Haiti, where the escaped Doctor Hannibal Lecter arrived almost certainly to eat black meat, is the land of wonderful realism, very well described by the Cuban writer Alejo Carpentier in his novel “The Realm of this World.”
Haiti, which gave a lesson to all of America on how to start a revolution, fight against colonialism and follow the route of Spartacus in the liberation of slaves, is today – as yesterday – a destroyed nation.
Natural phenomena are not the only entities that have shown no mercy against the most vulnerable and defenseless country of this hemisphere. After the times of the black king Henri Christophe (thousands of slaves constructed him the Palace of Sans-Souci), Haiti was very close to the devil. It’s not that, as a preacher of the island said in a loud voice, the Haitians have made a pact with the demon, as the great Italian violinist Niccolo Pagani did, but rather that the devil has passed them like the Mexicans in the 19th century, making them very far from God but very close to the United States.
The political and economic ruin of Haiti, a mystery for many, has been imposed for many years. The devastation of the earthquake caused a destroyed and devastated land – the object of all the humiliations and plundering of the United States. In Haiti, the U.S. has placed and removed numerous tyrants and pocket presidents, according to their interests and strategic motivations.
As most people know, Washington has been opposed since before the terrible times of Papa Doc to the construction of a stable and sustainable economy in Haiti. One of the effects of the white interventions in the internal points of Haiti has been, for example, the displacement of thousands of country people, causing what, for many years, has been known as the misery towns – almost all in Port-au-Prince.
Haiti, which has been said to be the first to promote the freedom of slaves, is a nation run on slave-work imposed by the native elites and foreign investors. The country does not have civil, financial or productive infrastructure that permits the people to gain access to decent work or have their basic needs fulfilled. What is more, it seems that the neo-colonist movement will prolong Haitians’ bad state of living, famines and diseases included.
It is necessary to remember that after the Haitian revolution (that which Bolivar also fueled), the United States went more than 60 years without recognizing the new country. What is worse, the U.S. invaded in 1915 to begin a long trend of interventions and domination. In between their tactics – well known in other territories – they brought blood-thirsty dictators to power in Haiti to look after the properties of foreigners.
Haiti, which was defeated by Napoleon and his empire, is a land of wonders, voodoo and popular painters, and has lived in the mouth of the wolf. Additionally, one of the most recent wolves (and a most memorable one) was Bush, who internationally blocked the Haitians and put the government of Jean-Bertrand Aristide in check, Aristide being the first leader elected by popular vote in all of the tragic history of Haiti. One of the intentions of Aristide, in order to improve the situation of his compatriots, was to increase the minimum wage.
Aristides proposed measurement triggered the fury of trans-nationals and the local soldiers, who were accustomed to having access to cheap work. We already know what happened: Aristide was expelled from his country by the terrorists favored by the United States and their supporters were massacred. Washington continued to occupy Haiti as they kept plunging misery and repression into the country.
Haiti, your lament continues. You are a destroyed land. Not only by nature, but also by the authentic, postmodern devil – North American imperialism.
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