[Selon la Journaliste dinvestigation Mary ANASTASIA OGRADY de Wall Street Journal, les troubles en Haïti ont une seule motivation: Devenir Riche à partir du pouvoir d’Etat. Les parlementaires et lopposition ne sont pas intéressés par la croissance économique et le développement; malgré les progrès réalisés par le gouvernement en place, leurs accusations contre le président Martelly et le Premier Ministre Lamothe sont basées sur un seul reproche: Le fait que Martelly et Lamothe ne leur ont pas permis dempocher les ressources de lEtat (PetroCaribe)] Wall Street Journal: The loudest objection I heard was not that Mr. Martelly’s policies have failed to generate sufficient growth, but that he does not share government resources with rival constituencies. --------------------------- In Haiti, Government Is Where You Go to Get Rich.- The political class fights over who next will loot the economy. Growth is an afterthought. By MARY ANASTASIA O’GRADY Dec. 14, 2014 6:46 p.m. ET23 COMMENTS Port au Prince, Haiti Early on a Sunday morning, women carrying bundles, baskets and buckets on their heads plod up the steep, winding roads of Pétionville, the most desirable suburb of this capital city. It’s a grueling start to the Lord’s Day, but those living or working in this neighborhood are among the lucky ones. They have escaped the dire poverty that defines life in most of the rest of the country. I’m in Haiti to catch up on events. On Monday, in the downtown part of the city, I’m besieged by beggars on my way to the Dec. 8 feast-day Mass at the Immaculate Conception church inside the gates of the General Hospital. They’re mostly mothers, shepherding half-naked children and holding infants. Demonstrators march through the streets during an anti-government protest in Port-au-Prince December 5, 2014. ENLARGE Demonstrators march through the streets during an anti-government protest in Port-au-Prince December 5, 2014. REUTERS I am almost through the crowd when I feel a small hand tugging on my dress. A curly-haired boy no more than 4 years old, wearing a tattered polo shirt but no pants, peers up at me holding out an open palm. Almost 25 years after the celebrated launch of a new “democracy,” following the fall of dictator “Baby Doc” Duvalier, Haitian per capita gross domestic product is just over $800 a year. The magnitude 7.0 earthquake in 2010 destroyed much of this city. Very little has been rebuilt. The sprawling slums, many of which long predate the quake, look more like garbage dumps than residential zones. Even for those who avoid the sheer desperation of the little boy I met, everyday life here is, in the words of Thomas Hobbes, mostly “nasty, brutish and short.” For this we can thank the politicians. Opposition parties and their constituents have been marching in the streets here in recent weeks, demanding that President Michel Martelly resign. They accuse him of violating the constitution in a power grab and packing the electoral council. Not all are devoted to peaceful change. Some have been burning tires and trying to incite violence. Earlier this month opponents of the president carried placards bearing the face of Russia’s Vladimir Putin . On Saturday night, Prime Minister (and presidential ally) Laurent Lamothe finally stepped down, paving the way for a new government and to organize legislative and local elections, the first since 2011. According to the president, Mr. Lamothe’s resignation is “a sacrifice” toward that end. Yet more compromise is needed to choose a new prime minister, and it is not clear whether either side, and particularly the extreme left-wing populists of former president Jean Bertrand Aristide’s Lavalas Party, is in the mood. Haitian politics is winner-take-all. Haitians understand that government is where you go to get rich. Messrs. Martelly and Lamothe may have used their offices to favor friends and themselves, as many Haitians believe. But at a meeting at the Parliament with opposition senators, the loudest objection I heard was not that Mr. Martelly’s policies have failed to generate sufficient growth, but that he does not share government resources with rival constituencies. Haitian poverty cannot be fixed with charity. It needs private-sector growth, which means it needs economic freedom and legal certainty. But Haiti is a failed state, devoid of institutions, transparency and the rule of law. Legal businesses face insurmountable odds, unless one has friends in high places. Haiti’s political class either hasn’t figured this out or doesn’t care. Things weren’t always so grim, as a visit to the northern coastal city of Cap Haitien, far from the earthquake, suggests. On the car ride from the airport, a bridge crosses a dirty, littered river. A resident now in his early 60s tells me that it was clean when he was a child. In town, old French-colonial-style houses with second-story balconies and railings line the narrow streets. Locals say that many of the owners of these architectural gems fled the country during the François Duvalier dictatorship and never returned. The buildings are in disrepair as are the streets and sidewalks, but the ghosts of their grandeur and charm remain. There can be little doubt that the brain-drain, which continues today, is an even greater tragedy. “Water is precious,” the sign in my hotel bathroom said, imploring bathers to limit use. There was no shower head, only a curved metal spout sticking out of the wall. The difference between the hot and the cold was that the cold was freezing whereas the hot was just cold. The inn keeper scrambled about, trying to please guests. In my head I tallied up the challenges facing entrepreneurs in a country with almost no public services and a government hostile to profits. It’s a marvel that hotels even exist. Bring up politics with Haitians and most will say “a pox on all their houses.” Only those who get by on the state payroll—or who have a chance to, should someone new come to power—believe that elections matter. For everyone else, government is an unavoidable nuisance at best and more often a predator. wsj/articles/mary-anastasia-ogrady-in-haiti-government-is-where-you-go-to-get-rich-1418600799
Posted on: Mon, 15 Dec 2014 15:18:26 +0000
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