The Past and Immediate History Escape Us

The prestigious Jesuit Georgetown University in Washington D.C., one of the oldest in the United States, founded in 1789, promised on Thursday official apologies for the sale of 272 slaves for profit in 1838 and proposed to facilitate admission for their descendants.

In practice, the compensation could take the form of positive discrimination, which means that the descendants would be given the “same consideration we give members of the Georgetown community,” stated the university.

The majority of private, American universities effectively favor the admission of candidates whose parents graduated from the same institution, the Agence France Presse notes in a dispatch. The sale of slaves – of which a portion of the proceeds, which would equal around $3.3 million today, was used to pay down the establishment’s debts – enriched this university, as well as other American universities such as Brown, Columbia or Harvard, which have already publicly acknowledged having participated in the slave trade.

Everywhere in the United States, historical works allow institutions and companies to rediscover their past and fix the damages caused to many minorities in different areas. That has happened without compulsion from the American government, but under pressure from groups organized by American society.

In Haiti, works of historical research are not encouraged. We even cultivate total ignorance of the past in the increasingly important layers of our elites, such that the educational system in which the students swim is fragmented.

Immediate history escapes us as well. Two big friends of Haiti, Venezuela and Brazil, are acquainted with serious political jolts. Who followed the massive demonstration organized by the opponents to President Nicolas Maduro in Caracas last Thursday? A million people were in the streets. The Venezuelan opposition called for two more days of mobilization to demand a referendum against President Nicolas Maduro.

Who followed the vagaries of Dilma Rousseff in Brazil? After a long impeachment trial, she was booted from power. This Thursday, the former Brazilian president counterattacked and appealed to the Supreme Court for a new trial.

In Gabon, President Ali Bongo, newly re-elected in a presidential election whose results are being contested, condemned the post-election violence that has led to three deaths. Unlike our last elections which were not completed and in which our presidents cannot run for immediate re-election, there are lessons for Haiti to take from the Gabonese experience.

The past and the present are escaping us. But even so, we hope to get past our problems. It is not astonishing that we are perpetually turning in circles, busy trying to catch our shadows.