On Wednesday demonstrators across much of Haiti marched on and ransacked buildings associated with the ruling INITE party and the national government. The protests come after preliminary election results were released by the country’s provisional electoral council (CEP) late Tuesday night. The AP notes that such acts included the burning of INITE’s party headquarters in the capital of Port-au-Prince, as well as the tearing down of INITE campaign billboards. In other Haitian cities, including Les Cayes and Cap Haiten, there were reports of government buildings being sacked and burned. The Miami Herald reports that demonstrators had set up camp at a gas station near the private residence of President Rene Preval, apparently blocking the only road to and from his home. Protestors also clashed with UN peacekeeping forces while flights into the capital’s international airport were cancelled Wednesday and today as barricades throughout the city have prevented airport employees from reaching work.
Thus far the protests seem to be a demonstration of two interlocking sentiments. Most clearly, they have been a direct and targeted repudiation of the current government of Mr. Preval, whose already fledgling popular support has crumbled in the months following last January’s devastating earthquake. After foreign diplomats were prevented, by protestors, from reaching Preval’s residence, the Haitian president made a set of rare public radio statements Wednesday, his first since Nov. 28. In those remarks, Preval said he acknowledged there as “certainly” fraud during the Nov. 28 vote. But nevertheless, he quickly dismissed recent criticisms from the US Embassy, issued after the CEP spoke on Tuesday, and demanded demonstrators to protest without violence. Preval:
“It's your right to protest, but protest in peace. If we can't put trust in an institution that is independent, and credible...the country will have problems.”
On the other hand, most of those demonstrating seem quite clear in who they are backing. That person is pop singer-turned-presidential contender, Michel “Sweet Mickey” Martelly – an individual who another presidential candidate called a “surprise phenomenon” Wednesday, and a man who has become the embodiment of anti-Preval/anti-Celestin sentiment. Martelly placed third in Nov. 28 elections, according to the CEP’s questionable vote tabulations, and there were a variety of reports Wednesday that the best way to get around the capital is by carrying a pink campaign poster featuring Sweet Mickey’s smiling face on the front. After staying quiet most of the day, Martelly spoke to his supporters late Tuesday, calling for protests to continue peacefully. Martelly:
“Demonstrating without violence is the right of the people. I will be with you until the bald-head victory,” (a reference to his now famous bald head).
Mr. Martelly added Wednesday that he plans to challenge the CEP’s vote count through available legal channels. Candidates have three days to issue their appeals. Meanwhile, the woman who currently sits in first place, Mirlande Manigat, also issued a few brief statements Wednesday. According to the Wall Street Journal, she too feels “victimized” by the vote tally and would support an official recount.
Thus far, Haitian radio has reported four individuals killed in protests – all outside of the Haitian capital. Good photo slideshows of Tuesday night and Wednesday demonstrations from the BBC, the AP, and the New York Times.
To other stories:
· More intriguing details from Wikileaks cables on El Salvador published by Spain’s El País and others. The documents include five cables written by Robert Blau, the top US official in the El Salvador Embassy before the arrival of new ambassador, Mari Carmen Aponte. As mentioned yesterday, they highlight, in great detail, significant tensions between President Mauricio Funes and sectors of the FMLN who seek a less “pro-Washington” and more “Bolivarian” agenda. Interesting commentary on those cables at Tim’s El Salvador blog. New this morning, it seems, is a sixth cable which El Faro writes on. The document, also from Mr. Blau, offers US Embassy analysis about the “good,” “bad,” and “ugly” of the Funes administration, and, interestingly says the following about Mauricio Funes’s moves following the Honduras coup of June 2009. From the cable:
“In the hours after President Zelaya's expulsion to Costa Rica, both [foreign minister Hugo] Martinez and Funes reached out to the Embassy and to Washington to coordinate what has been a reasonable, responsible approach to the crisis on their northern border.”
As El Faro notes, Funes would later become the most vocal of Central American countries, arguing in favor of Honduras’s return to international and regional organizations, and in line with US policy.
· In a press release from Senator Richard Lugar (R-IN), the official announcement of a bipartisan bill, sponsored by the Senator and Robert Menendez (D-NJ), to create an independent Western Hemisphere Drug Commission. Its objective, according to the release: “to evaluate current efforts and combat drug trade in a comprehensive manner that looks at both supply and demand of narcotics.” The full press release is worth looking at, although some may be disappointed with Lugar’s own statements which focus almost exclusively on bolstering US military and intelligence efforts against cartels in “Mexico…Central America, Venezuela, and throughout the region.”
· On this same topic, at Foreign Policy, the editor and publisher of El Diario de Juarez, Osvaldo Rodríguez Borunda, writes an open letter to the US government, demanding drug policy reforms. This too is a piece which should be read in full, connecting in convincing ways, the rise of drug cartels with issues the false hope of the maquiladora industry and issues of migration. Rodríguez Borunda’s powerful statement on what the US should not do:
“Some North American journalists are of the opinion that if the U.S. Army were to intervene in México, the drug cartels could be stopped. Nothing could be further from the truth. If the U.S. military were to directly interfere in our national territory, it would give organized crime organizations the tools they need to convert their members into guerrillas. Criminals would be converted into soldiers, while their leaders could appeal to nationalism and to the historic yoke that the United States has held over México. This type of solution would be the most dangerous possible because our country would be totally devastated. It is not because of a false sense of nationalism that we are opposed to this alternative; rather, we simply do not believe that it would work.
No. The solution must come from México and from its society -- though it's clear that the U.S. government should participate, because the problem has two sides.”
I read his somewhat indirect alternative as comprehensive drug reform in the US. Again, El Diario’s Rodríguez Borunda:
“As long as the United States refuses to recognize that the majority of the problems can be found there, as can most of the solutions, it is highly doubtful that the scenario we now face in Mexico will change.”
· More on Mexico, from the Washington Post, which looks at the “breakdown” in the country’s justice system which has opened the door for instances of so-called “vigilante justice” against the perpetrators of violence. From the Wall Street Journal, a report on how Servando “La Tuta” Gomez, one of Mexico’s most wanted drug kingpins and a leader of La Familia, has been receiving a salary from the Mexican public school system for the last 15 years.
· Democracy Now examines climate justice protests, led by Via Campesina, during the UN’s Cancun summit this week while the Washington Post looks at behind-the-scenes deal making apparently on-going at the international meetings.
· A piece from the CS Monitor suggests Chile, Paraguay, and Peru will soon be following Argentina, Uruguay, and Brazil in recognizing a “free and independent” Palestine – a quite interesting development in Latin America’s alternative experiment with international diplomacy. Also, from Foreign Policy, Colum Lynch on how Dilma Rousseff may take a more assertive line on human rights issues upon assuming office in Brazil’s president while largely retaining other aspects of Lula da Silva’s foreign policy agenda.
· If upcoming changes on the House Foreign Affairs Committee are any indication, the US’s position on international diplomatic matters is about to take a decidedly different direction. Again, from Foreign Policy, news that incoming chairwoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen has proclaimed her mission to be the slashing of State Dept and foreign aid budgets. She also intends to advocate that the US use international organizations as a forum for “advocating stronger action against ‘rogue states.’”
· Worries about possible crackdowns on internet freedoms in Venezuela as national telecom regular, Conatel, urges that a law governing TV and radio broadcasts be expanded to the web as well. More from the Knight Center.
· And, finally, new approval ratings this week in Colombia, which show approval of President Juan Manuel Santos soaring to an amazing 90%. According to El Tiempo, “no head of state in recent history has achieved such support” – that includes the controversial yet very popular Alvaro Uribe.
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