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From: zeyhilel@aol.com
Date: Mon Jan 18 2010 - 18:22:41 EST
Economic Justice in Haiti Requires Debt Restitution
Anthony Phillips and Brian Concannon Jr. | September 7, 2006
(http://americas.irc-online.org/pdf/commentary/0609Haiti'sDebt.pdf)
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(http://americas.irc-online.org/am/3494#comments) Americas Program, Center for
International Policy (CIP)
_americas.irc-online.org_ (http://americas.irc-online.org/)
A meeting of international diplomats and financiers in Port-au-Prince this
summer ended up with a commitment of $750 million in foreign aid to Haiti
over the coming year. This generosity will build badly needed roads,
schools and hospitals, which will make a real difference to ordinary Haitians—the
poorest people in the Americas—in the short-term. But what Haiti really
needs to permanently end centuries of misery is not the world's charity, but
its justice.
The July donors' meeting refused to discuss the one fair and lasting
solution to Haiti's grinding poverty: restitution of the independence debt
imposed by France in 1825. The debt—calculated at $21 billion in current dollars—
dwarfs current aid commitments and its payment would allow Haitians to
develop their economy without the attached strings that keep poor countries
dependent on international aid.
Haiti won its independence from France in 1804, through a bloody 12-year
war, becoming the second independent country in the Americas and the only
nation in history born of a successful slave revolt. But world powers forced
Haiti to pay a second price for entrance into the international community.
They refused to recognize Haiti's independence, while French warships
remained off its coasts, threatening to invade and reinstitute slavery.
After 21 years of resisting, Haiti capitulated to France‘s terms: in
exchange for diplomatic recognition, Haiti's government agreed to compensate
French plantation owners for their loss of “property,” including the freed
slaves; compensation to be paid with a loan from a designated French bank.
The debt was ten times Haiti's total 1825 revenue and twice what the United
States paid France in 1803 for the Louisiana Purchase, which contained
seventy-four times more land.
The debt was a crushing burden on Haiti's economy. The government was
forced to redirect all economic activity to repay it. A huge percentage of
government revenues—80% in some years—went to debt service, at the expense of
investment in education, healthcare, and infrastructure. The tax code and
other laws channeled private and public enterprise to export crops such as
tropical hardwoods and sugar, which brought in foreign currency for the bank
but left the mountainsides barren, the soil depleted, and the population
hungry.
Haiti did not pay off the independence debt until 1947. Over a century
after the global slave trade was eliminated as the evil it was, Haitians were
still paying their ancestors' masters for their freedom. After the debt was
paid, Haitians were left with a chronically undeveloped economy, rampant
poverty, and a spent land—today relatively minor environmental stresses like
tropical storms cause catastrophic damage in vulnerable Haiti.
Economic instability has engendered political instability. Haitians have
endured more than 30 coups since 1825, and most of the resulting rulers have
been malignant dictatorships
The independence debt was not only immoral and onerous, it was also
illegal. In 1825 aggression and oppression did not violate international law, but
the reintroduction of slavery—the threat underlying the debt agreement—
did. It had been banned by three treaties that France had signed by 1815.
Haiti has a new democratic government, and an opportunity to make a clean
break from the past. The $750 million that the international community has
promised towards this transition is a lot of money, but it is less than a
year's interest on the $21 billion dollars that Haiti owes France. Moreover,
if the past is any guide, not all of the promised money will arrive, and
much of it will come with strings attached—loan repayments, import tariff
reductions, privatization of government services, etc.—that will perpetuate
Haiti's dependence on international help.
If the international community really wants to help Haiti, repayment of
the independence debt will be at the top of the agenda, not off the table. A
just repayment of the independence debt, by contrast, would allow Haiti to
develop the way today's wealthy countries did—based on national priorities
set inside the country. It would also right a historical wrong, and set a
strong example of good neighbor policies for a global neighborhood.
Anthony Phillips works with the Institute for Justice and Democracy in
Haiti (IJDH). Human rights lawyer Brian Concannon Jr. directs the IJDH, found
at _www.ijdh.org_ (http://www.ijdh.org.and/) and is an analyst with the
IRC Americas Program at _www.americaspolicy.org_
(http://www.americaspolicy.org/) . This article was originally published on TomPaine.com at
(http://www.tompaine.com/articles/2006/09/01/justice_for_haiti.php)
www.tompaine.com/articles/2006/09/01/justice_for_haiti.php.