January 7, 2004 - March 3, 2004
BBC revives propaganda blitz against Zimbabwe
Posted: Wednesday, March 3, 2004
Herald Reporter
THE BBC has revived its propaganda blitz against the Government ahead of next year's parliamentary elections, claiming the Government has set up secret camps across the country in which thousands of youths are taught how to rape, torture and kill.
The camps being referred to by the BBC are national youth service training centres and it claims that those who have escaped from the camps "say they are part of a brutal plan to keep (President) Mugabe in power".
In its story the BBC claimed that it spoke to some recruits on its Panorama programme "about a horrific training programme that breaks young teenagers down before encouraging them to commit atrocities".
It claimed that Panorama also learnt that some of the recruits are taught to torture Government opponents.
During covert filming inside Zimbabwe, Panorama claimed it spoke to a camp commander who told the programme that youths in his camp had been sent to kill opponents of President Mugabe.
He said: "In the area I am covering I heard of two. My superiors instructed that the people must be eliminated."
The BBC also falsely claimed President Mugabe now wants every Zimbabwean youth to undergo training.
"We have been told they will be used to intimidate political opponents in next year*s elections. These guys are going to be used by the ruling party to keep the opposition out of power," the said commander was quoted saying.
In the past the BBC has heightened its propaganda against the Government each time elections draw near.
There have been false reports in the Western media in the past of youths claiming to have escaped from the training centres and confessing to committing rape, torture and murder in the country.
Some opposition elements including church leaders notably Archbishop Pius Ncube, who dabbles in opposition politics and is a staunch Government critic, have appeared at Press conferences where the Western and South African media are invited, flanked by youths supposedly confessing to raping, torturing and murdering opponents of the Government.
Last year in September, Archbishop Ncube appeared at a Press conference in Johannesburg, South Africa with youths confessing to such acts.
The press conference was held to release a report alleging human rights abuses under the National Youth Service.
The Government has since barred the BBC from covering events in the country because of its biased reporting and propaganda.
In July 2001, the Government suspended the accreditation of all BBC correspondents in the country.
¤ US widens its sanctions against Zimbabwe
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Aristide's Kidnapping: A Repeat Of History
Posted: Wednesday, March 3, 2004
By George Alleyne
Trinidad and Tobago Newsday
The reported kidnapping by the United States of America military of Haitian President, Jean-Bertrand Aristide and his family and their being spirited out ot Haiti, is an uncanny and shameful repeat of history. It followed by a little more than 200 years the kidnapping of Toussaint L'Ouverture who had led the world's only successful slave revolution. Then Haiti was known as Saint Dominique or San Domingo. It was Toussaint L'Ouverture who would change the name to that which had been given it by its indigenous people — Haiti! And as in the case of Aristide, L'Ouverture's wife and family had also been abducted and removed from Haiti. Perhaps CARICOM countries will issue travel advisories against the United States with appropriate warnings.
Aristide, in telephone conversations with highly respected United States political figures Charles Rangel, Randall Robinson and Maxine Waters, made from the Central African Republic (Chad) to where he was flown on Sunday, insisted that he was forced to resign the Haitian Presidency by the United States and taken to Chad against his will, and is under guard by French and African soldiers. Of interest was the choice of words by the US authorities in releasing information on Aristide. They said that he had "fled" Haiti, fully realising the implication that the word "fled" would convey. Aristide was Haiti's first constitutionally elected President and as such should only have been removed from office by constitutional means. Instead, for the past several weeks his Administration had been under threat by armed uprising by Haitians led by several and among them a man who had been notorious for having had thousands of Aristide's supporters murdered and maimed during the period 1991-1994, when Aristide had been ousted from office.
Some people tend to say, somewhat glibly, that it was the United States that had brought Aristide back in 1994, citing this as evidence of US concern, even today. They fail to point out that it was the Bill Clinton Administration which had actively supported his return, an Administration whose policies were clearly far removed from those of the present Republican Government. When Aristide returned to office he made the grave error of disbanding the Haitian Army, leaving thousands of men who had been trained to fight, not only out of jobs and disaffected, but leaderless and open to blandishments. In turn, it would have been unreasonable to have expected them to have been loyal to Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the man they would have considered responsible for whatever uncomfortable social situation in which they may have found themselves.
For the most part they were a gaggle of loose cannons whose loyalty, to use a cliche, was up for grabs. Haiti has been a poor country for most of its history. Its poverty was not self induced, clearly not the result of people not wishing to work and improve their lot. But Haiti, following on its slave revolt and the defeat of the French troops which had sought to reimpose French Imperial rule, had been the victim of economic blockades which prevented it from selling its sugar and other produce, and from purchasing goods and services, including equipment and spares, to keep its factories and plants going. In addition, France had demanded of and forced reparations payments on Haiti, claiming that former French land and slave owners in Haiti were entitled to reparations for the property (include in this slaves) which they had lost. Either the reparations or the economic blockade would have been crippling. The British Government, when it abolished slavery in its colonial possessions had been more "charitable." It had given the former slave owners 20 million pounds sterling as payment for the slave property they had lost, while allowing them to keep the lands which they owned.
When the Aristide Administration lost Gonaives, Haiti's second largest city, its days were literally over and all that remained if the Government was to live out its term would have been United Nations intervention in the form of peace keeping forces. The rebels were clearly being supplied from overseas with arms and ammunition, and Haiti's Police Service, trained to maintain law and order, had been no match for them. Interestingly, L'Ouverture had been at Gonaives when he was requested to attend a meeting with a French General, which would lead to his seizure and exile to France. In much the same manner that Toussaint L'Ouverture had agreed to meet at his house with Ferrari, Aide-de-Camp to General Leclerc, then Commander in Chief of the French troops in Haiti, Aristide had met with US soldiers at the Presidential Palace. The US soldiers, perhaps, like the French 201 years plus earlier, were there simply to "secure his person."
The world may never know the details for some time to come of what transpired at the Presidential Palace on Sunday, but it does know what happened when Toussaint L'Ouverture was kidnapped. Aristide was taken out of Haiti by plane, and Toussaint by ship. As he boarded the French vessel, which was to take him to France, exile and prison, he said to the ship's captain: "In overthrowing me you have cut down in San Domingo only the trunk of the tree of liberty. It will spring up again by the roots for they are numerous and deep." CARICOM must seek to persuade the United Nations to draw up and implement a plan for the social, educational, industrial and agricultural reconstruction of Haiti, and be prepared to be part of the rebuilding process of a CARICOM Member State.
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Aristide Says 'I Was Kidnapped'
Posted: Monday, March 1, 2004
March 1st, 2004
www.democracynow.org
Congressmember Maxine Waters said she received a call from Aristide at 9am EST. "He's surrounded by military. It's like he is in jail, he said. He says he was kidnapped," said Waters. Click on this link to read a full transcript of the Democracy Now! interview with Rep. Maxine Waters.
RUSH TRANSCRIPT
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now! I'm Amy Goodman. Congressmember Waters, can you tell us about the conversation you just had with Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide?
MAXINE WATERS: I most certainly can and he's anxious for me to get the message out so people will understand. He is in the Central Republic of Africa at a place called the Palace of the Renaissance, and he's not sure if that's a house or a hotel or what it is and he is surrounded by military. It's like in jail, he said. He said that he was kidnapped; he said that he was forced to leave Haiti. He said that the American embassy sent the diplomats; he referred to them as, to his home where they was lead by Mr. Moreno. And I believe that Mr. Moreno is a deputy chief of staff at the embassy in Haiti and other diplomats, and they ordered him to leave. They said you must go NOW. He said that they said that Guy Phillipe and U.S. Marines were coming to Port Au Prince; he will be killed, many Haitians will be killed, that they would not stop until they did what they wanted to do. He was there with his wife Mildred and his brother-in-law and two of his security people, and somebody from the Steel Foundation, and they're all, there's five of them that are there. They took them where-- they did stop in Antigua then they stopped at a military base, then they were in the air for hours and then they arrived at this place and they were met by five ministers of government. It's a Francophone country, they speak French. And they were then taken to this place called the Palace of the Renaissance where they are being held and they are surrounded by military people.
They are not free to do whatever they want to do. Then the phone clicked off after we had talked for about five--we talked maybe fifteen minutes and then the phone clicked off. But he, some of it was muffled in the beginning, at times it was clear. But one thing that was very clear and he said it over and over again, that he was kidnapped, that the coup was completed by the Americans that they forced him out. They had also disabled his American security force that he had around him for months now; they did not allow them to extend their numbers. To begin with they wanted them to bring in more people to provide security they prevented them from doing that and then they finally forced them out of the country.
So that's where his is and I said to him that I would do everything I could to get the word out. ...that I heard it directly from him I heard it directly from his wife that they were kidnapped, they were forced to leave, they did not want to leave, their lives were threatened and the lives of many Haitians were threatened. And I said that we would be in touch with the State Department, with the President today and if at all possible we would try to get to him. We don't know whether or not he is going to be moved. We will try and find that information out today.
AMY GOODMAN: Did President Aristide say whether or not he resigned?
MAXINE WATERS: He did not resign. He said he was forced out, that the coup was completed.
AMY GOODMAN: So again to summarize, Congressmember Maxine Waters, you have just gotten off the phone with President Jean Bertrand Aristide, who said he believes he is in the Central African Republic.
MAXINE WATERS: That's right, with French speaking officers, he's surrounded by them and he's in this place called the Palace of the Renaissance and he was forced to go there. They took him there.
AMY GOODMAN: What are you going to do right now?
MAXINE WATERS: I'm going to get to the State Dept to find out what do they plan on doing with him. Do they plan on leaving him there or are they planning on taking him to another country? We are going to tell them we would like to see him. We are prepared to go where he is NOW and that we are demanding that we are able to see him and go where he is. And to negotiate what will be done with him.
AMY GOODMAN: Did he describe how he was taken out? We had heard reports in Haiti that he was taken out in handcuffs. Did he...
MAXINE WATERS: No he did not say he was taken out in handcuffs. He simply said that they came led by Mr. Moreno followed by the marines and they said simply “you have to go!” You have no choice, you must go and if you don't you will be killed and many Haitians will be killed. We are planning with Mr. De filliped to come into Puerto Rico. He will not be alone he will come with American military and you will not survive, you will be killed. You've got to go now!
AMY GOODMAN: How did President Aristide sound? What was the quality of his voice?
MAXINE WATERS: The quality of his voice was anxious, angry, disturbed, wanting people to know the truth.
AMY GOODMAN: Did he say why he had not made any calls since early on Sunday morning; that people had not been in touch with him for more than 36 hours. Certainly this plane was equipped with a telephone?
MAXINE WATERS: OH, I don't think they were able to make any calls from the plane. They were only allowed to make calls once they landed. And I think the only call that they had made was to her mother who is in Florida and her brother. But they were not allowed...they had no access to telephone calls... to a telephone on the plane.
AMY GOODMAN: What is the next step...what are you going to do? What do you think the people in this country should being doing about this situation in Haiti?
MAXINE WATERS: First of all I think the people in this country should be outraged that our government led a coup de'tat against a democratically elected President. They should call, write. Fax with their outrage, not only to the State Dept. but to all of their elected officials and to the press. We have to keep the information flying in the air so people will get it and understand what is taking place. And for those of us who are elected officials we must not only get to the President, we must demand that he is returned to claim his presidency if that is what he wants. If you can recall what happened in Venezuela when Mr. Chavez was...they tried to force him out and they had someone step into the presidency and he had not resigned his presidency and he got it back. I did not have that conversation with President Aristide but we must meet with him and we must talk with him and be prepared to protect him.
AMY GOODMAN: Congressmember Maxine Waters I want to thank you for being with us again. Congress member Waters has just spoken with President Aristide who she says said he was kidnapped and is now with his wife and surrounded by security in the Central African Republic.
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Aristide Says 'I Was Kidnapped'
Posted: Monday, March 1, 2004
March 1st, 2004
www.democracynow.org
Congressmember Maxine Waters said she received a call from Aristide at 9am EST. "He's surrounded by military. It's like he is in jail, he said. He says he was kidnapped," said Waters. Click on this link to read a full transcript of the Democracy Now! interview with Rep. Maxine Waters.
RUSH TRANSCRIPT
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now! I'm Amy Goodman. Congressmember Waters, can you tell us about the conversation you just had with Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide?
MAXINE WATERS: I most certainly can and he's anxious for me to get the message out so people will understand. He is in the Central Republic of Africa at a place called the Palace of the Renaissance, and he's not sure if that's a house or a hotel or what it is and he is surrounded by military. It's like in jail, he said. He said that he was kidnapped; he said that he was forced to leave Haiti. He said that the American embassy sent the diplomats; he referred to them as, to his home where they was lead by Mr. Moreno. And I believe that Mr. Moreno is a deputy chief of staff at the embassy in Haiti and other diplomats, and they ordered him to leave. They said you must go NOW. He said that they said that Guy Phillipe and U.S. Marines were coming to Port Au Prince; he will be killed, many Haitians will be killed, that they would not stop until they did what they wanted to do. He was there with his wife Mildred and his brother-in-law and two of his security people, and somebody from the Steel Foundation, and they're all, there's five of them that are there. They took them where-- they did stop in Antigua then they stopped at a military base, then they were in the air for hours and then they arrived at this place and they were met by five ministers of government. It's a Francophone country, they speak French. And they were then taken to this place called the Palace of the Renaissance where they are being held and they are surrounded by military people.
They are not free to do whatever they want to do. Then the phone clicked off after we had talked for about five--we talked maybe fifteen minutes and then the phone clicked off. But he, some of it was muffled in the beginning, at times it was clear. But one thing that was very clear and he said it over and over again, that he was kidnapped, that the coup was completed by the Americans that they forced him out. They had also disabled his American security force that he had around him for months now; they did not allow them to extend their numbers. To begin with they wanted them to bring in more people to provide security they prevented them from doing that and then they finally forced them out of the country.
So that's where his is and I said to him that I would do everything I could to get the word out. ...that I heard it directly from him I heard it directly from his wife that they were kidnapped, they were forced to leave, they did not want to leave, their lives were threatened and the lives of many Haitians were threatened. And I said that we would be in touch with the State Department, with the President today and if at all possible we would try to get to him. We don't know whether or not he is going to be moved. We will try and find that information out today.
AMY GOODMAN: Did President Aristide say whether or not he resigned?
MAXINE WATERS: He did not resign. He said he was forced out, that the coup was completed.
AMY GOODMAN: So again to summarize, Congressmember Maxine Waters, you have just gotten off the phone with President Jean Bertrand Aristide, who said he believes he is in the Central African Republic.
MAXINE WATERS: That's right, with French speaking officers, he's surrounded by them and he's in this place called the Palace of the Renaissance and he was forced to go there. They took him there.
AMY GOODMAN: What are you going to do right now?
MAXINE WATERS: I'm going to get to the State Dept to find out what do they plan on doing with him. Do they plan on leaving him there or are they planning on taking him to another country? We are going to tell them we would like to see him. We are prepared to go where he is NOW and that we are demanding that we are able to see him and go where he is. And to negotiate what will be done with him.
AMY GOODMAN: Did he describe how he was taken out? We had heard reports in Haiti that he was taken out in handcuffs. Did he...
MAXINE WATERS: No he did not say he was taken out in handcuffs. He simply said that they came led by Mr. Moreno followed by the marines and they said simply “you have to go!” You have no choice, you must go and if you don't you will be killed and many Haitians will be killed. We are planning with Mr. De filliped to come into Puerto Rico. He will not be alone he will come with American military and you will not survive, you will be killed. You've got to go now!
AMY GOODMAN: How did President Aristide sound? What was the quality of his voice?
MAXINE WATERS: The quality of his voice was anxious, angry, disturbed, wanting people to know the truth.
AMY GOODMAN: Did he say why he had not made any calls since early on Sunday morning; that people had not been in touch with him for more than 36 hours. Certainly this plane was equipped with a telephone?
MAXINE WATERS: OH, I don't think they were able to make any calls from the plane. They were only allowed to make calls once they landed. And I think the only call that they had made was to her mother who is in Florida and her brother. But they were not allowed...they had no access to telephone calls... to a telephone on the plane.
AMY GOODMAN: What is the next step...what are you going to do? What do you think the people in this country should being doing about this situation in Haiti?
MAXINE WATERS: First of all I think the people in this country should be outraged that our government led a coup de'tat against a democratically elected President. They should call, write. Fax with their outrage, not only to the State Dept. but to all of their elected officials and to the press. We have to keep the information flying in the air so people will get it and understand what is taking place. And for those of us who are elected officials we must not only get to the President, we must demand that he is returned to claim his presidency if that is what he wants. If you can recall what happened in Venezuela when Mr. Chavez was...they tried to force him out and they had someone step into the presidency and he had not resigned his presidency and he got it back. I did not have that conversation with President Aristide but we must meet with him and we must talk with him and be prepared to protect him.
AMY GOODMAN: Congressmember Maxine Waters I want to thank you for being with us again. Congress member Waters has just spoken with President Aristide who she says said he was kidnapped and is now with his wife and surrounded by security in the Central African Republic.
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Update: Aristide 'U.S. Forced Me to Leave Haiti'
Posted: Sunday, February 29, 2004
Updated: March 02, 2004
U.S. Rep M. Waters: Aristide Says 'I Was Kidnapped'
Another blow to democracy in homeland, local Haitians lament "Aristide was kidnapped!" they screamed, draped in Haitian flags. "Election yes, coup no," said the placards they raised in defiance.
Haiti's Aristide says he was abducted
Aristide: 'White American Military' Kidnapped Me
Aristide: 'U.S. Forced Me to Leave Haiti'
Aristide accuses U.S. of forcing his ouster
BBC: Embattled Aristide leaves Haiti
Other news reports have stated that Aristide has not left Haiti
Haiti: return to savagery
¤ Haiti 2004: Another US-Backed Coup
¤ Aristide Bows to Pressure, Leaves Haiti
¤ Bush Increases Push for Haitian to Leave Office
¤ While U.S. Tries to Mask it's Role - Haitians resist coup attempt
¤ The Haiti Boomerang
¤ Bush accused of supporting Haitian rebels
¤ U.S. can end the killing it started in Haiti
¤ US is Arming Anti-Aristide Paramilitaries
¤ ESC: Act on Haiti now!
¤ Haiti's Descent into Gang Warfare
¤ Haiti still enslaved for all its rebellion
¤ Beloved Haiti: A (Counter) Revolutionary Bicentennial
¤ US Double Game in Hait
¤ Haiti-A Call For Global Action
¤ Media vs. Reality in Haiti
Crisis In Haiti
IMC Coverage
In the past week paramilitary groups in Haiti have continued to burn buildings and attack police stations, while the "opposition" continues to refuse negotiations and call for President Jean-Bertrand's Aristide's resignation, with the support of the US and Canadia n governments.
Meanwhile, the corporate media (and some "alternative media") have continues to ignore numerous aspects of the situation: US financial support of the opposition, previous US involvement in the region (including support of military dictators, the freezing of over $500 million in international aid and loans, and efforts to prevent the raising of the minimum wage). Haiti is the poorest country in the western hemisphere, and has been used as a source of cheap labour by companies like Disney, Wal-Mart and KMart. Workers are paid as little as 11 cents per hour.
US and Canadian diplomats have placed the blame on Aristide, who has publically declared himself to be willing to negotiate with the opposition. The opposition consists of a collection of political parties supported by US funds, the Haitian media and the Haitian economic elite, whose popular support is estimated at between 8 and 12%.
Haiti has a long history of resistance:
The year 2004 marks 200 years of Haitian independence. In 1791, 400,000 Africans enslaved in Haiti rose up against French colonial rule. Jean-Jacques Dessalines declared Haiti a free nation in 1804, culminating the world's only successful revolution of enslaved people. From the beginning, Haiti found itself isolated and besieged. The United States led a worldwide boycott against Haiti and refused to recognize the new nation until 1864, fearing that its freedom would pose a danger to the U.S. system of slavery. In 1825, the Haitian people were forced to assume a debt to France of 90 million gold francs (equivalent to $21.7 billion today) as "reparations" to their former "owners", in return for diplomatic recognition and trade. To make the first payment, Haiti closed all its public schools in what has been called the hemisphere's first case of structural adjustment.
www.indymedia.org/en/2004/02/110468.shtml
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Update: Aristide 'U.S. Forced Me to Leave Haiti'
Posted: Sunday, February 29, 2004
Updated: March 02, 2004
U.S. Rep M. Waters: Aristide Says 'I Was Kidnapped'
Another blow to democracy in homeland, local Haitians lament "Aristide was kidnapped!" they screamed, draped in Haitian flags. "Election yes, coup no," said the placards they raised in defiance.
Haiti's Aristide says he was abducted
Aristide: 'White American Military' Kidnapped Me
Aristide: 'U.S. Forced Me to Leave Haiti'
Aristide accuses U.S. of forcing his ouster
BBC: Embattled Aristide leaves Haiti
Other news reports have stated that Aristide has not left Haiti
Haiti: return to savagery
¤ Haiti 2004: Another US-Backed Coup
¤ Aristide Bows to Pressure, Leaves Haiti
¤ Bush Increases Push for Haitian to Leave Office
¤ While U.S. Tries to Mask it's Role - Haitians resist coup attempt
¤ The Haiti Boomerang
¤ Bush accused of supporting Haitian rebels
¤ U.S. can end the killing it started in Haiti
¤ US is Arming Anti-Aristide Paramilitaries
¤ ESC: Act on Haiti now!
¤ Haiti's Descent into Gang Warfare
¤ Haiti still enslaved for all its rebellion
¤ Beloved Haiti: A (Counter) Revolutionary Bicentennial
¤ US Double Game in Hait
¤ Haiti-A Call For Global Action
¤ Media vs. Reality in Haiti
Crisis In Haiti
IMC Coverage
In the past week paramilitary groups in Haiti have continued to burn buildings and attack police stations, while the "opposition" continues to refuse negotiations and call for President Jean-Bertrand's Aristide's resignation, with the support of the US and Canadia n governments.
Meanwhile, the corporate media (and some "alternative media") have continues to ignore numerous aspects of the situation: US financial support of the opposition, previous US involvement in the region (including support of military dictators, the freezing of over $500 million in international aid and loans, and efforts to prevent the raising of the minimum wage). Haiti is the poorest country in the western hemisphere, and has been used as a source of cheap labour by companies like Disney, Wal-Mart and KMart. Workers are paid as little as 11 cents per hour.
US and Canadian diplomats have placed the blame on Aristide, who has publically declared himself to be willing to negotiate with the opposition. The opposition consists of a collection of political parties supported by US funds, the Haitian media and the Haitian economic elite, whose popular support is estimated at between 8 and 12%.
Haiti has a long history of resistance:
The year 2004 marks 200 years of Haitian independence. In 1791, 400,000 Africans enslaved in Haiti rose up against French colonial rule. Jean-Jacques Dessalines declared Haiti a free nation in 1804, culminating the world's only successful revolution of enslaved people. From the beginning, Haiti found itself isolated and besieged. The United States led a worldwide boycott against Haiti and refused to recognize the new nation until 1864, fearing that its freedom would pose a danger to the U.S. system of slavery. In 1825, the Haitian people were forced to assume a debt to France of 90 million gold francs (equivalent to $21.7 billion today) as "reparations" to their former "owners", in return for diplomatic recognition and trade. To make the first payment, Haiti closed all its public schools in what has been called the hemisphere's first case of structural adjustment.
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Haiti: return to savagery
Posted: Sunday, February 29, 2004
by Raffique Shah
Few people bother to probe beneath the facade of what is both a popular uprising against a permanent state of poverty and at the same time yet another grab for power by some of the most despicable excuses-for-human-beings that have haunted the Caribbean. From all appearances, Aristide has failed his people, more so as he was all but revered by them, seen as a saviour-in-cassock at a time when the country was just emerging from almost a century of barbaric rule. In fact, his three terms in office have yielded little more comfort to poverty-stricken masses there than they enjoyed under the string of dictators who preceded him.
There were valid reasons for his failure to deliver. But one cannot assuage the pangs of hunger, the sub-human conditions the mass of Haitians are forced to survive under, on promises. Indeed, Aristide compounded his sins of omission by all but stealing an election in 2000, according to international observers who witnessed the poll. And to top off his failures, having disbanded the organised gang of thugs that was deemed Haiti's army, he resorted to creating his own brand of thugs who acted as his "enforcers", mercenaries little different to the uniformed ones that were banished in 1994.
But in examining Aristide's failure to rid Haiti of poverty and repression, one cannot help but examine the main reasons behind this descent into Hell. I shall try to trace this in reverse chronology. Bear in mind that following his massive victory in Haiti's first democratic elections in 1991, he was deposed by the remnants of Francois "Papa Doc" Duvalier's brutal army within seven months. He fled to the USA as General Raoul Cedras assumed control of the country and re-imposed the savagery that characterised the dictatorships of the past. It took four years of international sanctions and the threat of a US invasion for Cedras and his fellow-butchers to succumb. Aristide was reinstated with the help of a US-led coalition that included Caricom forces (among them members of the T&T Regiment).
His return to power came with a high price tag, though, that would eventually lead to him resorting to human rights abuses, and ultimately to this sorry pass. Because the US insisted that he institute strict IMF measures that were bound to wreak economic havoc the way they have elsewhere in the world. In 1994 Haiti still had some form of agriculture in quality coffee, cocoa and sugar cane (for export), as well as corn, rice and sorghum for domestic consumption. Forced into globalisation by his "sponsors", Aristide lowered import tariffs, opening the way for subsidised US-produced rice and killing the local industry. The US was so intent on exploiting this basket-case market, it withheld some US$30 million in aid because the Haitian authorities dared to impose fines on American rice dealers who were found evading customs duties.
With such draconian measures adopted by the world's richest nation against the poorest, what could one expect to happen to Haiti? Hungry bellies neither know nor care about the IMF. Poor people want only deliverance from their misery, and if they can no longer produce the few crops that brought them relief from hunger, they do not see as far as Washington or Paris. They see Aristide. He becomes the problem. And he realises he is trapped in a vice from which he cannot escape, so he resorts to repression. Even so, we must be fair to him. He knew that the alternative to his kind of democracy lay with men far more dangerous to the country than he.
And just who are these "rebels"? Start with Louis Chamblain, a former sergeant who was accused of atrocities during the years of military rule. He fled to the neighbouring Dominican Republic when Aristide was reinstated in 1994. His sidekick Emmanuel "Toto" Constant, a CIA operative who belonged to a group known as FRAPH. Its members tortured and murdered opponents of the 1991-94 military regime. Add to this vile brew Guy Phillippe, a hand-picked officer who was trained by US Special Forces: he was specially trained in methods of torture and murder and among his victims was the then Justice Minister, Guy Malary. Also, remember this name: Andre Apaid. He is one so-called leader of the "democratic front" who happens to be a US citizen and the owner of sweatshops in Haiti.
The masses in Haiti who have genuine reasons for opposing Aristide are caught in this web among deadly spiders of an era we all thought had died with "Papa" and "Baby" Doc. Caricom leaders probably understand this vicious undercurrent that lies beneath the surface of the "popular" uprising, hence their bid to get an agreement for him to remain in power and give in to some demands of the opposition. The US and France are saying Aristide must resign pronto. They will shed no tears if he is tortured and killed. Because they know the end result will be a country in chaos, but one that does not have the capability to harm them-except for illegal immigrants attempting to reach America. For them, it's another case of "Black people biting the dust". Or maybe eating dirt and dying of Aids like flies. No bother.
But for those who understand the significance of what Haiti came to mean in the 18th century, when Toussaint and Dessalines and Christophe defeated Napoleon's best forces, we cry for that country, for its people. She paid a high price for that bold battle for independence in 1791. The US and France refused to recognise her until she agreed to pay reparations (to former slave owners!) of 150 million francs. Today, they are still extracting revenge and blood from a barren land that has been sucked dry by a despotic ruling class and its natural allies in Washington and Paris.
Reproduced From:
www.trinicenter.com/Raffique/2004/Feb/292004.htm
More Reports here...
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Is the US Arming Haitian Paramilitaries?
Posted: Thursday, February 26, 2004
Haiti's Lawyer: US is Arming Anti-Aristide Paramilitaries
By Amy Goodman and Jeremy Scahill
The US lawyer representing the government of Haiti charged today that the US government is directly involved in a military coup attempt against the country's democratically elected President, Jean-Bertrand Aristide. Ira Kurzban, the Miami-based attorney who has served as General Counsel to the Haitian government since 1991, said that the paramilitaries fighting to overthrow Aristide are being backed by Washington.
"I believe that this is a group that is armed by, trained by, and employed by the intelligence services of the United States," Kurzban told the national radio and TV program Democracy Now!. "This is clearly a military operation, and it's a military coup."
"There's enough indications from our point of view, at least from my point of view, that the United States certainly knew what was coming about two weeks before this military operation started," Kurzban said. " The United States made contingency plans for Guantanamo."
If a direct US connection is proven, it will mark the second time in just over a decade that Washington has been involved in a coup in Haiti.
Several of the paramilitary leaders now rampaging Haiti are men who were at the forefront of the US-backed campaign of terror during the 1991-94 coup against Aristide. Among the paramilitary figures now leading the current insurrection is Louis Jodel Chamblain, the former number 2 man in the FRAPH paramilitary death squad.
Chamblain was convicted and sentenced in absentia to hard-labor for life in trials for the April 23, 1994 massacre in the pro-democracy region of Raboteau and the September 11, 1993 assassination of democracy-activist Antoine Izmery. Chamblain recently arrived in Gonaives with about 25 other commandos based in the Dominican Republic, where Chamblain has been living since 1994. They were well equipped with rifles, camouflage uniforms, and all-terrain vehicles.
Among the victims of FRAPH under Chamblain's leadership was Haitian Justice Minister Guy Malary. He was ambushed and machine-gunned to death with his bodyguard and a driver on Oct. 14, 1993. According to an October 28, 1993 CIA Intelligence Memorandum obtained by the Center for Constitutional Rights "FRAPH members Jodel Chamblain, Emmanuel Constant, and Gabriel Douzable met with an unidentified military officer on the morning of 14 October to discuss plans to kill Malary." Emmanuel "Toto" Constant, was the founder of FRAPH.
An October 1994 article by journalist Allan Nairn in The Nation magazine quoted Constant as saying that he was contacted by a US Military officer named Col. Patrick Collins, who served as defense attache at the United States Embassy in Port-au-Prince. Constant says Collins pressed him to set up a group to "balance the Aristide movement" and do "intelligence" work against it. Constant admitted that, at the time, he was working with CIA operatives in Haiti. Constant is now residing freely in the US. He is reportedly living in Queens, NY. At the time, James Woolsey was head of the CIA.
Another figure to recently reemerge is Guy Philippe, a former Haitian police chief who fled Haiti in October 2000 after authorities discovered him plotting a coup with a group of other police chiefs. All of the men were trained in Ecuador by US Special Forces during the 1991-1994 coup. Since that time, the Haitian government has accused Philippe of master-minding deadly attacks on the Police Academy and the National Palace in July and December 2001, as well as hit-and-run raids against police stations on Haiti's Central Plateau over the following two years.
Kurzban also points to the presence of another FRAPH veteran, Jean Tatun. Along with Chamblain, Tatun was convicted of gross violations of human rights and murder in the Raboteau massacre.
"These people came through the Dominican border after the United States had provided 20,000 M-16's to the Dominican army," says Kurzban. "I believe that the United States clearly knew about it before, and that given the fact of the history of these people, [Washington is] probably very, very deeply involved, and I think Congress needs to seriously look at what the involvement of the Defense Intelligence Agency and the Central Intelligence Agency has been in this operation. Because it is a military operation. It's not a rag-tag group of liberators, as has often been put in the press in the last week or two."
Kurzban says he has hired military analysts to review photos of the weapons being used by the paramilitary groups. He says that contrary to reports in the media that the armed groups are using weapons originally distributed by Aristide, the gangs are using highly sophisticated and powerful weapons; weapons that far out-gun Aristide's 3,000 member National Police force.
"I don't think that there's any question about the fact that the weapons that they have did not come from Haiti," says Kurzban. "They're organized as a military commando strike force that's going from city to city."
Kurzban says that among the weapons being used by the paramilitaries are: M-16's, M-60's, armor piercing weapons and rocket-propelled grenade launchers. "They have weapons to shoot down the one helicopter that the government has," he said. "They have acted as a pretty tight-knit commando unit."
Chamblain and other paramilitary leaders have said they will march on the capital, Port-au-Prince within two weeks. The US has put forth a proposal, being referred to as a peace plan, that many viewed as favorable to Aristide's opponents. Aristide accepted the plan, but the opposition rejected it. Washington's point man on the crisis is Roger Noriega, Undersecretary of State for Western Hemispheric Affairs.
"I think Noriega has been an Aristide hater for over a decade," says Kurzban, adding that he believes Noriega allowed the opposition to delay their response to the plan to allow the paramilitaries to capture more territory. "My reaction was they're just giving them more time so they can take over more, that the military wing of the opposition can take over more ground in Haiti and create a fate accompli," Kurzban said. "Indeed, as soon as they said, 'we need an extra day,' I predicted, unfortunately, and correctly, that they would go into Cap Haitian (Haiti's 2nd largest city) and indeed the next morning they did."
The leader of the "opposition" is an American citizen named Andy Apaid. He was born in New York. Haitian law does not allow dual-nationality and he has not renounced his US citizenship. In a recent statement, Congressmember Maxine Waters blasted Apaid and his opposition front, saying she believes "Apaid is attempting to instigate a bloodbath in Haiti and then blame the government for the resulting disaster in the belief that the United States will aid the so-called protestors against President Aristide and his government."
"We have the leader of the opposition, who Mr. Noriega is negotiating with, who Secretary Powell calls and who tells Secretary Powell, you know, 'we need a couple more days' and Secretary Powell says 'that's fine,'" says Kurzban. "I mean, there's some kind of theater of the absurd going on with this opposition where it's led by an American citizen, where they're just clearly stalling for time until they can get more ground covered in Haiti through their military wing, and the United States and Noriega, with a wink and nod, is kind of letting them do that."
Kurzban says that because Aristide's opponents rejected Washington's plan, "the next step clearly is to send in some kind of UN peacekeeping force immediately."
"The question is," says Kurzban. "Will the international community stand by and allow a democracy in this hemisphere to be terminated by a brutal military coup of persons who have a very, very sordid history of gross violations of human rights?"
Democracy Now! is a nationally-syndicated radio and TV program broadcast on Pacifica Radio, NPR, community TV stations and Free Speech TV Channel 9415 of the DishNetwork. Mike Burke and Sharif Abdel Kouddous contributed to this report. They can be reached at: mail@democracynow.org. Reproduced from: www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/02/25/1613200
More Articles:
ESC: Act on Haiti now! 02.26.04
Haiti's Descent into Gang Warfare 02.24.04
Haiti still enslaved for all its rebellion 02.24.04
Beloved Haiti: A (Counter) Revolutionary Bicentennial 02.18.04
US Double Game in Hait 02.16.04
Haiti-A Call For Global Action 01.07.04
Haiti-A Call For Global Action - Part II 01.07.04
Media vs. Reality in Haiti 02.13.04
Hands off Haiti 02.17.04
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Who, and what, is behind US's recurrent drive to war?
Posted: Wednesday, February 25, 2004
By Stephen Gowans
February 18, 2004
When Sam Smith led the mob of angry white men that strung up a black man accused of a heinous crime, he faced a torrent of criticism.
When it turned out the victim was innocent, he faced more.
Smith didn't care. The victim was a ne'er-do-well. And he had taken over the victim's farm, and was running it at a profit for the first time ever.
The way Smith figured it, the world was better off without the victim, innocent or not.
Besides, what's a mob to do -- wait until it's absolutely clear a potential assailant is blameless? The victim surely had to bear some of the responsibility for not doing more to prove his innocence.
Few people found Smith's reasoning compelling.
When criticism persisted, Smith exploded. "I know in my heart and brain that white people ain't what's wrong in the world."
***
Defending his government's decision to invade Iraq on entirely spurious grounds, US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld declared, "I know in my heart and brain that America ain't what's wrong in the world."
If by America, Rumsfeld means Blair Doan, who works at the hardware store on Main Street, or Cynthia Firsby, a cubicle worker with Hewlett-Packard, he's right.
Doan and Firsby and hundreds of millions of other Americans ain't what's wrong in the world.
Rumsfeld is.
Or more precisely, what's wrong is the recurrent theme in US foreign policy of seeking to dominate foreign territory, a theme that has roots in capitalism itself, and spans Republican and Democratic administrations.
Rumsfeld, his cabinet colleagues, and British toadies, are mere agents, no more so, and no less so, than Bill Clinton, Lyndon Johnson and Harry Truman were agents of the same theme.
No more than the next Democrat president will be.
War isn't an aberration, the policy of hawks and neo-conservatives in power. It's an ongoing motif in US external relations.
And the reason why is war is good for business.
The destruction of Iraq by the US military has been a boon to weapons manufacturers like Lockheed-Martin, Raytheon, and Boeing, who depend on the Pentagon -- and a robust military budget -- to provide an unceasing flow of revenue.
These firms have an interest in a continually expanding war budget, and will see to it that there's no shortage of potential enemies whose demise must be presided over by the combined forces of the US Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines -- profitably equipped by the combined forces of Lockheed-Martin, Raytheon and so on.
Downstream, firms like Becthel (one of whose directors, George Shultz, led a committee that lobbied for the invasion of Iraq), Fluor, (Dick Cheney's old firm) Halliburton, and dozens of others, pocket billions of dollars in Iraq reconstruction contracts.
This is the charmed circle of US capitalism. Corporate America builds the bombs and missiles to destroy the infrastructure of other countries, and then moves in to rebuild what it has destroyed.
At a profit.
And spending on the military serves to combat the incessant danger of aggregate demand falling, and the economy slipping into recession, or worse.
Meanwhile, an endless round of tax cuts have relieved corporate America and its wealthy functionaries of their fair share of the tax load, so it's ordinary Americans who pay the bulk of the taxes to fund the merry-go-round of capital accumulation, not the corporations who profit from the "destroy it-rebuild it" cycle and not the wealthy investors who pocket the interest on bonds sold to finance the national debt that grows ever larger as military spending spirals ever upward.
It's no accident that things work out this way.
After all, who's running Washington?
You don't have to go far to run up against millionaires, former corporate directors and CEOs on sabbatical on Capitol Hill.
And it doesn't matter who's in power -- Republicans or Democrats. It's always the same.
In fact, all branches of government -- executive, legislative and bureaucratic -- to say nothing of the key positions in both major parties, are teeming with personnel drawn from corporate America. Just the kind of people who know a thing or two about the importance of new markets and new outlets for investment and how inimical taxes are to the expansion of capital.
What also makes war good for business is the practice of "smash it, reconstruct it" being applied to target countries that impose limits on American exports and investments, providing the benefit of expanding corporate America's vistas, once the target country's government is ousted, and a pro-US (trade and investment) regime is left in its place.
Iraq's economy was largely state-owned, hardly the kind of arrangement that corporate America's leaders, continually scouring the world for outlets for the profitable investment of their capital, looked upon kindly.
So, it's no accident that the US administrator in Iraq, Paul Bremer (himself plucked from the heights of corporate America), has set about making over Iraq into a Middle Eastern model of free trade, free enterprise and free markets (read: an economy open to US exports and investments.)
Similarly, US hostility to the government of Slobodan Milosevic had much to do with Serbia's refusal to jettison a socialist orientation, which limited US investment opportunities.
As the former communist countries of Eastern Europe embraced the free market, and breakaway republics of Yugoslavia elected neo-liberal reformers, Milosevic replied with a defiant rejection of privatization, free markets, and integration into Western capitalism.
Sanctions, subversion, bombardment from the air, the buying of the opposition, and finally a coup, put an end to Milosevic keeping part of the Yugoslav economy closed to corporate America.
So, Rumsfeld's right. America ain't what's wrong in the world.
It's the expansionist theme of US foreign policy, fueled by capitalism's drive to accumulate, that's wrong.
****
While Rumsfeld seeks to make ordinary Americans complicit in the Iraq war by using the inclusive "we" to draw them into the crime, Blair Doan and Cynthia Firsby should think twice about taking the bait.
Their inclusion is selective. They weren't consulted about the war; they didn't gather phony intelligence to contrive a sham casus belli; they didn't decide to defy the UN.
And yet Rumsfeld wants to make them accountable, because they're Americans. What's that got to do with it? They may be Americans, but they're hardly beneficiaries. On the contrary.
Billions of dollars in taxes are hoovered out of their pockets and injected directly into corporate America's collective bottom line.
And they're paying the opportunity cost of squandering America's enormous productive assets on the fevered pursuit of capital expansion, when they could be used to the benefit of the majority, to provide basic material needs, high quality education and universal health care, the kinds of benefits the USSR, Eastern European countries, and yes, Yugoslavia, used to provide all its citizens, despite having more modest productive assets; the kinds of benefits even Cuba -- poor, harassed and systematically disturbed for the last four decades -- provides universally.
Some 55,000 Iraqis have been killed so far, 13,000 herded into concentration camps (John Pilger, "Mass Deception," The Mirror, February 3, 2004).
The toll is monstrously high. We should be clear who -- and what -- is responsible.
It ain't ordinary Americans.
Reproduced from:
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The Myth of Black African Slave Traders
Posted: Sunday, February 15, 2004
by Ayanna www.rootswomen.com/ayanna
February 10, 2004
Islam, Colourism and the Myth of Black African Slave Traders
Africans in the Diaspora have the challenge of rewriting a history that has been stained by years of distortions, omission and downright lies. One of the biggest challenges of rewriting this history has been the Atlantic Slave Trade, and one of the biggest sore points has been the idea that "Black Africans sold their own into slavery". A lack of information, a paucity of expansive scholarship and an unwillingness to have a serious discourse on Colourism as it existed in Africa even before European intervention, has contributed to this. Diaspora Africans are often quite naïve and will do anything to hold fast to the illusion that " we are all Africans" and ignore the racism that has existed among a group that is far from uniform.
In looking at the issue of Colourism I could not help seeing the links between the role of Islam in Africa and the role of Africans in the slave trade. The book, Islam and the Ideology of Slavery by John Ralph Willis is very helpful in looking at the almost imperceptible link between the enslavement of 'kufir' non-Muslims or infidels, and the belief that Black Africans were not only heathens but inherently inferior. This is not a new thought and certainly not one that originated with the Muslims coming into Africa. Several Jewish exegetical texts have their own version of the mythical Curse of Ham being blackness. Given the common origins of these two major religions, it is thus not surprising that both Jews and Muslims played some of the most important roles in the enslavement of Black Africans next to the Europeans.
In an article by Oscar L. Beard, Consultant in African Studies called, Did We Sell Each Other Into Slavery? he says "Even the case of Tippu Tip may well fall into a category that we might call the consequences of forced cultural assimilation via White (or Red) Arab Conquest over Africa. Tippu Tip's father was a White (or Red) Arab slave raider, his mother an unmixed African slave. Tip was born out of violence, the rape of an African woman. It is said that Tip, a "mulatto", was merciless to Africans."
The story of Tippu Tip who is one of the most widely known slave traders has always posed a problem for historians, especially Afrocentric historians in the Diaspora trying to find some way to reconcile themselves to the idea of an 'African slave trader'. The fact that Tippu Tip was not only Muslim, but 'mulatto' is vital. The common ideology of Judaism and Islam where Black Africans are concerned is certainly no secret. While in some Islamic writings we see an almost mystical reverence for Africans, especially an over sexualized concept of Ethiopian women who were the preferred concubines of many wealthy Arab traders and Kings, in others there is distinct racism. Add to this the religious fervor of the Muslim invaders, their non-acceptance or regard for traditional African religions, and the obvious economic and political desires for which religion was used as a tool, and we get an excellent but little spoken of picture of Islam in Africa.
Historians did not often record or think of the ethnicity of these 'Africans' who sold their brothers and sisters into slavery. As part of our distorted historical legacy, we too in the Diaspora buy the idea that all Africans were uniform and 'brothers', but the true picture, especially at this time was not so. Centuries of contact with Europe, Asia, North Africa produced several colour / class gradients in the continent, divisions fostered by the foreigners. This may have been especially prominent in urban and economic centres. When we combine the converting, military force of Islam sweeping across western and eastern Africa placing a virtual economic stranglehold on villages and trading centers that were Kufir, with the intermixing of lighter-skinned Muslim traders from the North and East Africa creating an unprecedented population of mixed, lighter skinned Africans who began to form the elites of the trading classes we can see how a society begins to change.
Some historians have tended to downplay, or completely ignore the potential for change in scenario. It has even been suggested that one cannot transplant a modern day problem outside of its historical context. However, we see this creeping problem of colourism occurring all over the continent. In the Portuguese colonies of Angola and Mozambique where European traders and administrators were encouraged to intermarry, the elitist, trader class was largely Mulatto and Catholic. If we look at the situation in Ethiopia with the age-old oppression of the original Ethiopians, the Oromo of indigenous Cushitic stock, by the more Arabized Amhara this too has its roots in colour prejudice. There were hints of this occurring in many other instances at crucial points of contact between indigenous black Africans and lighter-skinned foreigners or mixed Africans and the most significant of these were in the areas of severe Islamic incursion.
Many towns and villages converted to Islam because of the protection that the military banner of Islam could offer them in a changing economic, political and social landscape. But the more damaging result was the many light skinned, converted Africans, children of mixed encounters that now felt a sense of superiority over their dark skinned, black African counterparts. Colourism is indeed of ancient vintage. The truth of the matter is that fair skinned Arabs' racist attitude towards Blacks existed even before they invaded Africa. The evidence for this can be found in how they dealt with the Black inhabitants of Southern Arabia before they entered Africa as Muslims. Discerning readers and thinkers can look at this and many other accounts of this time and get a clearer picture of the inherent racism of this situation. When we combine this with the desire for African slave labour by Europeans it was no large feat for these often lighter skinned, Islamized Africans to enslave the black kufir, whom they barely endowed with a shred of humanity. And of course jumping on their bandwagon would have been those black Africans with deep inferiority complexes, who would have been only too eager to do the duty of the 'superior' Muslims in an effort to advance themselves. These facts are certainly not hidden and the patterns are everywhere, even today but it is we who do not like to see. For centuries we certainly have not been conditioned for Sight.
This leads us to another direct way colourism played itself out in the slave trade and this is in the 'type' of Africans who were enslaved. The biggest victims of slavery were undoubtedly the darkest Africans of what was called the "Negroid" type. If you look at old maps and documents by early European explorers you can note that the parts of the continent that they explored was divided by their crude definitions of what they saw as different African ethnicities. The regions of West and Central Africa were seen as the place of the "Negroes" which was distinct from Ethiopian Africans and even more so the lighter, more Arabized North Africans. We cannot say that NO Africans we taken from the north, but by and large most slaves that came to the West Indies, Americas etc were of the type mentioned above.
Beard continues, "In reality, slavery is an human institution. Every ethnic group has sold members of the same ethnic group into slavery. It becomes a kind of racism; that, while all ethnic groups have sold its own ethnic group into slavery, Blacks can't do it. When Eastern Europeans fight each other it is not called tribalism. Ethnic cleansing is intended to make what is happening to sound more sanitary. What it really is, is White Tribalism pure and simple." But the thing is that this thing we call 'slavery' never was a uniform institution. When people speak of slavery they immediately think of chattel slavery as practiced as a result of the Atlantic Slave Trade and apply this definition to indigenous African servitude systems, which bore little or no resemblance to chattel slavery. It is misleading to say, "Every ethnic group has sold members of the same ethnic group into slavery. It becomes a kind of racism; that, while all ethnic groups have sold its own ethnic group into slavery, Blacks can't do it" as it denies the complexities of that particular colonial, chattel slavery situation that existed between Africans and Europeans.
Servitude systems that existed in Africa, and in other indigenous communities cannot be compared to racist slave systems in the Western world and to this day we attempt to try to see this slavery in the same context. People bring up accounts of Biblical slavery, of serfdom in Europe and yes, of servitude in Africa and attempt to paint all these systems with the same brush. However NO OTHER SLAVE SYSTEM has created the never-ending damaging cycle as the Atlantic Slave Trade. West Indian poet Derek Walcott has stated his feeling that our penchant for forgetting is a defense mechanism against pain, that if we were to take a good hard look at our history, at centuries of victimization, it would be too much for us to handle and we would explode. Well I say we are exploding anyway and in many cases from bombs that are not even our own. We have begun the long hard road of rewriting our ancient history, of recovering our old and noble legacy. Let us not stop and get cold feet now when the enemy now appears to take on a slightly darker hue. We must look at the slave trade in its OWN context, complete with all the historic and psychological peculiarities that have made it the single most damaging and enduring system of exploitation and hatred ever perpetrated in the recent memory of mankind. Until we do we will not escape its legacy.
From: www.rootswomen.com/ayanna/articles/10022004.html
Continue to: Slave? What Slave? :
A Study of the Traditional Systems of African Servitude
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Unnatural Selection
Posted: Wednesday, January 21, 2004
By Tim Wise, Zmag
For those who speak out against racism, learning to deal with people who disagree with you is a time-consuming process, and a talent that must be cultivated. This was made painfully clear this past week when I received an email claiming that people like me should give up the battle against racism, not because racism was good, but simply because it's a part of that oft-conjured thing we like to call "human nature."
To my e-communicant, racism should be accepted since people instinctively choose to associate with those most like themselves. Anti-racists are, to this way of thinking, tilting at windmills, wasting our time, even battling against hard-wired biological impulses that tend towards racial separatism.
Worse in some ways than overt bigots whose hatred can be ascribed to emotional problems beyond the scope of my expertise, the calm reassurances of the "racism is natural" folks always get to me, probably because such arguments tend to be mere rationalizations for the biases already held by the persons making the claim. See, they seem to be saying, "I may be racist, but that's a natural human instinct, so you can't judge me harshly for it."
As white nationalist Jared Taylor put it during our debate at Vanderbilt University last year, "Preferring members of one's own race is no different than having a preference for one's own children as opposed to those of one's neighbor."
Oddly, I've even had ostensible progressives and leftists assure me that racism is to some extent natural, usually as a way to shift discussion to topics with which they are more comfortable and to which they think our activist attentions should be shifted.
But while it's true that internalizing racist views in a racist culture is to be expected, given how such views are inculcated through media, schools, and other institutions, it is not the case that personal racism, separatism, or fear of racial others are normal. Instead, such things stem from the history of racial domination and subordination to which people have been subjected.
That racial separation and enmity are unnatural and learned conditions is proven most clearly not by sociologists but rather by children.
Put two-year olds of different "races" in a room with an assortment of toys and you'll see what I mean. Although certain kids will get along better with some of the rest of the group than others, their emerging affiliations will rarely if ever break down along racial lines, even if the children have never been around "other" race kids before.
Although children that age can discern differences in skin color, they are too young to have typically ascribed value to such a thing; as such they don't naturally fear those who look different, or cleave to those who look similar.
Children encountering other children (at least if they do so before being exposed to too much media imagery or other negative conditioning) naturally gravitate to a common and recognizable humanity. They realize instinctively what grown-ups too readily forget, or have been taught to ignore: namely, that in biological and genetic terms, there is no meaningful difference between so-called racial groups.
That racism and racial bonding are socially conditioned responses should be obvious from history. Had it been natural for people to "stick with their own kind," in the racial sense, there would have been no need for segregation laws to compel separation or ban so-called "race-mixing." It was precisely because separation was not natural enough for quite a few (beginning with slave masters), that states felt the need to limit contact between whites and people of color.
Furthermore, throughout American history there have been many examples where people of different "races" overlooked those differences to make common cause.
In the 1600s, it was fairly common for black slaves and poor Europeans (especially indentured servants) to join forces in rebellion against the colonial elite. Recognizing their common economic interest, they fomented insurgencies that prompted the gentry to develop more intense forms of racial division so as to foster separation where it had not existed before.
For example, only in the wake of cross-racial uprisings like Bacon's Rebellion did elites begin to develop the concept of "the white race." Previously, lower-class Europeans had hardly been seen as part of a common family with the aristocracy. But in order to unite the masses behind the economic engine of slavery and solidify their position at the top of the nation's hierarchy, elites began to speak of "white people" united by a common culture, all of whom should be granted certain rights and privileges above all non-whites.
By granting the right to participate in white supremacy to persons at the bottom of the caste structure (via such mechanisms as slave patrols), the ruling class offered a stake in the system to those without a pot to piss in. It wasn't much, but it was enough to divide and conquer those who previously had worked together for common interests.
And it wasn't only for rebellion that blacks and whites commingled. Indeed, the residential proximity of Italians to blacks, and the comity that prevailed between the two groups in places like New Orleans, often led white elites to viciously repress the Italian community, so as to punish them for their transgressions against white bonding.
Likewise, though Irish immigrants were implored by their leaders at home to join the anti-slavery cause and ally themselves with blacks, political circumstance and the desire to enter the circle of privilege caused most to abandon solidarity and cast their lot with the white establishment.
Simple logic also compels a rejection of the "racism is natural" school of thought. Though people may feel more comfortable with those who are like themselves, this fact fails to establish that racial separation, let alone racism, is a natural condition. After all, there are many categories that the human mind could choose to prioritize as it goes about the business of deciding who is "like" and who is "unlike" oneself.
One could make weight, height, or some other attribute the primary dividing line of who is "in" and who is "out" when it comes to the circle of the accepted. Skin color (the attribute traditionally used to mark "race") is not any more natural as a dividing line than any of these other points of demarcation. As such, the two related decisions--first to place race above all other things, and then to delineate races by such outward appearance differences as skin color--are indeed decisions, not instinctual responses.
And when it comes to feeling more comfortable with those like oneself, how can any white American suggest they have more in common with a refugee from Central Europe (perhaps a Serb or Croat) than with those African Americans whose families have been in this country for generations and who share many elements of a common culture?
Far from natural, racial bias stems from propaganda. If people are told repeatedly that certain folks make bad neighbors, drive down property values, or bring crime to a neighborhood, they will likely come to believe these things, with or without first-hand evidence for such beliefs.
Even those who think their experiences justify their prejudice can only say such a thing because of selective memory: the decision to discount experiences that run counter to stereotype, and recall only those that confirm what they have been encouraged to believe. This is why whites can continue to fear blacks even though most of us have been victimized far more often by other whites, whether it is as violent attackers, shifty landlords, or pushy bosses.
Interestingly, those who claim racism and racial separation are natural often say other things that undercut their position. For example, I'm often told by these types that the reason they dislike or fear people of color is because of bad experiences with such persons in the past.
Putting aside the obvious irrationality of judging a group based on the actions of an unrepresentative sample of its members, there is a more important issue as regards the question of racism's "naturalness." Namely, if experience led us to feel the way we do about certain groups, then our feelings are not natural at all; they did not exist prior to the experiences we claim animate our current fear, dislike, or discomfort; and the fact that they exist now only attests to the experiential and environmental influences that engender feelings of racial amity or enmity.
Furthermore, if racial bonding were as natural as some claim, one would expect the process to play out roughly the same in all "racial" groups, though it doesn't. Blacks, for example, express significantly greater desire than whites to live in racially mixed neighborhoods, with the most commonly desired mix being about 50-50 black and non-black.
Most whites, on the other hand, say they prefer no more than 10 percent people of color in their neighborhoods. Likewise, when asked by pollsters, whites are 45 percent more likely than blacks to say that it's best for people to "stick with their own kind" in the racial sense.
Asian Pacific Islanders and Latinos too have high rates of intermarriage with whites, and rarely seek to avoid whites the way whites seek to avoid being around "too many" people of color.
On college campuses, where students of color are often criticized for "sticking together" and ostensibly self-segregating, the fact is that it is whites who are most likely to racially separate themselves. Black students are 2.5 times more likely than white students to dine or study with persons of a different race; Asians are three times more likely to do so; and Latinos are nearly four times more likely than whites to dine or study across racial lines.
Indeed, it was in part the openness of African and indigenous American cultures, and their relative lack of racial "consciousness" that rendered them vulnerable to conquest, enslavement and colonization. In other words, some folks appear more likely to engage in racial "othering," and those most susceptible (at least in the U.S.) are white.
Even the notion that preferring members of one's own racial group is no different than preferring one's own children to the children of others is absurd. After all, since when have "whites" thought of ourselves as one family? We certainly didn't think that way in Europe, when the English were slaughtering the Irish; or when the Normans set out to vanquish the Saxons.
The notion of a white family is a concept with a very short pedigree, concocted for the purpose of defending the oppression of non-Europeans, and for no other reason.
That some choose to exclude others from their circle of family or friends on the basis of race, or prefer to live amongst only those of their own race, is not, in other words, a benign and natural process. It is not akin to looking over a menu at your favorite restaurant, and then choosing the pasta dish over the filet mignon; and those who proclaim it is are guilty of the crassest rationalization for prejudice ever devised: the notion that they just can't help it.
To whatever extent we experience our racially-exclusionary "choices" as natural, we must yet come to realize the ways in which our choices have been circumscribed by material forces set in place long before we were born. Those forces are not our fault, but learning to confront and overcome them is our responsibility.
If there are some who prefer to maintain the divisions established long ago by others, so be it, but they should at least have the decency not to insult the rest of us by calling their own pathology normal.
Tim Wise is an antiracist essayist, activist and father. He can be reached at timjwise@msn.com. Hate mail, though not appreciated, will nonetheless be graded for originality, form and grammar. Extra credit will be awarded for the most creative death threat, most colorful use of the phrase "race traitor" and/or "Dirty Jew," and most inventive suggestion as to what the author can do to himself.
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Martin Luther King in the American Psyche
Posted: Monday, January 19, 2004
By Rootsie, www.rootsie.com
Every school in the United States has its obligatory Martin Luther King Day 'celebration.' It is interesting to ask students what they know about Dr. King:
"He got freedom for black people."
"He believed the races should get together."
"He believed in love."
"He got assassinated by a racist guy."
"He had a dream."
Once the little ones are finished decorating their papers with butterflies, rainbows, and flowers, perhaps it's time to ask, as I did:
"Did you know he was beaten and arrested many times?"
"No."
"Did you know his house was firebombed?"
"No."
"Did you know he knew he was going to be killed for the work he did?"
"No."
"Did you know he spoke out against the Vietnam war, and was assassinated shortly after?"
"No."
"Well what kind of man do these things say he was?"
"Brave."
"And who did all these things to him?"
"White people."
"From where?"
"The United States."
"Are those people gone now?"
"Well they don't do those things anymore."
"Well they killed him, didn't they? Don't you think they would feel pretty good about that?"
"Well yes."
"So are they gone now? Where did they go?"
At this point there would be many places to take such a conversation, from atrocities like Richard Byrd or the MOVE massacre, to government complicity in his harassment and assassination, to the lived reality of racism today in the United States.
But Dr. King has been colonized, co-opted as some sort of poster child for America's illusion of racial harmony. I remember how white people in the North feared Malcolm X and loved Dr. King; they ignored his militancy and embraced him as a 'good black.' He knew he would be silenced, and by whom. He knew that the moment Malcolm X spoke out on the international stage, he was quickly murdered. And yet Dr. King persisted.
But we don't want to talk about revolutionary spirit. We want our children indoctrinated into the idea that 'democratic processes' work, that if someone has a problem they must simply speak out and the government will write a new law to help them out. The assassination of Dr. King is viewed as anomalous to his work, and not as the inevitable result of it. In the North especially, people could shake their heads and cluck sadly about those 'Southern crackers.'
'Freedom fighter."
"Revolutionary."
"Radical."
None of these are used to describe Dr. King, and they would not be appropriate to describe the whitewashed version of him that has been constructed over the past 35 years. On this day, Americans are not encouraged to take a cool look at their history, and they are certainly not invited to reflect on what has become of Dr. King's 'dream.' Their president appointed a racist judge to a Federal bench while a filibustering Congress was out of town, and last year to celebrate he announced a lawsuit against the University of Michigan's affirmative action policies.
They are encouraged to dreamily dream a self-satisfied and self-serving dream. Howard Dean a few weeks ago insinuated in a speech that there are no racial issues in America, and that suits us just fine. We can listen to the 'I Have a Dream' speech and get teary-eyed. We can celebrate Dr. King's dream, but in no way are we willing to face his reality.
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Namibia: Whites could be killed
Posted: Monday, January 12, 2004
www.news24.com
Berlin - A high-ranking representative of the Herero tribe in Namibia said there could be a Zimbabwe-style backlash against ethnic German whites if Berlin refuses to pay reparations.
"Don't forget, our young generation does not have the angelic patience of the elders," Mburumba Kernina, an advisor to Herero Paramount Chief Kuaima Riruako, told Berlin daily, Der Tagesspiegel.
"If there is not agreement (on reparations), they will probably take matters into their own hands. What happened in Zimbabwe can easily repeat itself here," referring to the eviction of white farmers - sometimes violently - orchestrated by President Robert Mugabe in the name of land reform.
Germany's ambassador to Namibia, Wolfgang Massing, at a ceremony on Sunday expressed "regret" over the ruthless quelling of a Herero tribe uprising 100 years ago in which tens of thousands were killed by German troops.
His statement is the closest a German government representative has come to an apology - a demand repeatedly made by the Herero - for what historians have described as a genocide. But he stopped short of offering reparations.
The Herero have filed a lawsuit in the United States demanding payment from the German government and companies which allegedly benefited from German rule.
"The future of this country - reconciliation, development and security - depends on the outcome of the suit against Germany," Kerina said.
Namibia has a population of 1.82 million people, of whom about 25 000 people are German-speaking whites, most of them descendants of colonists.
Since 1990, Germany, Namibia's largest donor, has pumped $644m into the southern African country.
Source: www.news24.com
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Colorism
Posted: Friday, January 9, 2004
By Armstrong Williams
January 24, 2002
armstrongwilliams.echurchonline.com
Three prominent black Americans stud the cover of the current edition of Newsweek. Each is accoutered in a dark, well-tailored suit and bears a look of calm dignity. The caption reads, "The New Black Power: Ability, Opportunity and the Rise of Three of the Most Important CEOs in America."
It is nice that black Americans have pushed so far into the mainstream. Plainly these three men - Franklin Raines, Barry Rand, and Lloyd Ward-have seared through the competition to take possession of wealth and prominence.
So why am I hung up on the fact that each one is fair enough in complexion to pass for white?
Perhaps because there still resides in this culture a perception that the European aesthetic is ideal. Perhaps because we have been conditioned to believe that lighter skin equals success. Perhaps because-even in this modern, multicultural, multiethnic society-some black Americans continue to hate their dark skin, their hair, their lips. And perhaps because people of color continue to savage one another with pernicious little distinctions between dark and fair skin-a strain of prejudice dubbed "colorism."
Deborah Mathis, a syndicated columnist with Tribune Media, recalls an early taste of colorism. Upon graduation from high school in 1971, she applied for a sales position at a posh jewelry store. "You have such a light complexion," the employer effused with obvious delight.
"I was disgusted," recalls Mathis. "I remember thinking, what do you want to phase in integration a little drop at a time?"
Time and again Mathis has seen witnessed colorism snaking its way through the workplace. "I just think that there is an unspoken cultural attitude among white and blacks alike," observes Mathis, "that if you have a fair-skinned black in there, they are probably more like white people than are darker skinned blacks. ... I think white people feel more comfortable around fairer skinned black people..."
Felipe Luciano, a reporter for the New York affiliate of Fox 5, has smacked directly into that sort of cultural conditioning. "I' appear on black forums all the time, but I've never been invited on a Latino forum," says the mocha-skinned Latino. "On radio, but not on TV. I've even had ad executives say that I was too dark and that wouldn't sell."
This brand of racism is particularly insidious because it is subtle. Unlike the time when racists donned pointed hats and stomped down the streets, the colorist is subtle, their contempt concealed beneath the still waters of social etiquette.
To some degree this fair-skinned fetish is hangover from slavery, when light skinned blacks and, in particular, mulatto children were granted more privileges than the other slaves. Over time, a hierarchy of sorts developed around the idea that fair skin was more socially palatable.
This yearning by black to seem like their oppressors was perfectly embodied by the narrator in Maya Angelou's, I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings: "Wouldn't they be surprised when one day I woke out of my black ugly dream, and my real hair, which was long and blond, would take the place of the kinky mass Momma wouldn't let me straighten? My light-blue eyes would hypnotize them ..."
For decades, the notion that lighter skin equals success continued to be reinforced through our popular culture. "If you look at the first people who were on the air in television, you didn't have the dark-skinned black anchor on there," snorts Mathis. "Even today, every time they want to portray a big, black menace, he is really big and he is really black."
"Are there any Latino pop stars, movie stars, or TV stars that are black?" wonders Luciano. He pauses for a moment, then answers his own question: "Other than subsidiary roles of maids or crooks, there are essentially none. All the soaps on Spanish TV have protagonists with straight hair, light skin and European features."
To some degree, the 70's birthed a countermovement amongst people of color that eschewed the European aesthetic in favor of a more self-consciously African model. Groups like The Black Panthers, SNIC, and Nation of Islam demanded that one's blackness was a source of pride, not to be repressed or twisted inward. Sadly, says Luciano, the movement also birthed a certain resentment toward the European aesthetic that manifested itself in a form of reverse racism directed at fair skinned people of color.
So how precisely does a minority succeed in this world and still manage to keep one's unique identity in tact? Does one assimilate and consciously try to go about things as Caucasians do? Or does one shake one's fist at the ruling class, utterly embrace his unique heritage, and all but guarantee that he remains marginalized and the social hierarchy remains unaltered?
These are tough questions. The answer is twofold: It begins with a certain pride in one's own unique heritage. It is sustained with intelligence. The combination of the two can largely murder colorism. There must also be a dedication on the grass roots level to pressure advertisers into reflecting the full spectrum of the community.
With pride, academics, and some not-so-subtle shifts in our popular cultural myths, we may finally move beyond such destructive and arbitrary judgments as whether one is too light or too dark.
http://armstrongwilliams.echurchonline.com/
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Dr. Jacob Hudson Carruthers, passed over
Posted: Wednesday, January 7, 2004
From: Prof. Tony Martin
Professor Jacob Carruthers' Biography
Dr. Jacob H. Carruthers made his transition this morning, January 4, 2004 at 9:38 a.m. Chicago Time into the realm of the ancestors. His spirit soars as I write these words. These tears are mixed with joy and sadness that I must tell you of his passing. Please do not be distressed, for his love and joy will live on forever.
His magnificent works will lead us into the future and assured liberation for our people. The Creator knew what was best for my teacher, my friend, my mentor, my brother and all the other things he has meant to me and so many others around the world. He is truly loved. There is a hole in my heart and I feel so sad yet, I rejoice in knowing one of the most brilliant men I have ever met in my lifetime.
Jake is a genius and will serve us well among the ranks of Dr. Clarke, Dr. Williams, Dr. Diop, Dr. McIntyre, et al. and for that I am grateful.
The Association for the Study of Classical African Civilizations (ASCAC) asks for prayers and libations of all Africans for safe passage of the Ka of our youngest ancestor as he begins his initiation into eternity.
Know that you are loved by me and the ASCAC family as we all continue to build for eternity.
neb ankh, udjah, seneb, mi Ra djet (May you have all life, prosperity and health like the sun forever !!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Queen Nzinga Ratibisha Heru, International President
Maa Kheru 'True of Voice'
Dr. Jacob Hudson Carruthers ~ Jedi Shemsu Jehewty
Cage Memorial Chapel
7651 S. Jeffery Blvd
Chicago, Illinois 60649
(773) 721-8900
Visitation: Thursday January 8, 2004
12 noon until 8:00 PM
Services well be held Friday January 9, 2004
at St. James United Methodist Church
4611 South Ellis Ave.
Chicago, Illinois 60653
(773) 285-4244
Visitation: 10-11 AM
Services: 11 AM
Works By Dr. Jacob Hudson Carruthers
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