As Rigging Came to Light: US, EU Backed Haitian Election, Deeming “Too Much Invested” to Pull Out

[EFerrari]

As Rigging Came to Light:
US, EU Backed Haitian Election, Deeming “Too Much Invested” to Pull Out

by Dan Coughlin and Kim Ives

The United States and other international donors decided to support Haiti’s recent presidential and parliamentary elections despite believing that the country’s Provisional Electoral Council (CEP), “almost certainly in conjunction with President Préval,” had unwisely and unjustly excluded the country’s largest party, the Lavalas Family, according to a secret U.S. Embassy cable dated Dec. 4, 2009 provided by WikiLeaks to Haïti Liberté.

The meeting of representatives from the European Union and United Nations with ambassadors from Brazil, Canada, Spain and the U.S., decided to knowingly move ahead with the flawed polling because “the international community has too much invested in Haiti's democracy to walk away from the upcoming elections, despite its imperfections,” in the words of the EU representative, according to U.S. Ambassador Kenneth Merten’s cable.

The Lavalas Family (FL) is the party of then-exiled former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who was kidnapped by a U.S. Navy Seal team on Feb. 29, 2004 and flown to Africa as part of a coup d’état that was supported by France, Canada, and the U.S..

This history made Canadian Ambassador Gilles Rivard worry at the Dec. 1, 2009 donor meeting that “support for the elections as they now stand would be interpreted by many in Haiti as support for Préval and the CEP's decision against Lavalas.” He said that the CEP had reneged on a pledge to “reconsider their exclusion of Lavalas.”

http://www.haiti-liberte.com/archives/volume4-47/As%20Rigging%20Came%20to%20Light.asp#.Te-hZJzoxhE;twitter

[naaman fletcher]

1. On the plus side

it looks like it was a LIHOP rather than a MIHOP, if that is any consolation.

[Bacchus39]

2. I am glad the US supported the Haitian elections n/t

s

[Judi Lynn]

3. It's good to see this published, EFerrari. Overwhelming, absolutely.

More from the article you posted:

~snip~
Such plans to brazenly meddle and play favorites in Haiti’s sovereign electoral process presaged how Washington would forcefully intervene in the elections when they finally did take place on November 28, 2010, followed by run-offs on March 20, 2011.

Those interventions – primarily by the Organization of American States (OAS) or what Cuba calls Washington’s “Ministry of Colonial Affairs” – assured the victory of pro-U.S. coup-cheerleader Michel “Sweet Micky” Martelly, 50, a former lewd konpa musician, despite a dramatically flawed, and often illegal, electoral process as well as an anemic voter turn-out.

Less than 23 percent of Haiti's registered voters had their vote counted in either of the two rounds, the lowest electoral participation rate in the hemisphere since 1945, according to the Washington-based Center for Economic and Policy Research.

Furthermore, the second round was illegal because the eight-member CEP could never muster the five votes necessary to ratify the first round results which Washington and the OAS imposed.

Also, it's important to read the next linked articles offered at the end of the first article:

Newly Released WikiLeaked Cables Reveal:
Washington Backed Famous Brand-Name Contractors in Fight Against Haiti’s Minimum Wage Increase
by Dan Coughlin and Kim Ives

http://www.haiti-liberte.com/archives/volume4-47/Washington%20Backed%20Famous.asp

Thank you. Recommending.

[Billy Burnett]

4. Time for a thread hijacking post on Haiti's child prostitution?

In Haiti swaths of miserable never-schooled children are pimped for mud cookies. A "free" marketeer's libertarian dream.

[Bacchus39]

5. isn't engaging in child prostitution pretty much univerally illegal?

was there a particular point to your post?

[Judi Lynn]

6. What's not to like for those guys? Pure heaven.

A man with pockets full of candy or coins could really whoop it up, just like Rush Limbaugh on his trip to the D.R.

All that, and cheap labor, too.