a poor family you are condemned to die poor. You must be offered opportunity and this is what we must be fighting for. Every Haitian kid must have the same opportunity.”

As for past governments? “They have divided us. They have created segregation.”

It’s true. And that, says Martelly, is what Celestin represents.

Whose interests does Martelly represent? Aside from the predictable “my own,” he won’t say.

He still won’t identify the “friend” who placed the call that encouraged him to run.

“Finally, I have a secret from the press,” he says deftly. “I love it.”

Then he adds, “I will leave it up to my strategists to decide which day I let it out.”

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