* * * HAITI INFO * * * News direct from the people and organizations of Haiti's democratic and popular movement 12 November 1995, Vol. 4, #2 Contents: Stories: WERLEIGH SWORN IN FOR "100 DAYS" CRIMINAL ATTACK ON DEPUTIES GOURDE DROPPING "INFORMAL SECTOR" CONFERENCE MAYOR IS ANGRY STATE WORKER STRIKES END DRUG BUST IN JACMEL "DEVELOPMENT" BATTLE U.S. TO RETURN FRAPH PAGES Stories: WERLEIGH SWORN IN FOR "100 DAYS" PORT-AU-PRINCE, Nov. 11 - At a moment when it is becoming more and more difficult to conciliate the interests of the imperialists (the neoliberal agenda, privatization, etc.) and the demands of the population, this week Claudette Werleigh was sworn in as Prime Minister. Werleigh is well-known in government and non-governmental circles. She worked at Catholic Relief Services and then for CARITAS, serving as its Caribbean director from 1976-1987, and also for Institut de Technologie et d'Animation (ITECA). During the coup d'etat, was a director of the Washington Office on Haiti. She served as Minister of Social Affairs during the Ertha Pascale Trouillot government, was in Prime Minister Rene Preval's private cabinet in 1991, and was Minister of Foreign Affairs under Robert Malval and Smarck Michel. Her husband, George, was a founding member of the party PANPRA, which supported the coup. He has since resigned. Werleigh faces daunting tasks during a term she has said will last 100 days: assuage the country's clamor for disarmament and justice; answer people's demands for a lower cost of living and jobs; organize and pull off presidential elections, despite continued protests from the political "particles," and resume "negotiations" with the multilateral institutions or face the consequences: the non-delivery of "aid" and loans. In the meantime, in addition to the protests over the attack on the deputies, the population appears to be running out of patience: this week students in Grand-Goave and Carrefours closed down the main highway in protests over inadequate conditions in their schools, 1,000 parents in Acul-du-Nord blocked the same road in the north and threw rocks at police demanding, for the second time this fall, the revocation of a corrupt public school director, and popular organization members in Archaie blocked the highway in protest of the fact that President Jean-Bertrand Aristide has not come through on promises he made to the community when he visited there in May. Werleigh's Pledges In her speeches before the Senate and Chamber of Deputies, Werleigh said she was conscious that she was taking her new job at a very difficult moment. The immediate objectives of her government, she said, were: the presidential elections; the deployment of the new police force; the launching of a literacy campaign; the stimulation of food crop production; reforms in the public administration, including fighting corruption; fiscal reforms, including increasing the state's revenues; regularizing the "Tenth Department's" status, and aid for coup victims. Werleigh faced some of the population's demands head-on, declaring that political, social, culture and economic justice are her central goals. She promised justice for the victims of the coup, an emphasis on women's rights, "economic justice seated on political stability" and social justice, including the "reinsertion" of all those left by the wayside (street children, landless peasants, slum residents), and the "equitable partitioning of the riches produced by this country." The new prime minister also said she would work to reduce the Haitian economy's dependence, but aside from that vague promise, she generally stayed away from directly addressing the other tough issue she faces: the neoliberal reforms agreed to by the Aristide government in 1994, which today the "international community" continues to demand, and which stand in the way of many of her promises. Instead, she revealed she will have a pragmatic approach: "We should not hang our hat higher than our hand can reach." Parliamentarians Comment During two rigorous days of hearings, Deputies and Senators grilled Werleigh on the points of her program, and predictably, put the emphasis on justice, the high cost of living and the economic reforms. One of the main concerns of many speakers was the lack of disarmament, and their fears were obviously justified. They also repeatedly denounced U.S. imperialist policies in general, the lack of justice, and the failure of the government to "de- macoutize" the public administration. Many said they opposed privatization. Saying that the enterprises should not be sold in a "fire sale" just because of past bad management, Senator Renauld Bernadin noted that in the 1991 negotiations with the multilaterals, "the word 'privatization' was excluded from the conversation." In 1991, Werleigh replied, Aristide "had the force to say: 'Look at what I want.' In 1995 the situation is not the same." However, she said that if the parliament and executive work together, "the interlocutor cannot tell you what to do." There are positive elements in Werleigh's program, but without questioning her sincerity, when taking into account the general situation - the occupation, the imperialist presence, the government's practically non-existent margin of maneuver, a term that is supposedly only 100 days long and at a moment when the Haiti's dependence in all domains has never been higher - one cannot keep people from remarking on the idealism and naivete of its promises. CRIMINAL ATTACK ON DEPUTIES PORT-AU-PRINCE, Nov. 12 - The country reacted with outrage and revulsion to the commando-style attack on two new deputies on Nov. 7 that left one dead and the other, as well as a passerby, seriously injured. Dozens of homes were burned and sacked and three are dead in Les Cayes, there were demonstrations in the capital and Cap-Haitien, and all over the country, organizations and individuals have taken to the airwaves to denounce the atmosphere of impunity fostered by "reconciliation" without justice, as well as the lack of disarmament. Deputy Jean Hubert Feuille (Port Salut, Aristide's hometown), who died almost immediately, was a cousin and former bodyguard of Aristide's, spent three years in exile. He and Deputy Gabriel Fortune (Les Cayes), who is recovering from bullet wounds, both ran for office under the Lavalas platform (B Tab La) banner. The attack occurred only a few hours after Claudette Werleigh was sworn in and only one day after the date for the presidential elections (Dec. 17) was announced. Fortune, who spoke on the radio Friday for the first time, said it was clearly a political attack, and that the assassin's car had been waiting near his home, and also that since then, his family has been receiving threats. He said he blamed "the international community" for not carrying out a full disarmament program. Official Government Reactions Following the shooting, President Jean-Bertrand Aristide immediately called for complete disarmament, saying: "We are still working for peace and nobody can stop us... Disarmament was never done the way we wanted it... The people who stole power... are still making the blood flow." At Feuille's funeral today he was even more adamant. Aware that the U.N. and U.S. troops are being held responsible for the murder because of the non-disarmament following the invasion, the U.N. called for people to denounce caches of arms so they can seize them. Prime Minister Claudette Werleigh immediately called for her ministers to take all steps necessary to find the killers. Police have been conducting a number of searches, most notably of the homes of three ex-Haitian Army officers, including ex-Gen. Prosper Avril, who escaped and is in the Colombian embassy. Police reportedly found large arms caches, and have been hinting at the involvement of Avril and his new political party. They have offered a 50,000-gourde reward for information leading to the crime's solution. Parliament adjourned for two days, but Senators and Deputies were repeatedly on the radio this week, denouncing the lack of disarmament. The Senate Bureau issued a press release demanding the government to "execute... the law of Dec. 29, 1994, prohibiting the existence of paramilitary groups." Mayor Joseph Emmanuel "Manno" Charlemagne said: "'Pastoral' work is finished. Reconciliation does not give us anything." Yesterday, police announced a systematic arms-search operation in the capital for the next few weeks, during which five teams of 50 officers each will sweep neighborhoods. Protests Show People's Anger The populations of Port Salut and nearby Les Cayes reacted immediately. In Les Cayes, hundreds took to the streets to denounce "reconciliation," erecting barricades and protesting until midnight on Nov. 7 and all day on Nov. 8. At least two-dozen homes and stores, which people said belonged to those associated with the army or the CIA-linked FRAPH (Front pour l'Avancement et le Progres Haitien), were sacked and or burned, and over six automobiles were torched. The population's searches turned up dozens of guns it turned over to U.N. soldiers. In Cayes, Joseph Hugh Estanvil, reportedly a former FRAPH spokesman, was beaten to death. Two others were killed in nearby Chantal. U.N. forces and local police intervened, providing protection for ex-army officers in Cayes on May 7 and more recently patrolling the city, which yesterday could have been described as "occupied," with armed soldiers on every corner. The Cape also erupted, with barricades and burning tires. The city was closed down for at least one day, and popular organizations denounced reconciliation and have called for full disarmament. Today, protests erupted and tires were burnt in many neighborhoods around the capital to denounce reconciliation and demand justice. GOURDE DROPPING PORT-AU-PRINCE, Nov. 10 - Over the past month, the gourde has dropped, losing about 16 percent of its value in relation to the U.S. dollar (going from about US$.066 to US$0.055) in a context where the economy remains weak and the government is more and more dependent on foreign "aid" and loans. The tension between the Jean-Bertrand Aristide and the U.S. government does not hint at anything good, since U.S. currency is an important instrument of pressure in an extrovert, dollarized economy. Low Exports & High Imports A big part of the problem, which the Aristide government has not yet addressed, is that Haiti is living way beyond its means. Imports - which include a burgeoning increase in consumption of luxury items like US$50,000-four wheel drive vehicles (Mitsubishis, Toyotas and even Mercedes "jeeps") that dominate the roadways more each day - are increasing in inverse proportion to the drop in exports. According to the Inter Press Service (IPS), during the first six months of 1995, Haiti imported four times more goods than it exported: imports totalled US$265 million but exports were only US$65 million. This situation has a direct impact on the relation between the supply and demand of dollars. U.S. Holding Up Cash Related to the rise in cost of the dollar is the U.S. government's recent decision to pressure the Aristide government by withholding US$4.6 million of its promised "aid." Late last month, the U.S. Agency for International Development (AID) told IPS that the U.S. was blocking the money because Haiti halted negotiations with the international institutions and has not moved fast enough in its "structural adjustment," which includes privatization. "There are certain conditions waiting to be completed," U.S. AID told IPS. "We're still waiting for them to approve a scope of work for broad civil service reform and to prepare options for a second round of privatizations." (This week the European Union said it will also hold up the second part of a previously arranged grant, pending resumption of negotiations with the multilateral institutions.) Added to those pressures, speculation on the dollar continues. There are a number of new banks, many founded during the coup era, which, rather than investing, use their cash to gamble for dollars. The change in government, anticipation of elections, strikes and "insecurity" are certainly causing them and many others to speculate more furiously. "INFORMAL SECTOR" CONFERENCE PORT-AU-PRINCE, Nov. 7 - Anyone who has visited Port-au-Prince lately knows that cars can no longer get down some streets and that every inch of "free" space - parking spots, tiny patches of grass and street corners - is now home to new businesses. Hundreds of thousands of Haitians, the overwhelming majority of them women, sell used clothing and shoes, fruits and vegetables, old books, cooked meals, toothpaste, bouillon cubes, fried snacks, and almost everything else imaginable, trying to earn a few gourdes so they can make it through the day. Men operate "garages," little more than a space by the curb where they work with jury-rigged tools, or pull huge loads on two-wheeled carts. These people, the majority of the population, have lost their jobs or never had one, they were thrown off their land by thugs or money-lenders or out of their homes, and they end up in street- peddling, prostitution, day-labor, house servant jobs, etc. This phenomenon is related to the agrarian crisis which is the major reason for the massive rural-urban migration and the quick development of this sector of petty jobs. [Haiti Info will analyze the phenomenon in depth in the future.] "People who speak French call it the 'informal sector' but we call it the 'fringe sector,'" wrote a recent edition of Aksyon Travaye, (Workers' Action), a bulletin of Aksyon Katolik Ouvriye (ACO) (Catholic Workers' Action). "Ever since the sieve-embargo, the 'fringe sector' has been taking over," the journal continued. "Factories have not started up again, unemployment is all over the place. Today we see lots of little 'projects,' high-intensity labor jobs for a couple of weeks, that's all the country's leaders are encouraging... and that is directly tied to the informal sector's growth. The question everyone is asking is, in the new global division of labor, is Haiti just going to be a marketplace? Will the 'fringe sector' continue to be the number one activity of the economy?... Won't work which gives liberty and dignity disappear if the 'fringe sector' takes over?" Understanding the causes of the ballooning of the "informal sector" and coming up with strategies to fight its exploitation was the subject of a recent three-day meeting hosted by the Haiti chapter of ACO and attended by over 30 people, mostly women: delegates from the Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, Martinique and Haiti as well as members of local women's groups and several priests. The final report has not yet come out, but what follows are some of the ideas that were discussed. Participants' Discussions "Because of globalization and neoliberalism, our countries and our islands are more and more dependent on the big powers," explained Adriano Rosario, from the D.R. and the regional coordinator of the Catholic workers' movement. "Because of this, our local production drops. Every day, our money loses more and more buying power, which produces unemployment, prevents our families from obtaining education, health care, housing, food... Because of this, people, mostly women, create little businesses in order to survive. This is called the 'informal sector.'" Mathilde Florville, a local ACO leader, denounced neoliberalism as "a machine that kills because it manufactures poverty: there are no jobs, no money, no health, no education," and women, many of them caring for households on their own, are the first to suffer. She noted: "The foreign debt keeps growing and the IMF [International Monetary Fund] keeps making demands." Florville said the people trying to survive in the "informal sector" need to organize to defend their rights. The different delegations attending the meeting reported on the "informal sector" in their countries. The Haitian delegation estimated that the number of people engaged in the sector doubled during the coup d'etat era to about 700,000, 70% of them women, and although some get the necessary capital from borrowing clubs or savings or working as a maid or a prostitute, most borrow it at usurious interest rates: at least 25% to 30% per month. Buying a carton of canned milk or frozen (imported) turkey parts and selling it in detail, a woman can sometimes earn enough to ward off hunger for herself and her children for a day or two, the study said, but never enough to pay for school, and many times not even to pay the rent. In contrast, hefty profits go to the foreign producers and the local business people who sell to the peddlers. The study from the Dominican Republic determined that each woman involved in "informal" activities there cares for four children; that 80% can read and write and that 80% rent their housing. In Nicaragua, undergoing an IMF "structural adjustment program" which has eliminated many achievements of the Sandinista government, privatization and plant closings have caused many to lose their jobs, forcing them into the "informal sector." The Martinique participants reported that although laid-off workers can get unemployment benefits, many people are not eligible and end up selling food, working as day-laborers, selling used clothing or finding jobs on the street, like washing cars or carrying boxes. Need to Organize and Struggle The participants spent the three days discussing those and other specifics and coming up with strategies to fight for their rights. They targeted the usurers: "To the market lady, the money-lender is the IMF, because he lends 500 dollars and demands 700 dollars back 24 days later." Another big challenge, the participants determined, is "informal sector" people's lack of consciousness and understanding, or even the opportunity to advance their understanding, since few belong to organizations and because they live very unstable existences. Cooperation, consciousness-raising, and organization are crucial, they decided. Because the majority of the sector is women, fighting for women's rights is also a key part of the struggle. "Only through organizing will we be able to fight this situation," one document concluded, and called for: campaigns against IMF policies; that governments take their responsibilities and defend people; that women receive the same education and training as men so they have the option of working as skilled laborers (carpenters, electricians, mechanics, etc.), and for the strengthening of the "chain of solidarity" between the workers of different countries. The participants were conscious that the "informal sector" can never substitute for jobs which give someone dignity and independence and help her or him care for the family: "The 'informal sector' makes the rich richer and the poor poorer," they concluded. Throughout the three days, the participants sang songs like the following, showing their determination: "Let's fight to not lose the struggle, it's a terrible and difficult struggle, but the people will not abandon us in our fight to defeat misery! "Where are you, Caribbean people? We are here more than ever! "Where are you, exploited people? We are here more than ever! "Where are you combative people? We are here more than ever! "Where are you, those demanding change? We are here more than ever! Stand up strong!" [Translated from Creole] MAYOR IS ANGRY PORT-AU-PRINCE, Nov. 9 - Three months after being installed as mayor of Port-au-Prince, Joseph Emmanuel "Manno" Charlemagne is frustrated and angry. In different interviews, Charlemagne has variously denounced the U.S. government's pressure on him, corruption within the public administration and also a lack of support from President Jean- Bertrand Aristide. He has said that, aside from a one million gourde-loan from the president's office to pay employees' back salaries, he has no money, no equipment and that his only fax machine came from Aristide's office-in-exile. Because "aid" has strings attached, he explained, he has taken two fund-raising trips to the U.S., where he met with Jesse Jackson, Washington Mayor Marion Barry and attended the annual Congressional Black Caucus dinner, to look for money. Just back from a two-week trip, Charlemagne sat down with Haiti Info to share some of his ideas on the problems and how he wants to solve them. The conversation revealed interesting aspects but it also showed his contradictions which stem from a situation that was largely predictable. Questions & Responses Asked about his plans for reforms, Charlemagne immediately seized on City Hall's financial problems and lack of independence. "We want full autonomy, including taxation, including the ministries and the palace. We want to collect the taxes," he said, and added that in its current state, the Direction Generale des Impts, is totally "corrupt and rotten." He is also angry at the elite. "I always say we don't have a bourgeoisie, we have a 'lumpen- bourgeoisie.' A bourgeoisie that was serious would get together and organize so that, when the rain falls, we are not invaded by mud. They would say, 'Guys, let's buy a drag. Let's embarrass the state.' No, their money, they reinvest it in banks, you understand? Or little deals: they buy 200,000 sacks of cement, they sell the cement, they make 15 gourdes on each bag, and they put the money into cocaine, they put it into a bank, they buy big Mitsubishis, big Four Runners." Charlemagne is also outraged at corruption inside the National Palace. "When you want to do something in this country, a telephone call is made and the National Palace does it... releases someone who was arrested, gets the container whisked through the port... That's how things are done in this country. These guys come in, they give $3,000 and they can take the whole container with everything that is in it... I told Aristide: 'Don't let the Washington Post or the New York Times come and write about this in a year or a few months!' "If I criticized Cedras, I have to criticize those people too," he added. "Some of the militants that have jobs now... have so much power, they are creating disorder. President Aristide should be careful. People who can make any kind of telephone call they want, in the name of the National Palace, in the name of the president... the country should know that." Asked if he had received any foreign funding, Charlemagne replied that U.S. AID "never responded" and said: "As soon as you ask the international organizations to lend you money they choose a delegate [to oversee and even decide how the money is used]. Who is that for all the money they are lending? It is Dr. Reginald Boulos [director of the heavily U.S. AID-funded Centres pour le Developpement et la Sante.] I want to tell people that clearly: Garbage [collection, currently contracted out] is not my responsibility. It's Boulos's." Asked why he decided to run for office and work in such a corrupt and controlled situation, Charlemagne replied: "I entered into government to continue to denounce the state. When you criticize the state for a long time from the outside, then, when you are inside, you know how corruption inside the state is done... [but] that does not prevent people from saying, 'No! You should not agree to go into the government during an occupation.' I always tell people: 'We have been occupied since 1986.' That is something the progressives do not like me to point out. They use the cover of the soldiers and say that it's a new occupation, but they know we have been occupied for a long time." Can the government really do anything under such an occupation? "Will this government have time to do anything? It does not have time... and it is a de-structured country, full of robberies, pilfering. At least, if everyone was honest like some people, a little bit of change could happen... Lavalas, I do not think that it will have time... There are serious people... but unfortunately they are surrounded by vagabonds that are making disorder and it is us, the independents, who will be paying for it." Can he really accomplish something? "We are going to make things happen, because they gave us this job... We are working for two things: we are working to structure things and where things are blocked, we will denounce them." On the struggle against privatization and the neoliberal reforms, Charlemagne was not optimistic: "There are a bunch of militants that I know that are making a lot of blah-blah around privatization. It's just blah-blah... You know why? Because this return, the return of President Aristide, and people should know this, it was a three-year deal that was made. We are a poor country. There was coup d'etat that could not work, so big deal was made." STATE WORKER STRIKES END PORT-AU-PRINCE, Nov. 9 - As quickly as it appeared, the wave of strikes that swept the public administration has ended, temporarily at least. The Ministries of Commerce and Interior are back at work, as are the National Post Office and National Archives employees. Workers at the Direction Generale des Impts (DGI), the tax bureau, who had protested their new director as well as low salaries, have also returned to their offices, and the public school in Cap- Haitien opened. All of the strikes ended "conditionally," based on promises of raises after parliament votes on the new budget for this fiscal year, which began on Oct. 1. Before the workers returned to work, the post office director had resigned, Aristide had to meet with 75 employees from the Interior Ministry and a member of the president's office had intervened in the archives dispute. (In almost every case, the workers had demanded personal meetings with President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, calls which elicited criticism from the president, the new prime minister and some workers' organizations. Aristide himself is partly to blame, since he has repeatedly personally claimed credit for his government's accomplishments.) With the promises of raises, the government is playing a high- stakes game. It merely bought some time, because it also promised its "funders," the U.S. government and multilateral institutions who are being counted on to supply half of this year's budget, to fire half of the 45,000 people who work in the public administration. DRUG BUST IN JACMEL JACMEL, Nov. 7 - On Oct. 30, police found 19 kilos of cocaine on a Haitian freighter and swiftly arrested the crew members and boat owner, Jol Khawly, but two days later, Khawly and three others were out of jail. The Altagrace Marine affair has caused a stir in Jacmel, and illustrates once again the shabby state of the justice system where "money talks" and "reform" consists of mostly pay raises and "recycling." On Nov. 1, while Commissaire du Gouvernement Danton Leger, who has been very vocal in his support of justice here recently [see recent issues], was out of town, the assistant Commissaire, Luc Fran ois, decided to release Khawley and three Haitian crew members, because, he said, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency and its Haitian counterpart told him Khawly was the one who tipped them off to the presence of the drugs. Jacmelians demonstrated, and Leger, who had returned, then issued an arrest warrant for the released men. He also announced that he had since discovered that Khawly had also forged passports for his crew members to have illegal passports so they could travel. (The crew members were rounded up but not Khawly. To the contrary, he called a radio station claiming to be inside the U.S. embassy. The embassy has not commented.) "There are still a series of big shots that are still defying justice," Leger complained on Tele-National today. "The big bourgeois think they are untouchable." Since the event, there have been demonstrations against Leger, but he said he does not take them seriously: "Once you have cocaine money, a lot of things are possible." "DEVELOPMENT" BATTLE PORT-AU-PRINCE, Nov. 6 - In the mountains above Leogane, a power struggle has been going on between a peasant association and a World Bank-funded non-governmental organization. Founded in 1988, the Asoyasyon Peyizan Fondwa (APF) has members in six communal sections. As a result of vigorous fund-raising by Holy Ghost Father Joseph Philippe, it has a building and clinic, five new schools, wells, a bank, has planted 300,000 trees, founded a pig and chicken project and has begun a five-kilometer road. APF members do not work for cash, but instead exchange work in the konbit form. This winter, ALERTE, Association pour la Lutte Contre l'Erosion et pour la Renovation Totale de l'Environnement, began to work in the area, organizing a high-intensity manual labor tree-planting project funded by part of a massive World Bank loan to the Haitian government, channeled through the Pan-American Development Foundation (closely linked to U.S. AID) via the government office Unite Centrale de Gestion (UCG), which is overseeing many such infrastructure and jobs programs. ALERTE pays 36 gourdes per day (US$2.00) to teams of people who are supposed to rotate to allow others to work. Until recently, and perhaps still, the ALERTE program was riddled with corruption. Team leaders got a percentage of workers' pay: workers "bought" their jobs (paid off the leader) and could also "reserve" them (to stay beyond your rotation's time limit). But despite the corruption, peasants were signing up. For Philippe, the problem was not the corruption so much as the fact, he said, that ALERTE was taking people away from their farms and from APF, "telling peasants they don't need to work the land any more," he wrote in a press release. "They tell the peasants that they will find free schooling and foreign food imports... They also claim they will provide interest-free loans." Phillipe sees ALERTE as one more foreign-funded project which destabilizes local organizations, since APF was never invited APF to participate in the tree project. He is especially angry that a Haitian government office chose to fund ALERTE and not APF. Some have said Philippe went too far in his accusations. In any case, after threats (some against Philippe), counter-threats and many meetings (and the discovery that the APF president, now impeached, was reportedly taking ALERTE money under the table), ALERTE and APF have a truce. Philippe is still angry, but has ceased his attacks and is now trying to get the government to fund other jobs projects through APF. But the story's ending is not necessarily "happy." This situation - where a foreign group, sometimes with suspect ulterior motives, lands in a region and begins to provide jobs; where people scramble against one another over a few gourdes; where the focus is on "aid" and "projects;" where loan money is spent without centralized control (the Ministry of the Environment said it was unaware of the project until recently), and in a complete absence of the state (which should be organizing not only tree-planting, but also roads and schools) - is typical of the kind of "development" going on in many parts of Haiti. U.S. TO RETURN FRAPH PAGES PORT-AU-PRINCE, Nov. 9 - In response to pressure, and in order to allow the storm to blow over, the U.S. government this week promised to return to Haiti the 60,000 pages of documents U.S. soldiers "seized" last fall from the headquarters of the CIA- linked paramilitary force FRAPH (Front pour l'Avancement et le Progres Haitien). While still Minister of Foreign Affairs, Claudette Werleigh wrote to the U.S. government to demand the papers. The Gonaives branch of Commission Justice et Paix issued a scathing press release denouncing U.N. authorities for allowing the "seizure," and the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee sent a letter to the parliaments of 39 countries. The promise came only after those denunciations and many others, although, if they have good political reasons to do so, U.S. authorities can always argue that all sorts of internal procedural problems, judiciously founded, postpone indefinitely the restitution. In any case, the Haitian people know from experience - most recently the Emmanuel Constant affair - how much weight to give the declarations of the U.S. imperialists on such matters. ABOUT HAITI INFO: * Haiti Info is published every two weeks in Haiti by the Haitian Information Bureau, an alternative news agency, and is edited by a group of committed individuals from democratic and popular sectors. * All articles Copyright HIB. REPRINTS ENCOURAGED. Please cite Haiti Info and send copies of usage. * Haiti Info is available by mail, by fax, and also electronically via computer. Subscription rates range from U.S. $20 to $100, depending on location and method of reception. For subscriptions, other correspondence and help for journalists: Haitian Information Bureau, c/o Lynx Air, Box 407139, Ft. Lauderdale, FL, 33340, USA. For electronic mail: hib@igc.apc.org.