How can Canada help Haiti without making a bad situation worse?

CLIP You’re listening to a frequency podcast, network production in association with City News.

Donnovan Bennett The beautiful island nation of Haiti is known for soulful food and music, but of late it’s been in the news for its turmoil as it’s on the verge of self-destruction. Poverty, crime, corruption, or high food, fuel, water are all low. The violence has forced closures of schools and businesses. There are no legitimate elected officials at the helm and no evident plan to organize credible elections in the unoccupied country. Meanwhile, gangs of kidnappers and their foreign appointed political allies claim all the power. There is a legacy of Canadian intervention in Haiti dating back over 20 years, but it’s not a great one. In that time, Haiti has gone from having 7,000 dually elected officials. To none today. As Canada and other foreign powers consider renewed intervention in Haiti and supporting that, we reflect on the history of the Disastrous Ottawa initiative so that we’re not doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past. I am Donnovan Bennett, host of the Going Deep Podcast for SportsNet, and I’m filling in for Jordan. This is The Big Story. Jean Saint-Vil (Jafrikayiti), radio host and Member of Solidarité Québec-Haiti, an activist group pressing for Better Canadian Foreign Policy in Haiti. Jean, thank you for joining us.

Jean Saint-Vil Yes, thank you for having me. 


Donnovan Describe what it’s like on the streets of Haiti right now.

Jean Saint-Vil It’s a very strange situation where, you know, on one hand we see images of Carnival in Northern Haiti, in the city of Kaia attended by ambassadors, uh, that are accredited in Haiti. At the same time we get news of yet another journal. Getting kidnapped in Port France and in the streets you have, uh, the doctors in residence who are demonstrating because the general hospital does not have any of the basics that they require to take care of patients. So it’s, it’s a mix of things that don’t match that are happening at the same time. So, yes, the, it’s very hard to make sense of the news that you’re getting from, uh, Haiti.

Donnovan So as we look back, can you give us a bit of background on how we got here?

Jean Saint-Vil Yes. Well, You know, it’s a long story that really would have to take a look at the history of the creation of Haiti. Uh, 219 years ago, uh, a nation created by revolted Africans, uh, who defeated the armies of Spain, of, uh, France and of Britain. In order to create an oasis of freedom for themselves in the Americas, uh, Haiti has been in a constant struggle to really, uh, have its nationhood, uh, respected, accepted. And you can argue that the conflict that we are facing today, uh, is a continuation of that struggle, but to, you know, bring it closer to home, we are. Dealing with the efforts of Haitian society to establish a functioning democracy since, uh, the last dictatorship, the US back dictatorship of the Duvalier collapsed on February 7th. 1986 and Haiti eventually organized free and fair elections in 1990. Uh, but the new president who was inaugurated, uh, on February 7th, 1991, only lasted seven months in power because he was deposed by, CIA backed coup in September. Of that same year and President Risid who’s dominated, uh, Haitian politics since then, managed to, uh, finish. Part of that first, uh, mandate after three years in exile in the United States. And then when he returned to power in 2001, uh, he only lasted three years before another coup by the United States this time by Baby Bush, who was in the White House, who used, para militaries that they train in the Dominican Republic to remove the President by essentially kidnapping him and his wife in the dead of night with, uh, Canadian complicity, and they took president, to exile in, in, in Africa. Now what we are seeing today in the streets of Haiti is a result of that coup. Where 7,000 elected officials were removed from office, uh, and they were replaced by thugs. Thugs that were handpicked by the administration of Bush and then Obama with, uh, Hillary Clinton playing a role at the same time that Bill Clinton was, uh, the special. Representative of the Secretary General of the United Nations in Haiti. You know, you add to that the earthquake that happened in 2010 with a succession of fake elections that were organized. It’s really a number of calamities that be the Haitian population. Insist that the genesis of the current crisis is the 2004 collapse of the Haitian state through foreign intervention. Because in the news media, especially the last few weeks, every time they talk about crisis in Haiti, they time it to have begun after the assassination of the last puppet president of Neal Muis, when in reality all Haitians will tell you. That the wave of kidnappings, of killings, mass exodus of Haitians were happening for the past 11 years, not only after the assassination of Jovenel Moise.

Donnovan What percentage of the country right now is run by gangs? You know, I, I, I’ve, I’ve heard, I’ve seen, I’ve read those, uh, reports, but honestly, that’s not what I’m hearing from people in Haiti. 


Jean Saint-Vil What is really happening is that the capital Port Princes is encircled by gangs. And, and those gangs are in the outskirts of Port France and in areas as close as meters, uh, from the National Palace. The, it’s not really the National Palace, but they’ve created a makeshift thing. Cause the National Palace was never rebuilt, but the gangs are very close to it, and that’s an important point because, The evidence is showing that the gangs and the so-called government, they are working in coordination. You know, for instance, one of the gang leaders, uh, that is better known as barbecue, his name is Jimmy Shier, is a former police officer. You know, there’s an arrest warrant in his name since January, 2020, like three. Over three years. And this guy is in a small area of the capitol, very close to the national palace, very close to the police stations, and he never gets arrested. And that is not a mystery. It’s because the gangs are playing a specific role for the regime. Because one of the odd things about the assassination of Jovenel Moise. You know, uh, assassination took place, yet the same party remain in power, which again, shows that it was an internal thing because there’s not an external group that took power, uh, as a result of the assassination of the president. Likewise, the gangs are being mobilized in order to control. The, voting population so that whenever the United States would, uh, pass the order to have elections in Haiti, it’ll be another fake elections that will guarantee that the oligarchs and the associated, uh, party called PK would maintain the established disorder that we’ve had in Haiti for several decades. 


Donnovan So who is really running the country?

Jean Saint-Vil It’s hard to know who is running Haiti because, well, first of all, the man who is being called the Prime Minister of Haiti is completely illegal. Ri according to, uh, the Haitian constitution should have been named by a president and in he should have, uh, faced the interrogation of Parliament before being rat. None of that happened because the government of, uh, Vinal Moiz and Michelle Marli before him never organized legislative elections. So there is no parliament that is functioning, so he’s illegal. But the reality is Haiti has not been run by Haitians since the coup of 2004. And so there’s this entity called the core. Which is made up of ambassadors of the United States, Canada, Spain, Germany, the representatives of the European Union and United Nations in Haiti, who are actually the ones making all of the strategic decisions, such as they are the ones who issued a tweet, uh, to say that our is the Prime Minister of Haiti. Okay, this is completely illegal. Of course, in any country, that would never be an accepted reality. But like I said, we are living in a situation where Haiti is a country that is under foreign tutelage, but it’s a foreign tutelage where the foreigners assume powers but accept zero accountability. Uh, so that when there is a. You know, they can point to their puppets and say that, okay, see, this is a, a, you know, a mis leadership from the Haitians. Uh, but of course this provides the puppets, uh, opportunity to embezzle funds and enrich themselves, engage in mass corruption, and in return they get protection from their international allies so that they are not facing justice. This is. The worst, uh, uh, scenario that the Haitian people could have imagined because we have, you know, major scandals after the earthquake in 2010. There were announcements of 13 billion that were collected in the name of Haitians were Bill Clinton, who was in charge of managing these funds. Uh, You know, traveling around the world saying that they were going to build back better. And you know, anyone who’s been to Haiti, uh, for the past 12 years can tell you that there’s no evidence amounting to, to billions of dollars having been spent on the Haitian infrastructures or anything like that. So obviously this money was embezzled in coordination with foreign backed dictatorship. First by Michelle, led by Michelle Mar Deiz, and now a and uh, the Haitian populations thus far has not had any opportunity to bring those criminals to justice because they are protected by powerful allies in the United States, Canada, and Europe.

Donnovan So what role is Canada currently playing in? Haiti and potentially finding solutions? 


Jean Saint-Vil Hmm. Well, Canada is part of the problem, unfortunately. Hmm. Because the coup of 2004 was planned in Canada. There’s the meeting called the Ottawa Initiative on Haiti that took place here, uh, January 31st. February 1st, 2003 at Mitch Lake. That’s where the decisions were made. We know that because it was published in Ity, which is a Quebec paper, uh, Michelle Vasel, who penned that article titled it Haiti, put on the UN Tutelage, and he specified that it wasn’t the Haitian opposition, but uh, foreign ministers at the invitation of Canada that made the determination that the president of. Haiti had to be overthrown and Haiti put under UN. Now, one year later, the coup took place and in fact, the government of Haiti was overthrown. Now, Canada, of course, like I mentioned, is a member of the core group, uh, these ambassadors who make all of the key decisions in Haiti. And as we speak, uh, our Prime Minister, uh, Justin Trudeau is in the Caribbean, in The Bahamas, meeting with leaders of, uh, curriculum of the Caribbean, uh, community, uh, to try to assemble a, a military force to invade Haiti, something that is completely illegal and unnecessary as well, because they’re presenting the situation of, uh, the gangs that. Completely funded by the oligarchs that are known, identified in Haiti. Some of them have been sanctioned by Canada, so that means they know who these individuals are, but then no one is calling for their arrest. Okay, except for people from Haitian Civil Society, and of course the so-called Haitian government is not going to arrest them because, uh, there is collusion, direct collusion between that party and those oligarchs, who were identified by the Canadian government. Okay, so they’re not arresting these folks. Instead they’re talking about, uh, coming with, uh, an international force and the global population, uh, listening to this are assuming that this force will be there to protect the Haitian population. But, you know, history teaches us that those, uh, foreign interventions only have one goal, that is to protect the interest of the local oligarchs and their foreign allies, and the Haitian population usually is a victim. Of those boots that are coming, uh, from outside, just like they did in 2004. They collapsed. The Haitian government and the UN forces that were there engaged in massacres in the, uh, popular neighborhoods, killing thousands of Haitians with cholera, contagion, et cetera, rates and all kinds of things happen to the population. That’s why Haitians oppose the foreign interference and say that, you know, it’s not that complicated. All of these weapons that are coming, uh, to the gangs are coming from the United States. It’s been studied and, uh, and, and confirmed to be. So therefore, you could simply stop the gangs by not letting them, uh, receive ammunition from the United States and within months, perhaps even one month, the population in coordination with them, would stop, uh, the activity of these gangs. But because what’s at stake here is that the 15 White Mafia families in Haiti who are financing the gangs, their reign is challenged by the 99% black population of Haiti. Haiti is in a situation right now that is very similar to South Africa during apartheid, except that this is rarely spoken about in mainstream media because there’s collusion again between elites in the United States, Canada and Europe, and those white mafia families in Haiti who control the economy of the country using blackface puppets in the fake government that they put in. And in the most recent press release from the US government, it’s indicated that the murder of Jovenel Moise, who was put in place by uh, those 15 white mafia families in Haiti, uh, is very likely to have been killed by them.

Donnovan Uh, who hired those mercenaries from Colombia? So Canada’s UN ambassador is Bob Ray. What has he, if anything, had to say on this matter?

Jean Saint-Vil Bob Ray was sent on a fact-finding mission, uh, to Haiti, and when he came back he said that, You know, we are not interested in making the mistakes of the past, but he never specified what mistakes they were. And we can only speculate that, you know, the Ottawa initiative on Haiti, uh, the coup of 2004 would’ve been part of those mistakes. 


Jean Saint-Vil But what is most disturbing is that during those same interviews that he gave upon his return, Barbara, uh, mentioned that he’s in support of a reation of the deft for it. Fa it is is a so-called, uh, uh, military that. You know, carries the name of being a Haitian military. But you know, Haitians say we don’t understand this military that we had, which never shut at foreigners, but only, uh, against Haitians. And so really this is very disturbing because it confirms that there is an interest in keeping the established disorder that is to the oligarchs of Haiti with an arm, a repressive force. Okay. Uh, that protects their interest. What this means is that, you know, whenever the Haitian population manages to, uh, take over, Uh, the electoral process and participate in free and fair elections and choose a leader who inevitably is going to be investing in healthcare, in education, in basic infrastructure, in the needs of the general population, as opposed to, you know, offering the oligarchs more opportunities to, uh, The impoverished population in sweatshops and in all kinds of unproductive activities. Well, what they will do is mobilize that arm forces to conduct a coup. Which is what they’ve been doing, uh, throughout, uh, Haiti’s history since the US invasion of 1915. Okay? And so that’s why, uh, Bob Ray’s statement in support of, uh, that repressive force the Forza made it, is really, really disturbing. Uh, what Haitian need right now is not, you know, more tanks, more guns, uh, you know, we don’t produce guns. So of course, the people who are selling guns have an interest in having armies all over the world. But the people who have difficulty finding freshwater, where a number of, uh, Haitians have to send their kids abroad, uh, to finish their studies, uh, you know, Our priorities is building an education, uh, infrastructure, uh, building hospitals. It’s not in, uh, you know, creating an army that’s going to fight the Haitian population.

Donnovan What do the Haitian people living through this want to see happen? And is there a way of reparations? What would that look?

Jean Saint-Vil Well, I mean, we’ve been advocating this for the longest time, and it, of course, I always say that Haiti is a microcosm, uh, of the world. Okay? You know, this, all of these discussions about the 1% versus the 99%, I mean, you see that again in Haiti at at a smaller scale. So reparations is a global. Okay. Uh, we are living in era of white terrorism. Okay. Since the arrival of Costo Columbus, uh, in these parts in 1492, what we have been witnessing is native populations, uh, being, uh, disposed of their lands genocide. So people tend to talk about, you know, rich countries and poor countries, countries are not rich or poor. Individuals, uh, are in situations of abject poverty or, you know, in excess of riches, uh, beyond measure like billionaires and, and , and you have billionaires In Haiti, it so happens that the billionaire in Haiti is white, and it’s not a coincidence either. So white terrorism can only be addressed through repair. That was the object of the Durban Conference in South Africa in 2001. You know, just days before the nine 11 events in New York, the world was convened to have a serious discussion on how can we seriously not lip service, you know, providing, speeches we’re talking about seriously putting resources on the table so that the people of the Congo who are living in, you know, one of the richest territories on the planet, uh, do not have to suffer poverty. The people of Guatemala can have access to their gold. The people of, uh, Bolivia can have access to their lithium, and the only way that can happen is if we do a paradigm shift. So that nations such as the nations of Europe, uh, and North America no longer, uh, see themselves as people who can only thrive on the sweat and blood of the darker people of the world. Uh, and that requires reparations. That means you repair. Some of the damages that were caused to, uh, uh, these nations. Now in the case of Haiti, it takes a, a more drastic form because the president who was deposed by the intervention of the white cousins, the French, the Americans in the Canadians in 2004 had issued. Uh, not only a demand for reparations, uh, for Haiti, uh, but also of restitution because after the liberation of Haiti, uh, by the revolted Africans, instead of the French paying reparations to the human beings that they had enslaved for over 300 years, it was the Haitian population that was ransomed okay, at gunpoint. For over hundred years to pay reparations to the French. The New York Times, uh, issued an article last May. Their estimation was that it’s the equivalent of 115. Billion dollars now back in 2000 and, uh, three, president estimated it at, uh, 22, uh, billion dollars. And the French, instead of, uh, you know, negotiating how they’re going to make this happen conspired to kidnap the president and conduct a CO in Haiti. So that means we are nowhere near, uh, the advanced thinking that world leaders would need to. Adopt in order to embrace the cause, uh, for reparation.

Donnovan Is there a role that Canada can play here without making things worse for the people of Haiti? And if so, what would that look like?

Jean Saint-Vil There is nothing fundamentally that will change in Haiti unless the powers of those 15 white mafia families in Haiti. Um, are diminished. These men and women have private ports where they can import war grade weapons, and like I said, every time there’s going to be a progressive government in Haiti that is going to threaten their hegemony, they’re going to finance a coup. To me, that’s the fundamental thing. They need to lose their power. Most of them are not. Uh, they have all kinds of other nationalities and they don’t even personally live in Haiti. They just have their businesses in Haiti. Therefore, there’s not gonna be great laws to dispose us their people these people of their power. So a very practical thing that Canada can do because they did the investigation and that’s how they ended up putting on the list of people who are section, uh, Abela, BJO, d boa, but they are keeping the information secret. 


Donnovan As to what is the evidence they have against these people in terms of connecting them with the criminal kidnapping gangs?

Jean Saint-Vil Well, this is not very helpful. These powerful oligarchs need to be arrested, tried, and if some of them are innocent while then they would be proven innocent. If they are found guilty, the punishment is not only prison, but they need to be dispossess. Of the millions and perhaps billions of dollars that they have si out of an impoverished population. Some of it hidden in fiscal paradise accounts like we saw with the Panama Papers and and Pandora papers and that money. Need to be remobilize into the Haitian national budget so that people can build universities and, and hospitals infrastructure for the, for the population. So this is a very practical thing, and Canada has access to that information and that information needs to be released so that this criminals can be prosecuted. But all of these sanctions, like I said, are all theoretical because nobody has seen, uh, any evidence of those sections. Well, there’s one of these senators called . He’s one of the black senators. There’s all kinds of other things that the Canadian government could focus on instead, and I’ve, uh, said it several times, uh, in the past. That is, you know, instead, having this folly of, you know, sending Canadian soldiers to Haiti and, you know, and also in other parts of the world. I really think that we’re missing an opportunity here to do science diplomacy. Okay. Uh, to mobilize. Uh, the universities that we have here, uh, so that we can help, you know, countries build their educational infrastructures so that, you know, in Haiti, uh, where there is gold, there’s plenty of gold on the island. Cause the gold that Christopher Columbus was stealing was surface gold. And so, you know, there’s plenty of gold. Instead of focusing on, you know, organizing a coup so you can have a friendly, corrupt government in Haiti that is going to facilitate Canadian mining companies. Let’s abandon this approach. That’s the old colonial approach. Instead, why not collaborate? With universities in the Caribbean and, and in Latin America, uh, so that Canada can of course have its mining companies participate in bids and, and stuff like that. But the people of, of, of Bolivia, uh, should be able to access their lithium. And, and, and Canada should pay the fair price, uh, so that the, the people of Bolivia can benefit from the lithium. The people of Haiti can benefit from their gold. The people of Dominican Republic can benefit from their gold. You know, fair treating Haiti with fairness is what we’re talking about. You know, so many other countries and people around the world have benefited, uh, and enjoyed what Haiti has given to the world. It’s food, it’s music, it’s culture, uh, it’s people. And so certainly we, we’d love to see, uh, the rest of the world have a fair relationship with Haiti, including Canada.

Donnovan Thank you so much for breaking down the history and the present day Jeanl. Uh, it’s really important and much needed.

Jean Saint-Vil Thank you very much Donovan, and thanks for covering this story. 


Donnovan And that was Jean St. Viti radio host and member of Solidarity Tech Quebec, Haiti. That was a big story. For more head to the big story podcast.ca, find us on Twitter at the big storyFPN. Email us at hello big story podcast.ca, and you can also call us and leave us a voicemail at 4 1 6 9 3 5 5 9 3 5. We’re available in every single podcast player and on every smart speaker. All you have to do is just ask your speaker to play the Big Story podcast. Thanks for listening. I’m Donovan Bennett sitting in for J hr. We’ll talk tomorrow.