- Notice: Undefined variable: social_share in /home/ayibopost/htdocs/ayibopost.com/wp-content/themes/the-next-mag/library/templates/single/tnm_single.php on line 846
Notice: Trying to access array offset on value of type null in /home/ayibopost/htdocs/ayibopost.com/wp-content/themes/the-next-mag/library/templates/single/tnm_single.php on line 846
Notice: Undefined variable: social_share in /home/ayibopost/htdocs/ayibopost.com/wp-content/themes/the-next-mag/library/templates/single/tnm_single.php on line 849
Notice: Trying to access array offset on value of type null in /home/ayibopost/htdocs/ayibopost.com/wp-content/themes/the-next-mag/library/templates/single/tnm_single.php on line 849
Notice: Undefined variable: social_share in /home/ayibopost/htdocs/ayibopost.com/wp-content/themes/the-next-mag/library/templates/single/tnm_single.php on line 852
Notice: Trying to access array offset on value of type null in /home/ayibopost/htdocs/ayibopost.com/wp-content/themes/the-next-mag/library/templates/single/tnm_single.php on line 852
Notice: Undefined variable: social_share in /home/ayibopost/htdocs/ayibopost.com/wp-content/themes/the-next-mag/library/templates/single/tnm_single.php on line 855
Notice: Trying to access array offset on value of type null in /home/ayibopost/htdocs/ayibopost.com/wp-content/themes/the-next-mag/library/templates/single/tnm_single.php on line 855
Notice: Undefined variable: social_share in /home/ayibopost/htdocs/ayibopost.com/wp-content/themes/the-next-mag/library/templates/single/tnm_single.php on line 858
Notice: Trying to access array offset on value of type null in /home/ayibopost/htdocs/ayibopost.com/wp-content/themes/the-next-mag/library/templates/single/tnm_single.php on line 858
One point binds us: we want the departure of this de facto power, of this dictatorship which steals our property and tortures our bodies, blocks our future and is reminiscent of the worst hours of our past
Ah, what Russian opponents we are! Suspicious would be our death. Vilified our alleged murderers.
We could also be makers of the Arab Spring. Martyrs and heroes, we would be beautiful and young, full of new ideas. That we would praise our energy and our charm, emphasizing our young age, with the barely veiled wish that Arab youth would put an end to this Arab world which creates so many problems.
We could also be minorities persecuted for our sexual orientation. Ah, that we would be pitied, understood, and that there would be laws, treaties and resolutions protecting us from exclusion!
But we are only Haitians, citizens of a country that won its independence through its victory over an expeditionary army that planned to “exterminate all black males over the age of twelve.”
Read also: The Declaration of Independence of Haiti
We are just citizens of a country ostracized for at least the first twenty-five years of its existence. We are just a country in which the greatest defenders of democracy not so long ago tolerated a dictatorship that lasted thirty years. We are only citizens of a country that one considers as part of his backyard, another as without a stake, his backyard dream lying elsewhere.
So, a de facto government of indefinite duration that all national authorities reject: Catholics, Protestants, lawyers, students, teachers’ unions, peasants, provinces in turmoil, the main political groups, can lead us as he sees fit.
He does not deprive himself of this power: his police do not recognize the right to demonstrate and intervene with tear gas and live bullets. The obvious return of practices worthy of the Tontons Macoutes can become a fact of life: men in uniform can beat simple citizens, lawyers, journalists, political activists at will. Kill. This does not even deserve a press release, a note of protest.
Read also: The “Duvaliers” in the history of Haiti: repression of the critical press
And when we say that this power can only be maintained through this repression which takes on the appearance of a massacre, spokespersons tell us that we just have to shut our dirty, annoying mouths.
Yet many of us are dying in filthy prisons. Many do not reach the prisons, since there are summary executions in the middle of the street, in broad daylight.
However, we demonstrated, acted, brandished signs, and there were many young people among us, to demand a democratic government, real elections.
Yet there are among us who demand all of these things, people of all faiths and sexual orientations. Because we are people, quite simply. Humans. With all the differences that make humans.
Read also: Lyonel Trouillot | Never have the people been so despised!
One point binds us: we want the departure of this de facto power, of this dictatorship which steals our property and tortures our bodies, blocks our future and is reminiscent of the worst hours of our past. This de facto power, this dictatorship which does not even have the culture, nor the hypocrisy to claim an ideology, a vision of the world. The ideology of de facto power is Nothing and I remain in the name of this Nothing.
Are those who say that this is precisely why some Westerners adore him, finance him and protect him, right? We place a Nothing in power, we protect it, we maintain it. This Nothing nevertheless has a reality, and it is we who suffer it, it falls more and more into arbitrariness and wants to shut our mouths and shed our blood.
The abuses and repression take on proportions that would have aroused indignation elsewhere. We’re not even worth the outrage. But we don’t care. Because we are outraged. We cannot say it from the place of the State, since it was stolen from us. But everywhere else in this country, we are outraged. It’s written on the walls, in our eyes. Outrage is a big part of our history. And a weapon to do it with. Against all lies and all dictatorships.
Par Lionel Trouillot
Cover image published by AyiboPost: Haitian Prime Minister, Ariel Henry, July 20, 2021 (Image illustration). | Valerie Baeriswyl/AFP
Keep in touch with AyiboPost via:
► Our channel Telegram : Click here
► Our Channel WhatsApp : Click here
► Our Community WhatsApp : Click here
