Détails

Catégorie : What's up Little Haiti

Création : 9 septembre 2020

 Debate schedule for the 2020 presidential election released

By Lia Eustachewich

The schedule is set for the 2020 presidential and vice presidential debates — with the candidates squaring off later this September into October.

President Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden will meet on the stage for the first of three debates on Sept. 29 in Cleveland, Ohio, while their running mates, Vice President Mike Pence and California Sen. Kamala Harris, will face off on Oct. 7 in Salt Lake City, Utah, the Commission on Presidential Debates announced Wednesday.

Enlarge ImageError! Filename not specified.Donald Trump and Joe BidenAP; Reuters

All four debates will run for 90 minutes, from 9 p.m. ET until 10:30 p.m. ET.

Ticketing will be extremely limited for all four events.

Here’s a more detailed look at the debates ahead:

Sept. 29

First presidential debate will be held at Case Western Reserve University and Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland, Ohio. Fox News anchor Chris Wallace will moderate.

Oct. 7

The vice presidential debate will be held at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, Utah. USA Today’s Washington bureau chief Susan Page will moderate.

Oct. 15

Second presidential debate will be held at the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts in Miami, Florida. Steve Scully, senior executive producer and political editor of C-SPAN Networks, will moderate.

Oct. 22

The third presidential debate will be held at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee. Kristen Welker, co-anchor of “Weekend Today” and NBC News’ White House correspondent, will moderate.

Ghana Minister Invites African-Americans to Re-settle in Africa If They Feel Unwanted in the U.S.

BY BRENDAN COLE ON 6/10/20 AT 9:26 AM EDT

The debate about race following the killing of George Floyd has reverberated across the Atlantic Ocean, spurring the tourism minister of Ghana to appeal to its diaspora, including in the U.S., to "leave where you are not wanted," and return home.

A ceremony marking the death of Floyd was held at the W. E. B. Du Bois Memorial Centre for Pan-African Culture in the capital Accra during which Barbara Oteng Gyasi made the plea that her country is open to those fleeing racial tensions.

"We gather in solidarity with brothers and sisters to change the status quo. Racism must end. We pray and hope that George Floyd's death will not be in vain but will bring an end to prejudice and racial discrimination across the world," Oteng Gyasi said, according to Ghana Web.

"We continue to open our arms and invite all our brothers and sisters home. Ghana is your home. Africa is your home. We have our arms wide open ready to welcome you home.

News week

COVID: School has reopened in Haiti. But students, teachers are protesting on the streets

BY JACQUELINE CHARLES

Two weeks after schools were ordered reopened in Haiti, classrooms around the country remain empty because teachers are refusing to come to work over back pay and poor working conditions amid the global COVID-19 pandemic.

It is unclear how many schools are in essence closed, but since schools officially resumed on Aug. 10 — with national exams first and classes starting a week later — sporadic protests by teachers and students alike have erupted in several cities including Gonaives, St. Marc and most recently Jacmel.

While teachers have taken to the streets with their demands, students have done the same to demand that teachers return to the classroom. Some public-school students have gone as far as attacking fellow students at private institutions that are in session, to let out their frustrations.

On Tuesday, a clash in the southeastern town of Jacmel between police and a student protester, Joanès Dory, left human rights observers and a former minister of education horrified.

Two members of the Haiti National Police’s specialized Departmental Unit of Maintenance of Order, or UDMO, were videotaped punching Dory while dragging him down Avenue Baranquilla in the Saint-Cyr zone of Jacmel. Dory, who attends Lycée Pinchinat in Jacmel, was subsequently arrested and taken to the nearby police station.

“What happened this morning is totally unacceptable,” said Nesmy Manigat, who served as minister of education and professional training from April 2014 to April 2016. “In no country does this make any sense where you have police reacting like this when students are in the streets.”

A spokesman for the Haiti National Police did not return a call. Neither Haiti’s Minister of Education, Pierre Josué Agénor Cadet, nor a spokesman for the ministry responded to a text and email from the Miami Herald seeking comment.

The situation, says Manigat, is beyond the issue of teacher pay or closed classrooms. COVID-19, which temporarily shuttered schools, has only added to the inequality gap.

Even before the coronavirus pandemic forced the temporary closure of schools, education was already facing challenges. Parents spend about 80 percent of their income for schooling that is often lackluster, and mostly privatized with little government oversight. With education receiving about 11 percent of the national budget, the ministry struggles to not just give children a basic education but pay teachers on time and provide a bare minimum in terms of classrooms.

During the pandemic’s shutdown, children, who had already missed months of schooling last year due to violent anti-government protests, continued to fall behind because many lacked the technology or electricity or both for virtual learning. Students at wealthier schools were able to complete their studies and will return to classes on Sept. 7.

The reopening of most public and some private schools in early August was received with mixed reactions. Union leaders harshly criticized the decision, saying the government has not put in place the proper sanitary measures to help schools minimize transmission of the coronavirus, which continues to spread in the country.

“Some schools do not even have water,” said Magalie Georges, a career teacher and secretary general of the National Confederation of Educators of Haiti (CNEH). “They closed the schools in March when there were only two cases of COVID-19. Now they are opening it when there are thousands of cases. The health and security of the professors and students are in danger.”

Some Haitians abroad have tried to help. Fleur De Vie, a nonprofit education charity based in New York, recently contributed 5,000 masks for schoolchildren in 14 communities around the country. But the needs are much greater.

Détails

Catégorie : What's up Little Haiti

Création : 2 septembre 2020

 The Troubling Similarities Between Presidents Trump and Moise

Valerie Jean Charles

This post is also available in: Kreyol

Here, we find two administrations who behave strikingly similar: they perform the ruse of wanting democracy while working tirelessly to undermine it. 

“I become irritated at the attempt to govern mankind by force and fraud, as if they were knaves and fools.” 

More than two hundred years ago, political theorist and philosopher Thomas Paine wrote these words to express his frustrations when a fellow thinker tried to undermine the importance of revolutions. Now, it may be my Jesuit education or flair for the dramatic, but I find myself relating to his exasperation more and more these days.  

2020 is unlike any year we’ve ever experienced, and this summer alone has illustrated to us how desperately authoritarianism is hoping to cling to power, especially in Haiti and the United States. 

Last week, United States Secretary of State Mike Pompeo addressed the delicate matter of legislative elections in Haiti in a hallway with Haitian president Jovenel Moise during the inauguration of Dominican Republic President Luis Abinader. 

While some took the locale of the meeting as a “diss,” believing it showed that Haiti was a mere “afterthought” to the U.S. government, I believe we should take it for what it is — a sham of democracy being flouted in the face of Haitian activists who have long critiqued Moise for ruling by decree after failing to renew parliament. It is also rather ironic that Pompeo would be the one to stress how “critical” it is for Haiti to hold these delayed legislative elections when the very administration he represents has published over 40 executive orders this year alone and is actively working to suppress voter turnout for America’s November races. 

Here, we find two administrations who behave strikingly similar: they perform the ruse of wanting democracy while working tirelessly to undermine it. 

From the moment Donald Trump became president, political scientists, scholars and historians have been interested yet fearful of how Trump’s strongman tendencies would inspire other heads of state, especially those in democratizing nations. In fact, a week after Trump’s 2016 win, reporters Jason Burke and Ruth McClean wrote: “Trump’s victory may allow more autocratic African rulers freedom to tweak constitutions to retain power, harass dissidents, shut down media organisations or, in some cases, simply make more money.” 

Truth be told, it’s actually not rare for Black nations to experience this. In a November 2017 op-ed for the Guardian, Chigozie Obioma wrote, “African nations have a total dependency on foreign political philosophies and ideas, and their shifts and movements. It is the feeblest position a state can be in, because it is a position of chronic subservience. It also means that whatever becomes normalised in the west will eventually be adopted, in, say, Uganda or Togo.” 

This sentiment can apply to Haiti and her current government. 

Since their respective appointments to power, both Trump and Moise have ruled in similar fashions, showing a lack of regard for the rule of law, staying mum on insensible acts of violence and exhibiting no desire to practice accountable leadership. Perhaps, Moise — who enjoys the support of the U.S. —  takes his cues from Trump and aims to replicate the American bully’s destructive behaviors within his own borders. 

In May and June, all 50 states in America erupted in protests after Minneapolis police killed George Floyd. Facing economic and racial inequality, Americans from all walks of life poured into the streets demanding change. Trump’s response? A call for law and order which emboldened local and federal officers to attack protestors with wooden and rubber bullets, fists, batons and tear gas. 

A similar scene played out in Haiti during the same time. Growing anger and fear over mounting gang violence, economic insecurity and lack of government transparency pushed several local activists to demand change in front of the Ministry of Justice. Just as in the U.S., police attacked the activists with tear gas and other intimidation tactics.  

And that’s not all. 

Going back to the matter of elections and peaceful transfers of power, both Moise and Trump have let it be known they’d rather cosplay as absolute monarchs than be democratic presidents. In a July 2020 interview with FOX News’ Chris Wallace, Trump refused to comment on whether he’d agree with the results of the upcoming bid for the White House. He even bluntly stated: “No, I’m not going to say yes. I’m not going to say no, and I didn’t last time either.” 

That same week, Moise dropped a warning of his own. At an event billed as a community dialogue, the Haitian president announced that no one could strip power from him and his political party. He took a step further than Trump and proclaimed matter-of-factly that no one in the country holds more authority than him. 

On paper, Haiti should not be sitting in this boat with the United States as a buddy, sailing towards the shores of authoritarianism. As the two oldest republics in the western hemisphere, the two nations have represented two entirely different ideologies: one standing for white supremacy and violent conquest and the other illustrating the possibilities and hopes of Black liberation. But now, they find themselves partners for all the wrong reasons, with leaders appearing determined to flex their muscles, sparing no one in their respective quests to do so. I suppose with a U.S. president so hellbent on protecting and promoting expansion of executive powers, racism, homophobia, citizen militias, etc. it is no surprise that another wannabe strongman in the South would use this moment in history to do the same. 

Living in these unprecedented times, it feels as if the beast that birthed white supremacy, patriarchy, cronyism and a multitude of other sins is taking its last breath, so to speak, attempting to take down every person it can in its last moments. 

Simply put, how we continue to respond to these twin bullies will determine not just our lifetimes but the futures of our nations and which boats they sit in for generations to come. Haitian and American activists are showing the world what it means to believe in the creation of new worlds, just as their forefathers and foremothers did centuries ago. Not only are these activists imagining new worlds, they are pushing to birth them into the present while killing the desire to await change in some unseeable moment in the future. And it is our duty to stand with them, support them, motivate them, join in arms in them and find ways to evangelize to others to swell our numbers.

While I don’t know how all this will play out, Thomas Paine once more rings as the voice of reason with this quote: “Government…[has] no other object than the general happiness. When instead of this, it operates to create and increase wretchedness in any parts of the society, it is on a wrong system, and reformation is necessary.” 

Valerie Jean Charles

Valerie Jean-Charles is a Communications Strategist living in Washington, D.C. She is also an editor at Woy Magazine.

“We Returned to Haiti with A Master’s Degree and Ready To Give Back”

Haitian women scholars are helping reverse brain drain to support Haiti’s journey to self-reliance

U.S. Agency for International Development

The future looks promising for 20 U.S. college-educated Haitian scholars who recently earned master’s degrees from the University of Florida and Louisiana State University and have returned to Haiti ready to give back to their country.

Their graduate studies focused on nearly every field of agricultural sciences including horticulture, biological engineering, and entomology. An additional five students are enrolled at the University of Florida and are on track to graduate in December 2020.

With support from the U.S. Government’s global hunger and food security initiative, Feed the Future, implemented by USAID, these scholars are going against the tide.

Today, Haiti ranks at the top of the list of countries with the highest number of educated citizens living abroad. But by returning home, collectively the students represent one of the largest cohorts of Haitian agricultural professionals from U.S. universities.

With the knowledge gained during their tenure at the University of Florida and Louisiana State University, these agricultural experts are seeking to fill the gaps by improving the fertility of degraded soils, developing higher-yielding varieties of crops, managing crop-destroying pests and plant diseases, and developing agricultural policies to help address major food production challenges in Haiti.

Recognizing the critical role women play in the agricultural system, 13 of the 25 graduates are women and they are all working to support Haiti’s journey to self-reliance. One such graduate is Marie Darline Dorval.

Marie Darline began work in the fall of 2019 as a research assistant, shortly after she returned with a master’s degree in horticulture from the University of Florida’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences.

“It’s important work,” she says of her responsibilities at the research laboratory on innovation, biotechnology, and sustainable agriculture, associated with Quisqueya University’s College of Agriculture in Port-au-Prince, the capital city.

Ten of the program’s 20 graduates have already been hired on an array of agricultural-related projects: one graduate helps to manage a portfolio of agricultural, food security, and environmental programs for the Swiss Embassy in Haiti. Others work as researchers and educators to train women farmers, improve soil fertility, and test higher-yielding beans.

Jobs are hard to come by in Haiti, a country that historically suffers from high unemployment and a stagnant economy. The job market is now even more challenging because of heightened economic risks amid the coronavirus pandemic and ongoing civil and political strife.

Despite these challenges, skilled researchers like Marie Darline are in high demand and have the support of the Ministry of Agriculture. The current Haitian Minister of Agriculture, Parick Severe, has expressed his commitment to helping these scholars find jobs in the agricultural sector in order to ensure their expertise will be put to good use in the country.

 Marie Darline believes her master’s degree prepared her for life as a professional scientist in what she hopes is a brighter future for Haitian agriculture. Looking to the years ahead, she hopes to use her new skills to start her own genetic-testing firm. “Haiti is a beautiful country,” she added, “and it is up to the Haitians to develop it.”

Haiti Cultural Exchange

Haiti Cultural Exchange is excited to announce that through a competitive process, it has been selected by the New York City Department of Transportation’s Art Program (DOT Art) to participate in their Arterventions program. They have commissioned 2018 Lakou NOU Artist, @madjxo to create a mural in Flatbush. Madjeen’s “Migration” design visualizes the journey of immigrant residents to the neighborhood and the ways in which they carry the legacy of their ancestors. They are thankful to NYC DOT and New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with Council Member Farah N. Louis for their support of this community beautification project.

Détails

Catégorie : What's up Little Haiti

Création : 26 août 2020

 Tropical Storm Marco forms in Caribbean, Tropical Storm Laura shifts south

By Devoun Cetoute August 21, 2020 11:53 PM

Tropical Storm Laura forms and could approach South Florida

Tropical Storm Laura formed in the Atlantic on Aug. 20 and could track toward South Florida by Aug. 24, according to the National Hurricane Center. By NOAA

A disorganized Tropical Storm Laura is forecast to menace Puerto Rico and Hispaniola on Saturday as it continues to track away from Florida. But while the mainland is out of the cone, the Florida Keys could feel tropical storm conditions on Monday.

Meanwhile, newborn Tropical Storm Marco was born late Friday.

Both storms, if they survive their journey through the Caribbean, could threaten the U.S. Gulf Coast next week. Marco could be heading for Texas while Laura could menace Louisiana and Mississippi.

Early Saturday, the Dominican Republic issues a tropical storm warning for the southern coast. And the Bahamas upgrade its watch to a warning for the southeastern chain of islands.

Marco has 40 mph maximum sustained winds with higher gusts and is about 180 miles southeast of Cozumel, Mexico. It’s headed north-northwest at 13 mph.

The latest track shows it approaching the east coast of the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico on Saturday. The center will cross the northeastern part of the Yucatan Saturday night and move over the central Gulf of Mexico toward Sunday and Monday.

The storm is no longer forecast to reach a category 1 hurricane, but could still possibly see strengthening.

“Marco is embedded within an environment that could support a fast rate of strengthening,” forecasters said. “However, recent microwave data does not indicate that the system has developed an inner-core, and only gradual strengthening is likely until it does.”

Marco is moving toward the Yucatan Peninsula and is forecast to get there on Saturday.

NHC Tropical Storm Laura

Tropical Storm Laura formed in the Atlantic Friday morning, and by 11 p.m. was found to be quite disorganized. It is expected to move across much of the Greater Antilles this weekend.

Laura was about 195 miles east-southeast of San Juan, according to the 11 p.m. advisory from the National Hurricane Center. It has 45 mph maximum sustained winds with higher gusts and is traveling west-northwest at 18 mph.

The forecast track for Laura has again shifted farther south, which is now showing mainland Florida not in its path but only a portion of the Florida Keys. This shift south has also put more of Cuba its path.

Forecasters say the center of Laura will move near or over portions of the Leeward Islands Friday night, near or over Puerto Rico Saturday morning and near the northern coast of Hispaniola Saturday night and early Sunday.

Tropical Storm Laura has become quite disorganized and is expected to move across much of the Greater Antilles this weekend as its path has again shifted further south, forecasters say. NHC Monroe County declared a State of Local Emergency and ordered the evacuations of all live-aboard vessels, mobile homes, recreational vehicles, travel trailers, and campers in anticipation of the storm.

Miami city officials advised residents to be prepare for any potential storm impacts over the weekend. While the latest forecast does not show Miami in Laura’s path, the situation can easily change, said Mayor Francis Suarez.

“All preparation measures need to be wrapped up and buttoned up by Sunday evening,” said Suarez during an afternoon press conference.

The mayor said city crews have inspected storm water pump stations, and all are operating, and the city has contracts prepared to distribute ice and water if it becomes necessary.

Watches/Warning for tropical storms Laura, Marco

Tropical Storms Laura and Marco have caused a slew hurricane and tropical storm watches and warnings.

Marco has led to a hurricane watch from Punta Herrero to Cancún, Mexico, and a tropical storm warning from Punta Herrero to Dzilam, Mexico.

The storm is also forecast to produce three to six inches of rain in eastern portions of Quintana Roo and the Yucatan, which may result in flash floods. Northeast Nicaragua and the Cayman Islands are also forecast 1 to 2 inches of rain.

Laura has caused many warnings to be activated in the Caribbean.

A tropical storm warning is in effect for Puerto Rico, Vieques, Culebra, British and U.S. Virgin Islands, Saba and St. Eustatius, St. Maarten, St. Martin and St. Barthelemy, the northern coast of the Dominican Republic from Cabo Engano to the border with Haiti, the northern coast of Haiti from Le Mole St. Nicholas to the border with the Dominican Republic, and the southeastern Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos Islands.

A tropical storm watch is in effect for the central Bahamas.

Laura is expected to produce 3 to 6 inches of rain over Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, the Dominican Republic, the southern Haitian Peninsula and eastern Cuba through Sunday.

It could also produce up to 8 inches of rain along eastern portions and the southern slopes of Puerto Rico, as well as over Haiti, the Dominican Republic and eastern Cuba. This heavy rainfall could lead to flash and urban flooding, as well as an increased potential for mudslides with minor river flooding in Puerto Rico.

The Leeward Islands, the Turks and Caicos and the southeast Bahamas are projected to see 1 to 3 inches of rain with isolated maximum totals of 5 inches.

What about the other wave in the Atlantic?

The third wave is producing disorganized showers and thunderstorms near the Africa coast.

Forecasters said “some slow development is possible during the next couple of days” as it moves across the eastern tropical Atlantic. They gave it a 20% chance of organizing into a tropical cyclone in the next five days.

The next storm name on the list is Nana.

Tropical Storm Laura has become quite disorganized and is expected to move across much of the Greater Antilles this weekend as its path has again shifted further south, forecasters say. NHC

Pompeo Pushes Haiti President on Elections, Rights
By ReutersAug. 16, 2020
The New York Times

(Reuters) - It is "critical" that Haiti hold a delayed vote and strengthen the rule of law and human rights, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told President Jovenel Moise on Sunday at a meeting after more than six months of rule by decree in the Caribbean nation.

Haiti has been without a parliament since January after missing a deadline to hold legislative elections. Moise has yet to set a date for new elections.

"It is critical that Haiti schedule its overdue legislative elections, form an inclusive (electoral council), and strengthen rule of law and support for human rights. These are key elements of the democratic process," Pompeo said in a tweet after the meeting.

Moise also said the conversation had focused on the organization of the election.

"Like me, our American partners believe that elections remains the ideal way for democracy to survive," Moise tweeted.

The two men met at the inauguration of Dominican Republic President Luis Abinader.

On Friday, Acting Secretary for Western Hemisphere Affairs Michael Kozak told reporters that although Washington recognized that there were difficulties in organizing elections in Haiti, the president should move ahead with laying groundwork.

"We're trying to build a little bit of a fire there," Kozak said. "If you're going to have a democracy, that means all three branches of the democracy need to be in place. It can't just be one or two."

(Reporting by Susan Cornwell; Writing by Frank Jack Daniel. Editing by Gerry Doyle)

US ELECTIONS

You don't need the U.S. Postal Service to deliver your mail-in ballot

Many American voters are caught between competing concerns regarding the fall presidential election, as they weigh fears about the public health risks of voting in person against growing alarm about the ability of the U.S. Postal Service to deliver a mail-in ballot on time.

Worries about the Postal Service have mounted in recent days after President Trump said he might oppose funding the agency to stop Americans from voting by mail. And on Friday it was revealed that the Postal Service recently warned 46 states and the District of Columbia that it may not be able to deliver all mail-in ballots on time.

That comes after a few weeks of reports about the recently installed Postmaster General Louis DeJoy — a wealthy Trump donor with potential financial conflicts of interest in the mail industry — making changes to the Postal Service that arealready causing a slowdown in mail delivery.

But there are ways to vote by mail without having to rely on the Postal Service to return your ballot. You could call it a hybrid process of receiving a ballot early through the mail and then returning it in person, before Election Day.

The Postal Service is the only way to receive an absentee or mail-in ballot in most states.

But voters do not have to use the Postal Service to send in their mail-in ballot. In other words, voters have a few options to return those ballots before Election Day without having to stand in line or worry about their vote being delivered too late to count.

One option available in most states is to fill out a mail-in ballot and deliver it to your local election office. Most states organize their local elections by county. But voters can go on their state Board of Elections or secretary of state website and look for a list of local election offices.

A second option is to take your mail-in ballot to an early voting site. There are only five states that as of now don’t have an in-person early voting period this fall, according to a database compiled by the Voting Rights Lab, a group dedicated to increasing voter participation. Those states are Kentucky, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri and South Carolina.

But again, the specific days for early voting vary by state, so the best way to figure out when and where you can vote in person at an early voting site is to go to your state election website.

The added bonus of going to an in-person early voting site is that if you are not a registered voter yet — and you don’t have a ballot yet — in 21 states you can register the same day you vote.

A third option to bypass the U.S. Postal Service is to use a drop box. This is a secure receptacle in which you can deliver your completed mail-in ballot.

Drop boxes are a relatively recent development and were initiated by the states that started conducting their elections entirely by mail over the last 10 to 20 years.

Washington state has tracked drop box usage since the 2012 election. In that year, just over a third of all ballots returned came in through secure drop boxes. In 2016, drop boxes accounted for almost two-thirds of all returned ballots.

There are variations of secure drop boxes, with some available 24 hours a day and seven days a week, monitored by video surveillance. Others are available only during certain hours of the day and monitored by election workers. The U.S. Election Assistance Commission has guidance on drop boxes that recommends one box for every 15,000 to 20,000 registered voters, and to start publicizing the locations of these drop boxes about 80 days ahead of the election.

The presidential election on Nov. 3 is 80 days away as of today.

Some states are on schedule. Michigan, for example, a key swing state that could decide the presidential election, will have over 900 drop boxes available to voters and has a published list of the location of every drop box, which you can see by clicking here. Michigan is one of the five states that do not have in-person early voting, but by requesting a mail-in ballot and then returning it to a drop box, voters have access to a modified form of in-person early voting,starting 45 days before Election Day.  

North Carolina, another swing state, does not have drop boxes. But a spokesman for the state Board of Elections, Patrick Gannon, said, “North Carolina law allows for absentee-by-mail ballots, if not mailed, to be dropped off at the county Board of Elections or at any One-Stop early voting site in the county.”

“Most counties have multiple early voting sites,” Gannon said.

Voters in some states can have another person deliver their mail-in ballot for them. But state laws vary on whether this is allowed and, if it is, it’s often restricted to close relatives or legal guardians. Nineteen states and the District of Columbia allow anyone to return ballots on behalf of voters, according to the Voting Rights Lab. Voters should consult their state election website for specifics on this particular question.

Marc Elias, a Democratic attorney who is overseeing much of the litigation to ensure more access to voting, wrote on his blog on Friday that “community organizations in states that allow ballot collection should consider setting up their own drop boxes now.”

“Local libraries, church groups and civic associations should explore setting up secure ballot drop boxes. There may even be a role for businesses to play in preserving our right to vote through drop box placement and security,” Elias wrote. “While we all prefer that states take on this important role, we cannot let democracy suffer at the hands of state inaction or presidential intimidation.”

Mike Ricci, a spokesman for Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, said this state has 127 drop boxes but is working on getting more.

Arizona, which already conducts about 80 percent of its voting by mail, has drop boxes, but the secretary of state, Katie Hobbs, does not have a statewide list of locations, a spokeswoman said. Voters need to consult their county election office for drop box locations.

But in other swing states, Republicans are taking steps to block drop boxes. In Ohio, for example, Republican Secretary of State Frank LaRose said this weekhe would limit drop boxes to one per county. And in Pennsylvania, President Trump sued election officials in the state on June 29 to, in part, stop them from using drop boxes in the fall election. That litigation is still pending.

Détails

Catégorie : What's up Little Haiti

Création : 18 août 2020

 Entrepreneur, activist Bernard Fils-Aimé dead at 67

Cette adresse e-mail est protégée contre les robots spammeurs. Vous devez activer le JavaScript pour la visualiser. 

August 11, 2020

Bernard Fils-Aimé, 67, was an activist and organizer who was a founding member of the Haitian Refugee Center in Miami before pioneering cellular service in his native Haiti. 

As an entrepreneur, he helped pioneer cellular service in Haiti as the chief executive officer of a mobile phone company where he made corporate giving and responsibility the rule rather than the exception, and gave working Haitians access to technology and the chance to get connected. 

And as a retiree, he used his skills as a former assistant dean of students at Miami Dade College to groom Haiti’s next generation by giving them a shot at a college education as chairman of the board of the Haitian Education & Leadership Program, HELP.

But it is Bernard Fils-Aimé’s role as a militant activist and organizer, which eventually led him to become a founding member of one of the most powerful Haitian rights organizations in the United States, the Haitian Refugee Center in Miami, that he was most proud of and will be best remembered for.

“I was at the forefront of the battle to gain legal status for Haitian refugees,” Fils-Aimé told state Rep. Dotie Joseph in May as part of a spotlight on trailblazing Haitians during Haitian Heritage month. “We won many legal battles, which paved the way for the development of the vibrant Haitian-American community in South Florida today.”

Fils-Aimé, who spent his life working to raise the voice of Haitians at home and abroad, died Saturday at the University of Miami Hospital in Miami after becoming infected with the novel coronavirus. He was 67.

“What gave his life meaning, besides his loving family, is he always fought for people’s rights and for communities, especially for Haiti,” said son Karl, 35. “He was an exceptional human being and an even better father. He will be missed dearly.”

Fils-Aimé’s untimely death is not only hitting his family hard but a closely knit circle of friends and collaborators in South Florida and Haiti, the two communities where he and his wife of 41 years, Marise, called home and divided their time after moving back to Haiti in 1995. 

A former president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Haiti, Fils-Aimé often advised his close friend, the late President René Préval, on a number of issues including the development of Haiti’s private sector. Lately, he had spent a lot of time thinking about the country’s political future, its struggling private sector and how he could best influence Haiti’s path.

“He had flawless rationale and the ability to extract the big picture from a huge amount of information or a big event. René appreciated his capacity to reach out to people from all categories and reunite them with a common purpose, which was to strive to make things change for the good of all,” said Préval’s widow, Elisabeth Débrosse Delatour Préval.

As news traveled this week about his death, former employees of his mobile phone company, Communication Cellulaire d’Haïti, S.A. or ComCEL, which was better known by its trademark Voilà before being acquired by Digicel Group in 2012, remembered Fils-Aimé as a caring and generous boss.

“He was really proud at one point because ComCEL/Voilà was the No. 2 organization that had paid the most taxes,” said daughter Erica Brown, 46. “He was proud because it was about providing stability for the betterment of the community.”

Another proud moment came just weeks before the Jan. 12, 2010, Haiti earthquake. In December of 2009, the company’s U.S. subsidiary, Trilogy International Partners, was honored by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for Voilà’s corporate responsibility programs, transparent business practices and contributions to the economic development of Haiti under Fils-Aimé’s management. 

“Some would like to see in Bernard two different people,” said Fritz Longchamp, a longtime friend and former Haiti foreign minister who served as chief of staff to Préval during his second term in office. “The militant activist who fought for the rights of the Haitian people and the minority owner of a telecom enterprise. But that was absolutely not the case. For Bernard, it was two sides of one coin. His primary objective was always the wellness of the people.”

Rulx Jean-Bart, a former director of the Haitian Refugee Center, agreed.

“Bernard is a guy, who practically all of his adult life was devoted to the betterment of the Haitian people,” said Jean-Bart, who lives in Miramar. “Whether it was as a student in college in New York, or his fight against Duvalier, he’s been there.”

Recalling the various Haitians organizations that he and Fils-Aimé were involved in to help Haitian asylum seekers win the right to remain in the United States, Jean-Bart said, Fils-Aimé “was a key person, instrumental in a lot of decisions.”

Fils-Aimé was born in Petionville, Haiti, on May 24, 1953. At the age of 13, he moved to New York with his mother to flee the dictatorship of Francois “Papa” Doc Duvalier.

As his children recalled his legacy and pivotal moments in his life on Monday, they said he had several loves: his wife, a good glass of Scotch with his friends and sòs pwa, a popular Haitian bean soup dish. 

They recalled his stories about getting chased while fighting on behalf of farm workers, fighting against the Duvalier dictatorship and deciding to relocate to Miami from New York because he believed “this was going to be the front line for the rights of Haitian immigrants,” said son Gerard, 40.

“We’ve all been to protests with him at Krome when we were young kids,” he added. “He was a freedom fighter.”

In addition to his wife and three adult children, Fils-Aimé is survived by five grandchildren and a host of family and friends. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Fils-Aimé’s family said he will be laid to rest in a private ceremony on Thursday. A Catholic Mass in his honor will take place Friday at Saint Charbel in Peguyville, a residential area of Port-au-Prince.

In lieu of flowers, the family asks those who wish to honor his legacy to make a contribution in his honor to HELP, undefined, the education charity that was close to his heart.

Haiti-coronavirus: Jimmy 'Barbecue' Cherizier unites gangs while Moise watches

The Washington Post

Anthony Faiola

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Jovenel Moïse is president of Haiti, but ask the people of the terrified shantytowns who's in charge in this impoverished Caribbean capital, and they'll point to a man called Barbecue.

A former police officer who portrays himself as the savior of the streets, Jimmy “Barbecue” Cherizier has come to symbolize the accelerating erosion of Haiti’s already challenged rule of law during the coronavirus pandemic. Accused of orchestrating massacres that left dozens of men, women and children dead, he has succeeded in accomplishing the once unthinkable: uniting the warring gangs of Port-au-Prince into a powerful new confederation aimed at what he calls “revolution.”

Daily protests are paralyzing Haiti. Here’s why.

Cherizier announced the alliance on YouTube in June in a powder-blue three-piece suit. His newly formed “G9 Family and Allies” paraded triumphantly through the streets of the capital last month, led by gang leaders and dozens of armed men — both a flagrant violation of coronavirus rules and a warning to all.

On a recent afternoon, Cherizier led a reporter through the run-down neighborhood of La Saline, stomping over festering piles of garbage, barging into one corrugated shack after another, bellowing, “You see the conditions they live in?” as residents cowered.

“This is an armed revolution,” Cherizier told The Washington Post at his headquarters in Delmas 6, a no-go zone where he is hailed as a protector. “We will put guns in the hands of every child if we have to.”

But critics say he’s not targeting the government — he’s going after its opponents. Human rights activists and political opponents say the U.S.-backed Moïse has done little to check the rise of Haiti’s anarchic gangs, at least in part because their growing influence has appeared to serve the president’s interests.

With an apparent goal of becoming the strongman of the streets, Cherizier and members of his consolidated gang are extorting businesses, hijacking fuel trucks and kidnapping professionals and business owners for exorbitant ransoms as high as $1 million.

As he brings Port-au-Prince to its knees, Cherizier is also terrorizing poor neighborhoods where opposition to Moïse runs deep — potentially neutralizing any challenge to his party’s continued rule.

Barbecue expanded his turf through the alliance, controlling all of Port-au-Prince’s downtown and critical cross sections leading to the north and south, and the dense, opposition-dominated slum Cite Soleil that is now living a gang-fueled reign of terror.

Cherizier denies an alliance with Moïse. But in Cite Soleil, victims and human rights groups say G9 gang members have looted and burned down shacks and stalls, systematically raped women, killed at random, and dismembered or torched bodies.

When Cherizier’s men took to the streets in June, witnesses claimed to have seen them ride in the same armored vehicles used by the national police and special security forces. Justice Minister Lucmane Delile denounced the gangs and ordered the national police to pursue them; within hours, Moïse fired him.

Haiti has a tragic history of disasters. Will covid-19 be next?

Moïse’s office initially agreed to an interview but then did not respond. The president has denied ties to the gangs, which he has described as Haiti’s “own demons.” His government says it is seeking a disarmament accord with them.

“We prioritize dialogue, even in our fight with bandits and gangs,” Moïse said in March. “I am the president of all Haitians, the good and the bad.”

There’s a standing warrant against Cherizier for allegedly possessing illegal arms and failing to report for duty — the reason police gave for firing him last year — but it has not been served. Cherizier denies that his gangs have committed violence in the slums. He has not been charged in a 2018 massacre that left dozens dead in La Saline, or any other killings.

But for his long-suffering countrymen, Cherizier’s G9 is evoking the horrors of the Tontons Macoutes, the government-backed paramilitaries that terrorized Haiti for decades under dictator François “Papa Doc” Duvalier and his son, Jean-Claude.

“The government has said nothing about [Cherizier’s rise], and the international community has turned a blind eye,” said Pierre Espérance, director of Haiti’s National Human Rights Defense Network. “There is no rule of law anymore. The gangs are the new Macoutes. It feels like there is a manifest will to install a new dictatorship.”

Governments across Latin America have used the coronavirus to harass their opposition, delay or manipulate elections, and consolidate power, undermining democracy in a manner not seen in the region in decades.

The right-wing interim government in Bolivia is accused of unleashing an intensifying wave of repression against its political opposition. Critics say Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele is violating civil liberties with mass arrests of quarantine violators and gang members. Courts controlled by the authoritarian government of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro have replaced the heads of opposition parties amid a fresh wave of arrests of journalists and social leaders.

15 babies and children died in a fire at a group home in Haiti run by a U.S. church

“Coronavirus is the perfect excuse for a power grab and authoritarian measures to crack down on political opponents,” said Michael Shifter, president of the Inter-American Dialogue, a Washington-based think tank. “This is a regionwide trend, but the consequences are worse in the countries already facing the most dire situations.”

Moïse, 52, won the 2017 presidential election after a 14-month standoff over alleged fraud in a previous vote. Analysts say his base of support is thin amid allegations of government corruption in the petrodollars that flowed for years from Maduro’s Venezuela.

The former business executive was the target last year of protests by students and opposition groups that led to a three-month Peyi Lok, Creole for “country shutdown.”

Businesses were burned, hotels and restaurants shuttered, and thousands of Haitians left jobless. By January, the underpaid national police joined the protests, burning their own vehicles and blocking traffic on the capital’s main arteries.

Moïse has postponed legislative elections indefinitely. The opposition says his term ends in February, but he says he can stay in office a year beyond that.

“There’s no possibility of holding elections while he’s in power,” says Andre Michel, spokesman for an alliance of opposition parties. The opposition is calling for Moïse to resign and a transition government to be put in place.

U.S. officials have urged Moïse to call new elections. But critics say they’ve largely turned a blind eye to his government’s alleged links to the gangs because they value his support for the Trump administration’s hard-line policy against Venezuela’s Maduro.

Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) sent a letter to U.S. Ambassador Michele Sison in May denouncing what she called Cherizier’s “politically motivated” death squad.

“There is no real concern for the plight of the Haitians, whether they are being beaten and killed by the president of Haiti,” Waters told The Post. “As long as the president is in our pockets, everything is okay.”

David Mosby, head of the State Department’s Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, met with Haitian police officials this month to discuss the wave of gang violence.

Sison called on “all of Haiti’s actors” to engage in dialogue.

“Rather than pointing fingers,” she told The Post, “our point is to encourage all actors . . . to think about the most vulnerable who continue to bear the brunt of these challenges.”

U.N. peacekeepers fathered, then abandoned, hundreds of children in Haiti: Report

Few nations are as vulnerable as Haiti. The poorest country in the Western Hemisphere has lumbered through decades of misery, finally shedding the yoke of the Duvaliers in the 1980s only to spiral into a gyre of lost potential and repeatedly failed efforts to lift its population out of dehumanizing poverty.

The 2010 earthquake that killed more than 200,000 Haitians and left 1.5 million homeless crystallized the country’s plight, bringing, for a time, an avalanche of international organizations and promises, finally, of transformative aid. But many of the charities have since departed, the transformation unrealized, leaving a mix of resentment and hopelessness as the country has teetered on the verge of anarchy.

Health analysts feared the coronavirus would devastate Haiti. Most believe numbers are higher than the official count of 7,810 infected and 192 dead, but the country’s relative isolation seems to have spared it the worst of the pandemic so far. Still, the outbreak has made chronically underfunded health care here worse — medical staff, lacking protective gear, have failed to show up for work, leaving hospitals operating shorthanded or closing altogether.

Rumors, particularly in rural areas, that symptomatic Haitians are being used as experiments for unproven vaccines have led some to avoid treatment. Doctors say parents are now rejecting regular vaccines for their children in alarming numbers.

“People fear they are being guinea pigs,” said William Pape, head of the government’s covid-19 task force.

The coronavirus crisis has opened a window of opportunity for Barbecue. As a police officer, Cherizier, whose nickname stems from his mother’s locally famous grilled chicken, allegedly led a feared gang that for years was involved in murder, rape, extortion and kidnapping.

Haiti, spared a major coronavirus outbreak so far, now a ‘tinderbox’ set to ‘explode’

While Haitians were locked down, he helped unify street gangs under the G9 Family and Allies umbrella. Gang members began rolling into anti-government hotbeds in sophisticated armored vehicles with automatic weapons and tear gas. The National Network for Defense of Human Rights and witnesses say homes were torched, weapons fired and at least 111 people killed.

Police say they are unable to explain why their vehicles appear to have been used in the operation. They say they are investigating.

In a narrow alley between ramshackle two-story dwellings, Cherizier paced back and forth, alternately shouting or laughing into a succession of cellphones rushed to him by a posse of eager-to-please youth.

He insisted he was not working for the government but to liberate the Haitian people.

“The bourgeoisie, the opposition, the government, they are the problem,” he said. “They call us gangs — they are the gangs! We’re defending the ghetto. It’s live or die here.”

The alliance pushed last month into Cite Soleil. It was here that Lenese Leo, 38, says she was caring for her 8-month-old daughter on July 12 when bullets slammed into their shanty. When the shooting stopped, she said, the infant lay on the floor, bleeding from the head. She hailed a motorcycle taxi to go the hospital, but the child died in her arms.

In Haiti, family members of gang victims often avoid reporting deaths, for fear of reprisal. But Leo and her partner have instead insisted on an autopsy and shared their grief on social media. She says they now get death threats.

“It’s never been like this,” she said. “I’ve lived here all my life. I have never lived in so much fear.”

Faiola reported from Miami.

Program helps new immigrants blend into their communities

Geralde Gabeau, who emigrated from Haiti 26 years ago, started the Boston-based Immigrant Family Services Institute.

Social justice warrior Geralde Gabeau has worked for over two decades advocating for and developing public health initiatives for immigrants, especially for women and children.

But while working on her doctorate degree in strategic leadership several years ago, Gabeau learned something that moved her in a new direction and, in turn, is impacting the lives of thousands of immigrants in the Boston area.

"I came across some articles on immigrant integration and how long it takes for a new immigrant to integrate into the U.S.," she said. "So that really pushed me to research more and realize that it can take five to 10 years for an immigrant to fully integrate and that time means a lot of challenges for families, a lot of barriers to accessibility. And if they are children, most of the time, they are left behind."

That understanding motivated Gabeau to create the Immigrant Family Services Institute five years ago to help reduce the challenges faced by Caribbean, African and Hispanic immigrants in the Boston area. Adopting a "village model," the nonprofit organization provides academic support for children, advocates for immigrant rights, and acts as a bridge for employment, health care and education services. With a staff of 15 and a team of 200 volunteers, IFSI serves about 5,000 clients.

"We embrace the concept of the whole family, which means that we work with children, parents and grandparents," said Gabeau, who emigrated from Haiti 26 years ago. "So when we serve the children, we also serve the family. We also do a lot of educational programming for adults regarding the different issues immigrants are facing. The idea is to facilitate the integration of immigrating to their communities a little faster than usual."

One Dorchester family turned to IFSI for help when the youngest child faced difficulties in school. Restless and unfocused, the 4-year-old girl was having trouble learning and following directions. A friend referred her mother, Alice Therlonge, to the program, and things began to turn around quickly. After enrolling in IFSI's after-school tutoring program, Carla, now 7, is learning to play the violin and thriving in her classes.

"I can tell you this program is a miracle for me," Therlonge said. "She's sitting down and doing the work. She's listening. She does everything they ask her to do. I think the music program really helped her. She really enjoys the violin. She can play 'Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star' by herself. Imagine that!"

Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the organization has moved its tutoring programs online. "She's doing well, just like when she's in the classroom," Therlonge said. "But she does keep asking me when she can go back. She misses her friends."

IFSI also is supporting Boston-area immigrants by identifying social determinants of health and educating clients to make healthy choices. It recently received a grant from the American Heart Association's Social Impact Fund, which invests in enterprises in several cities that are helping to overcome social and economic barriers to health equity.

"When we talk about health, if you don't know what's going on around you, you're going to make poor choices," Gabeau said.

In light of the nation's recent civic uprising and Black Lives Matter movement, staff and volunteers also have been working with the organization's youth on channeling their emotions and educating them on the best ways to express their anger, sadness or fears. The children are encouraged to write, draw or play music.

"Since we are an immigrant organization, anything that affects the community through our Black and brown children affects us directly," Gabeau said.

"We invite them to create something new that could be used as a symbol in the fight against injustice and against racism so that it doesn't follow the same pattern that we are dealing with now in our society."

If you have questions or comments about this story, please email Cette adresse e-mail est protégée contre les robots spammeurs. Vous devez activer le JavaScript pour la visualiser..