Message of
hope, promise of help
Haiti homecoming
Michaelle Jean returns
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PHIL CARPENTER & LIZ THOMPSON |
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The Gazette |
Sunday, May 14, 2006
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CREDIT: Phil
Carpenter, The Gazette |
Governor-General
Michaelle Jean holds Raphael, 61/2
months, in Port-au-Prince yesterday. The
boy was abandoned at birth at the
doorstep of Genevieve Gasser, a worker
with the Canadian International
Development Agency from Quebec City who
has decided to adopt him. |
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CREDIT: THONY
BELIZAIRE/AFP/Getty Images |
Canada's
Governor General, Michaelle Jean (R),
receives flowers upon her arrival at the
international airport in Port-Au-Prince
May, 13 2006, one day before Haitian
President-elect Rene Preval is scheduled
to be sworn into office. |
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Governor-General Michaelle Jean arrived in the land
of her birth yesterday, bearing a message of hope and a
pledge that Canada will help rebuild the troubled
country.
"Haiti cannot get out (of misery) alone," Jean told
reporters. "Happily, there are countries, including
Canada, that are prepared to support Haiti."
But that will take time, she warned.
"You cannot come out of decades of dictatorship and
expect that things will change from one day to another.
It takes time, and we have to support Haiti with a real
will to see things change in this country.
"This country really deserves it. The people do
deserve it."
Today, Jean will represent Canada at the swearing-in
of Haiti's new president, Rene Preval, an event that
many hope will signal a new start for a country that has
lurched from dictatorships to anarchy for much of its
history.
About 80 per cent of Haiti's population lives in
poverty almost unimaginable for most Canadians.
Speaking to reporters a couple of hours after being
formally welcomed to the country by dignitaries and a
band playing the Haitian and Canadian national anthems,
Jean said the Haiti of today is a far cry from the
country her family fled when she was 11.
"There was no freedom," she said. "You could be
jailed for a word."
Since 1986, there has been more freedom of speech,
largely thanks to efforts by Haitian journalists. But
"some paid for that freedom of speech with their own
lives," she added. "Some died for it here."
Jean said she hopes her visit will change the view
many Canadians have of Haiti - the images of Cite Soleil
slum, home to the poorest of the poor, where armed gangs
terrorize the population.
"Cite Soleil is not Haiti. Haiti is also a lot of
other realities. People who work very hard every day so
that children can go to school. People who believe in
it. People who work every day on irrigation projects."
Jean would also like to see Canada help Haiti develop
its hydro system.
In the capital, Port-au-Prince, those without their
own gas-fuelled generators are lucky to get two or three
hours of a day of electricity, and the city can go for
days at a time without any power in public places.
Hydro-Quebec has been providing technical assistance
for electricity production, distribution and marketing
in Jacmel, and Jean said she would like to see more
projects like that in other parts of Haiti.
"Do you know what it means in terms of development
for a country to have that energy to make industries
work, to allow hospitals to work at full capacity?"
Canada also can help Haiti develop a stable
government and better justice system, Jean said.
"There has been a tradition of dictatorship in this
country and you don't get rid of some behaviours from
one day to another; it takes time.
"But to ensure that justice will prevail in this
country and that Haitian people's rights will be
respected, we must accompany the building of that
institution, and I think that Canada can do that.
Supporting the construction and the building of the
institutions and good governance is really a priority.
"Haiti needs it. The Haitian population needs it. I
think I know the conditions in Haitian jails. I think
that some of them are totally unacceptable. They're
unbearable and this is something we will certainly be
looking at in the kind of institutional support that we
can provide to the new Haitian government."
Claude Boucher, Canada's ambassador to Haiti, said
today's ceremony is both symbolic and historic, because
Preval's election was easily the most democratic the
country has ever known, with a much higher than normal
participation rate and every ballot counted.
"It is really a question of satisfaction and of hope
for this country, because it now has democratic
institutions," Boucher said.
He said the situation is still fragile and nobody can
be sure that forces opposed to Preval's presidency won't
disrupt today's swearing-in ceremony.
But he noted that Preval has been making efforts to
reach out to supporters of other political parties.
"I think we should be hopeful because Preval has a
strong popular support."
ethompson@thegazette.canwest.com
Beacon of hope, Page A14
© The Gazette (Montreal) 2006
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