“For lack of guidance a nation falls, but many advisors make victory sure”. Proverbs 11:14
Hi! For the last few months’ politics is the subject of daily conversation here in Haiti. The country is in the process of electing a new president to succeed Rene Preval. Officially his term ended on February 7th but the parliament authorized his staying in power until May to allow time for a smooth transition to a new president. The last few months’ things have been not even close to being “smooth” here in Haiti.
The Bible passage above is applicable for those involved in the electoral process as well as for the many mission groups, NGO’s and governments involved in rebuilding the country after the earthquake. Mission groups are angry at other mission groups. Each is criticizing each other’s works. Haitian government feels left out of the rebuilding process because funding is channeled through the large NGO’s.
At a dinner that we attended back in May 2010 there were several high-level government officials present. One of Preval’s cabinet ministers told us about their frustration about decisions being made not understanding the culture and desires of the Haitian people and government. The dinner we attended was sponsored by a Canadian construction firm owner who was hoping to assist the Haitian government with rubble removal.
The first 3 months after the earthquake were times of emergency, and relief work was carried out in urgence to help and save the lives of the Haitian people. Since then there has been some reconstruction but not enough. A lot of rubble removal still remains. The rubble and unsafe buildings that haven’t yet been demolished impede efforts to get people out of the refuge camps. Although there are less people now living in camps; an estimate of 800,000 from an original 1.5 million people, these last 800,000 people have nowhere to go to.
Proverbs 11:14 needs to be followed by everyone. Haiti will fall if everyone continues on like it has been going. Pray for a leader to be elected that will seek guidance from advisors (Haitian people, missions, foreign governments). We all have a part in rebuilding the country and don’t want to see the country fall even further.
We spoke recently with a couple of Brazilian military officers. Liz who is a member of the Angels to Haiti team speaks fluent Portuguese and was able to converse with the Brazilians. We asked them what they thought about the Haitian people. One mentioned that Haiti had the people to rebuild the country but that they need to decide to work together. Another said that the leader should be a man of God who loves the people more than money.
There has been some turmoil taking place with the election process. The first people affected are always the students. Schools were closed during times of protests and possible protests to protect them from being out on the streets. Being involved in the community I want to understand and experience what the Haitian people are going through. Together with some of the older guys here at Coram Deo we have been following the election process.
Election day was November 28th and people applied for a CIN (Carte Identite Nationale) or voting card ahead of time. The last few weeks before the election, people were in lineups to retrieve their CIN cards in order to be eligible to vote. One of the CIN bureaus was on Delmas 31 and lineups were large the last couple of weeks before election day. As days wore on people got more frustrated and impatient and several times we saw that the police had to get involved in crowd control.
Election day on November 28th was a Sunday. Churches still held worship services and everything else was closed. The top 3 favored candidates were Mirlande Manigat, Michel Martelly and Jude Celestin who was the candidate of the president’s INITE party. Michel Martelly is the popular vote of the people but on election day there were problems at a lot of voting booths. At one location in Carrefour voters showed up at the site only to be told that all the voting ballots were already filled in. In anger the people barricaded the door and asked the authorities to come and arrest the head of the voting booth and to confiscate the ballot boxes.
We drove around the city being a witness to what was transpiring that day. We saw the anger of the people at a corrupt election process. Tires were burned at some of the sites. Some voting sites were ransacked and the voting ballots strewn on the ground. I have a copy of the presidential, senatorial, and deputy voting ballots as a souvenir from one of the ransacked sites. Some people voted multiple times and ballot stuffing occurred.
People showed up at their voting site only to find that their name was not on the voting list but dead relatives from the earthquake were listed on the voter lists. Sony is one of our secondary school sponsor students. He was pressured at his voting site on Delmas 31 and told to mark Jude Celestin’s name. He refused and marked Martelly’s name. The first protests against the elections were organized the afternoon of November 28th. 12 of the candidates stood up together at a news conference and denounced the day’s election as fraudulent. Late in the afternoon protesters carrying posters of their favorite candidate went to the area of the CEP (electoral building) to let them know who they had voted for. Jn. Eddy’s mother joined with Henry Ceant’s supporters even though she voted for Michel Martelly. It was a festive atmosphere amongst the supporters of the various candidates. They all had a common purpose; protesting. I saw no supporters for Jude Celestin.
The interim time from election day to the release of the official voting results were ones of political discussions and also a couple of anti-election protests organized by the presidential candidates who had denounced the faulty elections. The first protest had around 2,000 people. Jean Henry Ceant, Charles Henry Baker, Jacques Alexis, Chavannes Jeune who were all presidential candidates spoke from a sound truck and delivered a message in front of the CEP. The protesters had knocked the barricades down blocking access on Delmas to the front of the CEP building. We were prepared that the riot police might launch tear gas but everything was peaceful. The candidates voiced their messages and then announced that the protest was over. They announced that the next protest would be in a few days starting at Place St. Pierre in Petionville. We hung around the CEP watching the protesters head back down Delmas and then started to walk back down Delmas also to where we parked the truck. All of a sudden rocks started to fly and the police shot in the air and we dove under a vendor’s table. We waited a bit and then followed behind the police as they headed down Delmas. The protesters had overturned dumpsters on their walk down Delmas as well as tossing a lot of rubble on the road creating an obstacle course for vehicles. This was the first hint of upcoming problems.
That’s all the news for today. I’ll send out another update soon to follow up on what has happened since the elections. Have a good week!
Karen Bultje, Coram Deo
No comments:
Post a Comment