Lavalas - Haiti Observer Blog

The field is getting crowded. The next election in Haiti is definitely going to be something interesting. According to The Associated Press, Richard Morse, manager of the Hotel Oloffson and the leader of the musical band RAM, already met with Former Haitian President Jean Bertrand Aristide three times in the past two weeks to discuss the possibility of his wife, Lunise Exume Morse, to run for the Senate seat under Fanmi Lavalas banner.

Richard Morse is a first cousin to president Michel Martelly. He left the government last January for what he called "corruption" in the National Palace. The Morses are considering for Lunise Exume Morse to run as candidacy for the west department in the next election likely to take pale in 2013 or 2014.

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This is no longer a rumor. According to lematinhaiti.com, judge Yvickel Dabrezil who has been working on the case regarding the assassination of the CEO of Radio Haiti Inter, John Leopold Dominique and Jean Claude Louissaint has confirmed that to be a fact. The Lavalas Leader and former President of Haiti Jean-Bertrand Aristide has received an invitation to answer questions around the assassination on April 3rd, 2000 of John Leopold Dominique and Jean Claude Louissaint

President Jean-Bertrand Aristide will be present at the cabinet of instruction, Wednesday, April 24, for questioning in the case following the invitation that was delivered to his residence of Tabarre.

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René Garcia Préval had his first turn as Haitian president the first elected in the country's independent history who served a full term lasting from the 7th of February 1996 to the 7th of February 2001, previously having briefly served as Prime Minister in 1991. Préval won the five year seat with 88% of the popular vote, making him the second head of state elected through a democratic process in Haiti's 200 years of history.

Rene Préval used his presidency to influence the implementation of various reforms to the economy, leading to a significant fall in the rate of unemployment by the end of his term, and to support the investigation of instances of human rights violations perpetrated by the police and the military. He brought about the privatization of government companies and, after dissolving parliament in 1999, spent the duration of his presidency ruling by decree.

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It is always thought wiser to teach a man to fish than to hand him one. This is a sentiment that Jean Dominique shaped his career around upon returning to Haiti from private school in France. Working with the poor, he took his training in agronomy to teach the peasantry how to sustain themselves through skillful use of the land.

Because of his efforts, which included showing peasant farmers how to avoid being in debt to wealthy landowners, Dominique was imprisoned for six months due to the connivance of the landowners who convinced the authorities to jail him so they could hold on to their control over the peasants. Upon his release from jail, he became a fierce detractor of François 'Papa Doc' Duvalier and his militant regime.

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Jean Dominique spent his early career first educating farmers on how to be self-sufficient under the thumb of wealthy land-owners. He then went on to making two notable firsts in the broadcasting world, opening the first film club in Haiti as well as Radio Haiti, the first station to broadcast in Creole. He went on to have multiple run-ins with the Duvalier regiments and was exiled in New York until his return in the mid 80's when he became a member of the Lavalas party which won the 1990 election.

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During an interview with Valery Numa at Radio Vision 2000 this week, former Haitian president, Ertha Pascal Trouillot, was showed little reserve. She managed to give us some important facts during her government.

She was very hard on another former Haitian president. Ertha denounced a conspiracy created by former President Jean Bertrand Aristide and the Lavalas group in the objective of murdering her.

She went into some details on the Coup D'etat orchestrated by the late Roger Lafontant one January 6, 1991.

Ertha Pascal Trouillot also blamed Jean Bertrand Aristide for not taking the opportunity he had at the time to reconcile the nation with itself and at the same time bring Haiti on the path of development.

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