*   *   *   HAITI INFO   *   *   *

            News direct from the people and organizations 
             of Haiti's democratic and popular movement

                    4 May 1996, Vol. 4, #13

       ***   HAITI INFO now has photos in every issue   ***

Contents:

                  PREVAL TEAM JUGGLING
                  ANTI-PRIVATIZATION PROTEST ON MAY 1
                  INSECURITY, POLICE PROBLEMS
>From Les Cayes:   RADIO VKM INAUGURATED
>From Grande Anse: FISHERMEN AT LA NAVASE
World of Labor:   PROTEST AT PARLIAMENT
Close-up:         THE LABOR MOVEMENT


Stories:

                   PREVAL TEAM JUGGLING

PORT-AU-PRINCE, May 3 - Nothing has filtered out of the three 
weeks of "negotiations" between the Haitian government and the 
multilateral banks, but President Rene Preval's continued 
campaigning for privatization and other neoliberal policies, even 
if he has turned down the volume and emphasized lately that he 
will not "sell" anything, is a clear indication of what route he 
and his team have already decided to take. 

But the president has lost the assurance and arrogance of earlier 
days. He called the May 1 demonstration a "failure" but also noted 
"there is an inquietude" among public sector employees, and said 
he wants to meet with opponents of privatization. This change in 
attitude comes at the same time a French representative of the 
banks said they recognize the resistance and will not push 
privatization all the way. 

In that sense, Preval is now trying to cool people down, for 
despite the small turn out on Wednesday, opposition to his 
policies remains steady in many sectors, contradictions in the 
Lavalas movement are evident and people's impatience with the 
government and the deteriorating situation is growing. 

Tax and Customs Receipts Offensive

In the meantime, to take people's minds off the policies and show 
he can be "tough" on the bourgeoisie and the private sector, the 
president personally launched an attack on tax evaders and 
smugglers, showing up at the Direction Generale des Impts (DGI), 
the tax office, four times in two weeks. He and others also made 
surprise visits to Customs.

This week, DGI announced tax evaders will be penalized by having 
their property and goods seized, names published and  even with a 
prison sentence. Inspectors seized office material at three 
companies on May 2. Reportedly, more doctors, business people and 
others are paying their taxes as a result. Customs announced those 
turning in smugglers will get half the confiscated material as a 
reward. Today customs officers seized "thousands of cases of milk 
and hundreds of cases of tomato paste" from a merchant.

Contradictions, Impatience Growing

But Preval is well aware that people's patience with his 
government is growing thin and showy visits to the DGI will not 
solve his problems. On May 1, organizations blocked the Mirebalais 
road, specifically to prevent Preval advisor Chavannes Jean-
Baptiste from getting home for May 1 festivities. The action was 
to protest the terrible condition of the road which the President 
Jean-Bertrand Aristide government, with great fanfare, last year 
had promised would be fixed.

Popular organizations also blocked the highway near Leogane last 
month with the same demand. Eventually public works  made 
rudimentary repairs. Also last month, groups in Carrefours 
protested the half-finished road repair job there, and groups from 
the Martissant neighborhood  protested  their poor living 
conditions, saying: "the neoliberal plan will destroy all attempts 
to establish a national economy and correct inequalities."

 In the meantime, the inevitable contradictions within the Lavalas 
family remain. The April Tanbou Verite, the publication of 
Oganizasyon Politik Lavalas, a large element of the Lavalas 
platform headed by Gerard Pierre Charles, warned of the 
"fragility" of the Lavalas political movement and called for 
"democratic unity." Nevertheless, a press release on Lavalas 
platform stationary in late April signed by over a dozen 
representatives, including Sen. Renaud Bernadin, called 
privatization "the destruction of national production, of the 
living force of the country" and asked Preval to cease his "logic 
of submission." 

Preval this week revealed his impatience with the dissident 
Lavalassiens in parliament, which still has not voted this year's 
budget (because, lawmakers said today, the executive still has not 
sent them all the necessary fiscal laws) and where, in both 
houses, representatives have recently rejected various neoliberal 
"reforms," like a lowered tariff on rice, an independent office to 
oversee education loans, and an US$17 million education loan. [See 
last issue]

At his impromptu press conference following the May 1 march, 
Preval said parliament should "lift its feet" and approve a series 
of loans he said will repair roads, irrigation systems and provide 
jobs. He also revealed, once again, his determined fidelity to 
neoliberalism, even to the point of defending, on International 
Worker's Day, Haiti's rock-bottom minimum wage as necessary to 
remain competitive and saying a higher salary might be "beautiful" 
but "not workable."

And, responding to a question concerning people's preoccupations 
about privatization, Preval slid away from the essence once again, 
claiming people are not really interested in that, and instead 
want to know "what are we going to do quickly, without getting 
into a lot of talking, so we can develop the country, to give 
local and international investors electricity, water, telephone so 
they will invest in the country." At least his priorities are 
clear.


              ANTI-PRIVATIZATION PROTEST ON MAY 1

PORT-AU-PRINCE, May 2 - Although only several hundred people 
marched in a demonstration organized by 15 popular, peasant and 
worker's groups yesterday and the president called it "a failure," 
organizers today said it was "a success" because it captured the 
attention of the nation and of President Rene Preval: 
significantly, 30 minutes after it ended, the National Palace sent 
a minibus to round up journalists for an impromptu press 
conference. [See other story]

One of the strongest sectors represented in the march was the 
union of Electricite d'Haiti (EDH), one of the companies on the 
auction block, which had 25 trucks with workers brandishing signs. 
Other sponsoring organizations included Kolektif Mobilizasyon Kont 
FMI, Rasanbleman Fanm Popile and Solidarite Ant Jen/Veye Yo.

The demonstrators, who included some parliamentarians and well-
known artists, went from the National Cathedral to the National 
Palace carrying an effigy of "Preval, the country-seller" dressed 
as an Uncle Sam and scores of signs and banners with slogans like 
"The bourgeoisie should pay taxes," "Privatization is a twin with 
the coup d'etat" and "Down with the IMF." Despite a strong police 
presence, in some neighborhoods people were hostile. 

The march was the target of much criticism and confusion before 
May 1. Father Yvon Massac told people not to attend, and said he 
thought police would be shot at, and various political 
organizations and other groups, like KID (part of FNCD), lent 
their support to the march, some for their own reasons. Today, 
march organizers once again distinguished themselves from other 
sectors, saying the march was organized by popular groups and 
denouncing "everyone taking a ride on the popular mobilization."

The march organizers said the demonstration was a beginning and 
that they will be organizing other activities. 


                  INSECURITY, POLICE PROBLEMS

PORT-AU-PRINCE, May 3 - Insecurity continues to mount, especially 
in the capital, where three police officers have been murdered 
over the past week, and a least a half-dozen other people killed 
or wounded. 

In the meantime, the Police Nationale d'Haiti (PNH) is struggling 
to control its members and maintain its credibility. Yesterday, it 
announced a new disarmament campaign. But on Apr. 29, there was 
another sign of internal problems when the Police Academy 
director, Lucien Chenet, resigned.

The most recent officer killed was from Petion-ville, shot five 
times while downtown yesterday. Two other PNH members were killed 
here over the weekend. The murders have been the subject of much 
speculation, but no evidence has been uncovered yet.

On May 1, a member of the union of Electricite d'Haiti (EDH) was 
shot in what the union has called a political attack, since, 
according to union spokesman Harry Clerveaux, the union has been 
receiving threats recently, because "the EDH union is engaged in a 
battle against the plan of death [structural adjustment]." [See 
other story]

Other recent victims were a teacher and his wife, shot and killed, 
and their daughter, injured, in an Apr. 26 attack. In March, a 
young female PNH member who had condemned reconciliation with 
armed gangs during President Jean-Bertrand Aristide's visit to 
Cite Soleil was brutally murdered. 

Local control of the force is still very tenuous, but discerning 
those with ultimate control is unmistakable. Despite threats to 
cut off "aid," the U.S. embassy this week announced Congress 
"unblocked" US$1.5 million for training and arming the force.

In the meantime, although there have not been recent reports of 
police shooting civilians, lack of discipline remains high. A 
number of agents of the secret police, SIN, were recently arrested 
for illegally selling state land in Petion-ville. (Despite Lavalas 
claims to have dismantled the army, SIN, the Service 
d'Intelligence National, set up by the CIA after 1986 and which 
has been linked to brutal repression, still exists today.)

There are also signs of dissension in the ranks, especially over 
the continued presence of former members of the army in the PNH. 
When the dismissal (reportedly for absenteeism) of 23 traffic 
cops, refugees trained at Guantanamo, was announced last week, 
they protested, saying on the dismissal letter "we see the names 
of the same people who forced us to flee." 

Also, on Apr. 24, another group of police drove through the city 
in police vehicles with darkened windows, honking their horns to 
protest the selection process for commissaires. The next day the 
direction condemned "the little group" which "tried to destabilize 
public order" because they "feel their interests are in danger by 
the wind of reforms." The group concerned, which had previously 
protested that candidates need a university degree to qualify, on 
Apr. 26 also told Agence Haitienne de Presse that all the 
candidates selected are "former members of the Armed Forces" and 
said their "movement is an expression of nervousness felt by all 
police." While the PNH direction did not respond, Eric Falt, 
spokesman for the other extra-national authority here, took the 
liberty and "suggested" the officers "be punished at the 
disciplinary as well as the penal level."


>From Les Cayes:   RADIO VKM INAUGURATED

LES CAYES, May 1 - Over three hundred friends and supporters spent 
today celebrating the opening of Radyo Vwa Klodi Mizo (Voice of 
Claudie Museau Radio), the memory of Jean-Claude Museau (a teacher 
and a founder of MUPAC who was beaten to the point of death by 
soldiers and released to die in January, 1992) and celebrating the 
democratic and popular struggle in general. In addition, over and 
over, participants denounced the policies of the government, the 
lack of justice and widespread impunity, and U.S. domination of 
Haitian affairs.

Arriving on foot, on bicycles and in cars from as far away as 
Gonaives, men, women and children, and Museau's father, gathered 
at the La Cayenne restaurant and listened to members of a 
teacher's union, non-governmental organizations, poets, musicians 
and local leaders, and then visited the new station, located over 
a small restaurant. RVKM's 20-watt transmitter covers the city and 
nearby region with a small rooftop antenna. RVKM hopes to someday 
get a bigger transmitter and install an antenna on a mountain. 
RVKM is a project of by Mouvman Inite Pep Okay (MUPAC) and Mouvman 
Peyizan Sid. [See Haiti Info v.4 #7 and last issue] 

"A Different Kind of Communication"

For three hours, the assembly listened, sang and danced before 
walking along the shore to the studio. After a moment of silence, 
a local teacher explained that the radio is a "community radio 
that will work for and in the sense of the people of Les Cayes" 
and that it is also "a popular radio, a radio of the people... it 
is the hope and pride of a valiant people." RVKM's slogan is: "A 
different kind of communication for a different kind of society."

After explaining the radio's history, a MUPAC member listed its 
objectives, which include to create space for popular expression, 
enable everyone to experience popular culture, encourage popular 
talent, facilitate cultural exchange and interchange and 
solidarity with other popular struggles, provide space for the 
women's movement and to "fight  reactionary ideas" with  
information and education. Other speakers included those from the 
non-governmental organizations that helped RVKM start up.

Anti-imperialist, anti-neoliberal

MUPAC and other groups chose May 1, commemorated as "Day of Work 
and of Agriculturalists" in Haiti, because they wanted to stress 
the radio's link to the worker's struggle. A member of a nearby 
Tet Kole Ti Peyizan Ayisyen chapter had an angry statement from 
"the people who work the land" to "the people who always bluff." 
Reading, with difficulty, he said: "We are shocked to hear 
President Preval and all his acolytes preaching the salvation of 
privatization... We know there is no country where privatization 
brought the people a solution!... We ask all organizations... to 
meet, to rise up across the country, and we say, 'Down with the 
pets, the restaveks (child-slaves) of the Americans! Down with 
privatization! Long live the people's struggle!'" 

A highlight of the ceremony were the poems and songs.  Tet Kole 
singers sang "Haiti is not for sale" and "The Criminals must be 
judged." IJA, a group of young "engages" (commited to the popular 
movement) musicians, sang "Yankee Hypocrisy" about the U.N., the 
O.A.S. and U.S. State Department, and an homage to Museau.  

RADA (Rassemblement d'Artistes) presented poems and songs, one 
celebrating Museau, another calling for people to continue the 
struggle. Guitarist and singer Betoni, sang a "Mr. President" 
which warns: "If you are on the people's side in their demands, if 
you respect your promises, we'll yell 'Long live!'" but "If you 
trick us, we will not fail to yell 'Down with the President!'" The 
song covers land reform, privatization and other issues.  Fanm 
Vanyan of Les Cayes ended the ceremony with a rousing "We will not 
give up the battle," where everyone sang and danced along before 
processing to downtown.


>From Grande Anse: FISHERMEN AT LA NAVASE

ANSE D'HAINAUT, Apr. 18 - In their search for fish, poor fishermen 
in this coastal town have strayed offshore to an island which the 
U.S. claims as its own.

La Navase, 60 kms. west of the mainland, was claimed as U.S. 
property in 1857, when the U.S. declared all guano-rich islets 
U.S. property and when a U.S. company set up a factory there to 
convert the one million tons of guano on La Navase, with a US$40 
million value at the time, into fertilizer. The factory stayed 
open until 1898. (The ruins are still there.) U.S. interest in the 
island was not only commercial, however, as its continued presence 
in the region illustrates. It maintains a lighthouse there. 

Poor Fishermen Driven West

Despite being chased off the island, where they have planted 
lemon, orange, avocado and other trees, poor fishermen say they 
keep going back, since fishing near the coast has steadily 
declined. Without money for gasoline or motors, nets, radio 
communications or other equipment, small fishermen cannot compete 
with more sophisticated ones.

"The sea is finished around here for us," explained Asson Darius, 
who has been fishing since he was ten. "The only ones who find 
fish are those with fancy material and money. When we spend 8 days 
fishing here, we make 200, 150, 125 gourdes. Sometimes we only 
make 50 gourdes."

After an eight-day trip to La Navase, which the fishermen reach in 
one day of sailing in their small boats that hold three or four 
people, each man has earned between 1,500 and 2,000 gourdes 
(between US$90 and US$120). The main buyer is Pcherie Belle Anse 
which purchases about 30,000 gourdes (US$1,800) worth of seafood a 
day to sell in the capital, Canada and the U.S. 

Haiti's Sovereignty Not Respected

The Haitians are not without competition in the La Navase waters. 
Jamaican, Cuban and even U.S. boats are in the area, the fishermen 
said. Although competitors, the Jamaicans often lend a hand to the 
Haitians, who have lost fellow fishermen in storms.

 "When they see the weather is bad, they sometimes let us on their 
boats, give us security, let us eat, sleep, bathe, until it is 
better," said Darius, who also said they try to understand one 
another's language with "lessons" during each visit. Although they 
get along with the Jamaicans, however, they are angry the island 
is not respected as Haitian territory. 

"Jamaicans can come and fish at La Navase, but it's not their 
right... because the island is part of Haiti," Darius noted. "But 
since our country is not organized, any old country can come here 
and do whatever they want... boats can come from all over the 
place and dump their garbage, do whatever, and not one person will 
tell them not to... there is no authority or government that will 
say the island is ours and they are here illegally."

The fishermen also said drug runners use the island as a 
"turntable," leaving cocaine packages on shore or floating in the 
water.

But more offensive to Darius and his fellow fishermen is the U.S. 
military, which uses the island for tests and experiments, he 
said, sometimes detonating small bombs on the land or in the sea, 
sometimes landing men, shooting, and so on. When U.S. soldiers 
catch the Haitians on the island, they chase them away. Once, a 
Coast Guard boat wanted to tie up to the same position where 
Darius' boat was tied and cut his boat's line, he said.

"I said, 'This is not possible!' The Americans have to learn to 
respect Haitian laws!" Darius said. "We do not want them on our 
land anymore, and we are clear on that."

Darius and the others are angry that the Haitian government does 
not undertake its responsibilities, both to help small fishermen 
compete against big ones, foreign and local, and to protect 
Haitian territory:

"Other countries do whatever they want with the resources of La 
Navase because the Haitian government has 'resigned' from the 
issue... La Navase is supposed to be for us. When the U.S. became 
a big power, it decided to take it over... but today, us Haitians, 
we know what 'Liberty or Death' means and we will keep going 
there, even if it means confronting the Americans."


World of Labor:   PROTEST AT PARLIAMENT

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Apr. 30 - To commemorate International Workers 
Day, 15 workers held a sit-in in front of Parliament to protest 
the low minimum wage, the need to change antiquated laws and 
against exploitation in general. [See photo on page 4]

"Why did we choose hoods? Because here in Haiti we do not really 
have a state that respects the workers' rights. A worker who says 
'syn-' is immediately fired because they think he is going to say 
'syndicat' (union). So, the hood is a measure for some of the 
workers who have jobs and could be fired, and second, it is a form 
of protest against the situation in general," explained one. 

"Factories are firing people because they know we are organizing," 
said a hooded woman. "We are doing this so the nation knows and 
lends solidarity to our struggle."

The protesters, workers from several factories and members of 
Batay Ouvriye (Worker's Battle), held signs with slogans like 
"Long live the worker's struggle," "Down with imperialist 
domination" and "We have a right to organize." 

The workers said they chose Parliament because they want the Code 
du Travail changed and minimum wage, officially at 36 gourdes a 
day (although many factories pay less), raised to 75 gourdes 
(about US$4.50).

"Many of us believe that many parliamentarians are not interested 
in the question," said the first worker. "They are more interested 
in voting laws to open the country's stomach, to give the country 
to foreigners and open a lot of disguised free trade zones."


Close-up:         THE LABOR MOVEMENT


May 1, International Worker's Day, falls in a context that is not 
at all favorable, where neoliberal ideology and policies are 
wreaking devastation: in the industrialized countries, a 
dismantling of social benefits, the welfare state and lowered 
union activity, and in the dependent countries like Haiti, 
misery, unemployment and intolerance of unions and organizing. 
Here, Haiti Info presents the opinions and visions of two 
organizations working with the labor movement with whom we 
recently met, and a third which just released an 11-page document 
on the situation of workers.


A MEMBER OF ANTEN OUVRIYE, A NON-GOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATION.

Q: What is the origin of the labor movement in Haiti?

The labor movement really began at the end of the 1930s and in the 
1940s, and is very much linked to the communist and socialist 
movement that was germinating in the country in those years... The 
real expansion was in 1946, when the worker's question was very 
much linked to the democratic movement in general. It was also 
linked to the economic and political situation that developed in 
Haiti after the U.S. occupation, when a few big companies with 
large numbers of employees were set up.

The movement continued until during the 1950s, especially in 1956, 
when there was a renewal of the labor movement linked to a renewal 
of the democratic movement, particularly with the communist 
party... [and] the birth of one of the biggest organizations that 
marks the labor movement, the Union Intersyndicale Haitienne, 
which had the capacity to bring together diverse sectors of 
workers that existed then, not only in factories, but also 
restaurants, teachers, etc. The Union Intersyndicale developed but 
it was broken down by the Duvalier dictatorship... 

The labor movement began over again with the relaunching of the 
democratic movement that was trying to break through in the 
1980s... but very quickly that rebirth was broken down, and 
parallel to that, there was a big offensive made by the U.S., 
which gave birth to organizations like F.O.S., Federation des 
Ouvriers Syndiques, basically a creation of the AFL-CIO and the 
Americans so they could say there was a democratic opening during 
Jean-Claude Duvalier's regime, when really, wherever the real 
democratic movement was taking off, they blocked it...

In 1986 when the democratic movement began again, the labor 
movement started up again. But when the union question reappeared, 
it brought with it a bunch of problems that would mark the 
evolution of the movement and deliver us into the situation we are 
in today... In 1986, you did not really have a movement that was 
made up of unions that represented the workers demands. In 
reality, you had a number of labor confederations that appeared, 
and that listened to and represented the very real demands of 
workers, but that were very linked to exterior organizations that 
had an interest in training and education here... Little by 
little, the confederations got further and further away from the 
bases. That means that today... there are divisions, more 
divisions and re-divisions at the level of confederations, but 
that the movement at the bases is not really structured. The 
confederations do not sit on a structured workers' base.

Q: What are the principal challenges facing the labor movement?

There are two large series of challenges. One is allied to the 
history of the labor movement: the reconstitution of the movement, 
but from the bases... The other is to channel the demands of the 
workers into real organizations that will represent the bases, and 
to open the labor movement to all workers in the country, because 
one of the faults of 1946 was that the labor movement was very 
much based on factory workers and the workers of state 
enterprises, but there were large sectors that were not included.

That is linked to another challenge that we have in general, which 
is that today we have more unemployed people than workers. Because 
of this, there is a need to continue making links between the 
organized worker's movement... and the democratic movement that is 
developing in the country.

There is also something that is perhaps less important... but that 
needs to be addressed, and that is for workers to clean the 
terrain of these confederations that are a handicap for the labor 
movement... to get rid of these so-called unions that do not 
really represent anything except their capacity to have outside 
contacts that support them.

Q: What future does Anten Ouvriye see for the labor movement here 
and around the world?

The prospects are not cause for celebration in the short term, and 
for two big reasons. The first is the relation of forces at the 
international level today. That relation of forces gives us a hope 
that in the medium term, a series of things will become more clear 
and will initiate a series of changes at the global level, but in 
the short term, the neoliberalism that is advancing in all 
countries breaks down the workers courage...

I think there is another problem today in Haiti that makes the 
future look not too rosy: a certain confusion created by the 
political movement that has developed over recent years. It has 
created confusion because it poses itself as a representative of 
popular demands, but at the same time it is not a real expression 
of popular demands. That means there is a confusion among workers 
and the masses in general, which means that there is a lot of work 
to be done - ideological work and political organizing - so that 
the demarcation can finally be made so the working masses become 
autonomous and carry their demands forward the way they should...

But there is something that we can add, which is that the 
prospects for the movement are not separated from the global 
democratic, progressive movement in this society... When the 
democratic movement takes a step forward, the labor movement takes 
a step forward. Today it is the same: the overall movement is in a 
period of retreat... and when we can in a general way move out of 
this retreat, the labor movement will also take a step forward.

One last important element that is a challenge I did not mention, 
and which is linked to the prospects, is the question of women in 
the labor movement. In the city, in factories, in the countryside, 
they occupy a large place... but until today, the movement has not 
really succeeded in organizing women workers... Even if there were 
many women in the union movement, it was not organized to 
represent women's specific demands and today that remains an 
important challenge.


A MEMBER OF AKSYON KATOLIK OUVRIYE, LINKED TO THE TI LEGLIZ 
MOVEMENT:

Q: What are the challenges for the labor movement here?

The biggest challenge for us in the labor sector is the fact that 
we are seeing, more and more frequently, that all the 
accomplishments workers were able to win from the capitalist 
system through struggle, like the right to organize, the right to 
found unions, the right to fight for a minimum salary... are 
almost eliminated. 

We also realize that unions practically have no weight anymore. We 
see that unions have now become part of the offensive the system 
is making where, all of a sudden, you see that unions do not 
really represent the workers, and not only in Haiti but all over. 
Also, unions no longer have the strength they had, because the 
policies that accompany neoliberal policies mean that all the 
rights under the capitalist system and that the worker used to 
struggle have been swept away... We can say that capitalism has 
entered a phase we could call 'aggressive capitalism' or 'savage 
capitalism.' People in the church say it is a diabolical thing! 
There is no place anymore for anything resembling a democratic 
accomplishment or democratic right for workers once capitalism is 
in that phase... It's like an open war was declared.

Q: How is the movement in Haiti today?

The worker's movement has been hit by a series of big blows. There 
is no longer any dialogue, no more of what the International Labor 
Office called 'tripartite-ism': worker, boss, government. All the 
laws were written as a result of that tripartite-ism, but today it 
does not exist anymore, so the movement is in a situation of 
weakness... The labor movement practically has no response to what 
is happening here, for the moment. I am not saying that it will 
not raise its head in the future, but for now it is just taking 
the blows. It cannot give any response now except that workers do 
not have the capacity to raise their heads against exploitation."

Q: What does the future hold?

We are in a transition and we cannot see the end of the tunnel 
yet, how this will end. But we will continue to do battle, to 
struggle. It has always been like this. It has always been through 
struggle that workers were able to win the few rights that the 
system gave them. This phase is a critical one but that does not 
mean that workers are finished. We are struggling. We are taking 
blows but we are resisting and trying to build up our forces so we 
can turn around and we can give blows, too. That is the phase we 
are in. We cannot say how the battle will finish, because the 
forces are so unequal, but workers will never just sit there with 
their arms folded.


BATAY OUVRIYE INTRODUCED ITSELF TO THE PRESS ON APR. 30 WITH A 
DESCRIPTIVE DOSSIER, WHERE IT SAID IT WAS "AN ORGANIZATION SET UP 
BY WORKERS IN VARIOUS FACTORIES... TO MAKE OUR OWN PROPOSALS 
HEARD." THEY DISTRIBUTED THE 11-PAGE "OUR PROBLEMS AS WORKERS, 
WHAT STRUGGLES WE SHOULD CARRY OUT," PUBLISHED IN JANUARY AFTER 
MEETINGS LAST FALL. THEY MADE VARIOUS PROPOSALS. WHAT FOLLOWS ARE 
A FEW EXTRACTS.

Let's look at the reality... In the factory, bosses have crushed 
all unions. They blocked all the new practices that were 
developing in 1991. The coup d'etat did a big service for them, 
and that's why they did it with the Americans... Now we are in a 
situation where we have to rebuild all our organizations.

On the confederations, we can see they are all plunged in a big 
disintegration... What is important is that all of the little 
pieces have the same kind of practice: collaborate with the 
dominant class, sell the worker's struggle, integrate themselves 
into the state to help the bourgeoisie crush workers...

What should we do?... We need to understand our global situation 
and the situation at various levels... Workers are conscious they 
need to develop their capacities to integrate themselves into and 
develop revolutionary working class organizations...

Looking at the way things are in the factories... it is necessary 
to organize ourselves quietly, clandestinely... In certain cases 
it will be possible to set up unions. That is a form we can use to 
wrench our rights...

Alongside all this, we should be conscious that these actions 
should not be isolated.... That means, we must organize... a good 
Union Coordination that is really democratic [and]... we should 
not limit ourselves to the factories, but coordinate and globally 
construct political organizations that will unify our democratic 
struggle...

The work is not small. It demands consciousness. What we have 
already done together shows we have consciousness... We need to 
continue to advance in our work.


ABOUT HAITI INFO:

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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.