Analyses & Opinions

Who, In His, Or Her Right Mind, Would Entrust A Dictator With The Mission Of Organizing Fair Elections?

By L. Sept , January 15, 2015

Since when dictators organize honest elections? Paradoxically this is the mission the American State Department have assigned to American made Dictator Michel Joseph Martelly, aka, J. Michael Martelly.

The American Ambassador, Mrs. Pamela White conducted a marathon in the middle of the Haitian night of 11th to 12th of January in order to install Michel Martelly as the sole ruler of Haiti, regardless of the checks and balances and guards of Haitian laws! As we are writing these words, Michel Martelly is president, prime minister, chief judge of the supreme court of Haiti. What a basket lead of power and responsibilities for a dirty night club entertainer who barely completed high school!

This favor done to Michel Martelly happened after this president managed to skip all the elections that he was supposed to organize according to the Constitution of Haiti. He replaced or maintained around 5,000 elected officials whose mandates had expired as de facto authority forcing them to be subservient to him since he can now fire them at will, based on their appointed status caused by the suppressions of elections.

Thus, the question come to mind, simple in nature: Who is benefit from this gross violation of the law, social, and political decorum? What is important enough to warrant such a wrong in a bleeding country like Haiti? Are those interest so powerful that they supersede the most basic humanistic ethic?

We know well that countries, including Haiti, the United States, or anywhere in the world, are not monolithic. Interests are never general. There are always a diversity of interest creed, shades of believes, different visions of local, regional and individual always at play anywhere we go in the world. But in the 21st century, a certain modus vivendi has been developed among humans on earth that tends toward universality. The world at large, rather is striving to develop a global level of deontology, of practice, ethics and social etiquette in the broad sense. What could be powerful enough to push Mme White and his superior to install a Dictator, against the will of the vast majority of the people of Haiti?

Mrs. Pamela White is certainly familiar with those two lines in the letter below. They are the content of the letter of resignation of President Richard Nixon in June 1972. This resignation took place over a matter of undue interference of President Nixon and his staff in the American presidential elections where Nixon was a candidate for a second term. At the time of this letter, Richard Nixon had just been elected president of the USA for a second term.

Those events took place in the United States of America during the struggle for Civil Rights, in the heat of the Vietnam War. However, the general international context was one of the cold war with, then, the Soviet Union. The protagonists were, not only the Soviet Union, but also, the Cuban Revolution, and the recent visit of Nixon to Mao Tse Tong, le leader of the Popular Republic of China. All those international actors were waiting to see how the political establishment would disentangle itself from that sticky situation. Well American society proved that it was up to the challenge, lucky it was that there was not an ambassador White accredited in the USA by another power.

In 1972, Richard Nixon was elected president of the United States over Senator George Mc Govern, democrat of South Dakota. That was the time for the United States establishment to rise to the occasion on many front, especially with his internal issues with governance. Richard Nixon did rise to the occasion and save the United States reputation, at least, at the level of the internal governance of the country.

Rather than falling into the gutter of history as the elected president, Richard Nixon rose on his own power and relinquish the presidency. He, then, avoided humiliating impeachment proceedings and keep the dignity of this office intact.

We cannot tell how familiar Mrs. White and president Martelly are with those events. However, they can always reflect on them. Then they can decided, in the depth of their human dignity, that there are things in life which are more important than the regular intrigues and pursuit of narrow interests.

Haiti, in 2015, is a country that has been mistreated in the past, by her own children, and even more so by its most welcome visitors, like those diplomats, commercial agents, NGO operatives, whom the Haitian people consider as their own. The country has been badly hurt by nature. Her cities are still on the ground five (5) years after the January 12th, 2010 quake. Tons on money were dilapidated on its name and it is still haunted by the souls of the dead or the wounded, even during those strange pessimistic-hopeful processions like the street marches, or the that famous 700 kilometer long Kita Nago.

For 100 years (1915-2015) of American direct occupation and interference, Haiti is still poorer than ever and rift with conflicts. Massive American interference like the one that took place during the night of January 11th to the 12th, 2015 can only make Haiti worse.

L. Sept
Source: Facebook
Unedited