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| Socialist
Party
USA:
Statements |
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Solidarity with the People of Haiti
passed by
the National Action Committee, January 13, 2010
The Socialist Party
USA stands in solidarity with the people of Haiti after the devastating
earthquake that hit the island. Estimates of the dead are more than one
hundred thousand and significant parts of the capital city
Port-au-Prince’s infrastructure have been destroyed. The full extent of
the damage will not be known for days and the country seems certain to
be thrust into a humanitarian crisis even more serious than the one
that exists on a daily basis.
While
this disaster has natural origins, it occurred within a nation that had
already been ravaged by capitalism. Haiti is a model case for the
failure of the neoliberal economic model and the negative legacies of
US militarism in the region.
After
coming out of the vicious dictatorship of 'Baby Doc' Duvalier in the
late 1980s, the country was saddled by massive debt payments to the IMF
and World Bank. When the “people’s priest” Jean Bertran-Aristide was
elected to the presidency in 1990 new hopes for change were raised.
Aristide promised to move beyond a government of the elites and to
challenge the IMF free-market model. His administration was then
brought down by a violent military coup backed by the US military.
After a direct US military occupation, Aristide returned to office,
agreed to implement the IMF plans and was again removed by a military
coup. The already weak Haitian economy spiraled, creating mass
unemployment and suffering.
As
multinational companies exited the country, they left behind ecological
and economic devastation. Large swaths of the countryside have been
de-forested rendering them useless for cultivation. Even before the
earthquake, the urban infrastructure was in decay, suffering from a
lack of investment for decades. In a final humiliation, a few months
before the earthquake, a group of multinational investors assembled in
Port-au-Prince to create a plan to return to exploiting the population.
Despite
all of this, the Haitian people have continued to struggle for justice.
In their trade unions, cooperatives and women organizations, poor and
working Haitians have kept alive the legacy of struggle born in the
great Haitian Revolution of the 18th century. Such grassroots
democratic struggles offer the best hope for the future of the island.
The
Socialist Party USA encourages our members and supporters to get
involved with efforts to provide relief to earthquake victims. There
are many organizations engaged in this effort including the Haiti
Emergency Relief Fund which has supported grassroots democratic
struggles in Haiti since 2004. The history of Haiti offers a reminder
that democratic socialism must offer a vision that transcends national
borders in order to create a global society based on solidarity,
compassion and justice.
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