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by Thomas Péralte
President Michel Martelly and Prime
Minister Laurent Lamothe reshuffled their cabinet last week for
the third time in nine months. The new cabinet comprises 23
ministers and 10 secretaries of state. The previous government
of President René Préval and Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive
was less bloated but more effective with only 18 ministers and
just a few secretaries of state.
In a Jan. 12, 2013 decree, approved by Martelly,
Lamothe changed seven ministers: David Bazile replaced
Ronsard Saint-Cyr as Minister of the Interior and
Territorial Communities; Charles Jean-Jacques replaced
Josépha Raymond Gauthier as Minister of Social Affairs and
Labor; Josette Darguste replaced Jean Mario Dupuy
as Culture Minister; Régine Godefroy replaced Ady Jean
Gardy as Communications Minister; Magalie Racine
replaced Jean Roosevelt René as Minister of Youth, Sports
and Civic Action; Jean François Thomas replaced Jean
Vilmond Hilaire as Environment Minister; and Bernice
Fidelia replaced Daniel Supplice as Minister of
Haitians Living Abroad.
The remaining ministers stayed
in their posts: Laurent Lamothe as Minister of Planning
and External Cooperation; Pierre Richard Casimir as
Minister of Foreign Affairs and Religious Affairs; Jean Renel
Sanon as Minister of Justice and Public Security; Marie
Carmelle Jean-Marie as Minister of Economy and Finance;
Thomas Jacques as Minister of Agriculture, Natural
Resources, and Rural Development; Jacques Rousseau as
Minister of Public Works, Transport, Energy, and Communications;
Wilson Laleau as Minister of Trade and Industry;
Stéphanie Balmir Villedrouin as Tourism Minister; Vanneur
Pierre as Minister of National Education and Vocational
Training; Florence Duperval Guillaume as Minister of
Public Health and Population; Yanick Mézile as Minister
for the Status of Women and Women's Rights; Jean Rodolphe
Joazile as Defense Minister; Ralph Théano as Minister
delegated by the Prime Minister for Relations with Parliament;
Marie Carmelle Rose Anne Auguste as Minister delegated by
the Prime Minister for Human Rights and the Fight Against
Extreme Poverty;
Marie Mimose Félix as Minister
delegated by the Prime Minister to Promote the Peasantry; and
René Jean-Jumeau as Minister delegated by the Prime Minister
for Energy Security.
Meanwhile, other appointments
were Reginald Delva as Secretary of State for Public
Security; Philippe Cinéas as Secretary of State for
Public Works and Transport; Fresnel Dorcin as Secretary
of State for Plant Production; Michel Chancy as Secretary
of State for Animal Production; Vernet Joseph as
Secretary of State for Agricultural Renewal; Ronald Décembre
as Secretary of State for Tax Reform; Oswald Thimoléon
as Secretary of State for Literacy; Marina Gourgues
as Secretary of State for Vocational Training; Gérald Oriol
as Secretary of State for the Integration of Persons with
Disabilities; and Robert Labrousse as Secretary of State
for External Cooperation.
In addition, the infamous
Duvalierist Emmanuel Ménard was appointed as the Director
General of the National Radio and Television of Haiti (RTNH).
Ménard was once a leading propagandist for the Duvalier
dictatorship on Radio Nationale; he was also formerly a director
of the Delmas mayor’s office, director of the National Library
of Haiti, and an advisor to President Martelly.
This cabinet reshuffling
promoted many other notorious and zealous Duvalierists and
neo-Duvalierists of yesteryear, or their children. For example,
Interior Minister David Bazile was a former officer in the Armed
Forces of Haiti (FAD'H), and a former Secretary of State for
Public Security under the coup government of President Alexandre
Boniface and Prime Minister Gérard Latortue (2004-2006). A
leader of the Duvalierist Party of National Unity (PUN), Bazile
was also an advisor to President Martelly and coordinator of the
National Commission for the Fight Against Drugs (CONALD).
Meanwhile, Sports Minister
Magalie Racine is the daughter of former Tonton Macoute militia
chief Madame Max Adolphe. She is married to Georges Racine, a
Martelly advisor and a strongman in the National Palace. Also
Public Works Secretary of State Philippe Cinéas is the son of
longtime Duvalierist figure Alix Cinéas, who was an advisor to
Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier and a member of the original
neo-Duvalierist National Council of Government (CNG) which
succeeded Duvalier after his fall in 1986.
While former Lavalas official
Mario Dupuy lost his job as Culture Minister, right-wing
hardliners like Justice Minister Jean Renel Sanon, a former
soldier, kept his. Sanon has come under particular outcry for
firing Port-au-Prince’s prosecutor Jean Renel Sénatus, who
refused to arrest three human-rights lawyers. Sanon also
appointed a controversial lawyer, Fermo-Jude Paul, as an
investigating judge of the court in Croix-des-Bouquets, just
north of the capital; Paul then went on to release to release
Calixte Valentin, a close Martelly advisor, who shot to death in
cold blood Octanol Dérissaint, a Haitian vendor, in front of
many eye-witnesses in the town of Fond Parisien, near the
Dominican border, last April. Sanon also stands accused of
encouraging corruption in an already corruption-riddled judicial
system.
Public Works Minister Jacques
Rousseau has been on the hot seat before Parliament for agreeing
to sign contracts, which the lawmakers consider illegal and
unconstitutional, granting gold mining permits.
Finally, the Minister delegated
to deal with Parliament, Ralph Théano, has taken to insulting
lawmakers. He described members of the opposition’s minority
bloc, the PRI, as "Kamikazes" and children raised in
single-parent families. Some parliamentarians feel that Martelly
and Lamothe are thumbing their noses at Parliament by keeping
the unapologetic Théano in his post.
The cabinet shake-up is the
fourth under Martelly, who came to power in May 2011. The first
cabinet to change was that formed under former Prime Minister
Garry Conille.
Parliamentarians are also up in
arms after Martelly floated a threat to unilaterally (and
illegally) shorten the terms of ten Senators who were elected to
six year terms: John Joel Joseph (West), Wencesclass Lambert
(South East), Francky Exius (South), Maxime Roumer (Grand'Anse),
William Jeanty (Nippes), Jean Willy Jean-Baptiste (Artibonite),
Desras Simon Dieuseul (Central Plateau); Moïse Jean-Charles
(Nord); Méllius Hyppolite (Northwest) and Jean-Baptiste Bien-Aimé
(North-East). All were sworn in on Sep. 4, 2009, and therefore
their constitutional mandate will expire on the second Monday of
January 2015. Several of the senators are outspoken critics of
Martelly, and the President wants to silence them, particularly
Moïse Jean-Charles.
Martelly’s threat to trim
Senate terms has already triggered howls of protest in both the
upper and lower houses of Parliament. Even senators considered
aligned with Martelly expressed their opposition. "I spoke with
the President, and I told him that it was a bad road to take,"
said Senate President Desras Simon Dieuseul. "If he has advisers
who told him he can enforce this law, I challenge them to tell
me that I am not right, because when we talk about a
transitional provision, it is a something that is for a limited
time and that time has elapsed. I told the President that I did
not want him to insist on this path. If we question the terms of
one category of elected officials, then we should also put into
question the terms of all elected officials (including the
President), and we could arrive at a general election."
Senator Wencesclass Lambert, a
close Martelly ally in the Senate, also voiced his disagreement
with Martelly’s proposal to shorten the ten mandates, saying
they were constitutionally protected. He lamely suggested that
Martelly’s remarks do not reflect the government’s official
position. He warned that any attempt to reduce the senators’
mandates would precipitate “a new and serious political crisis.”
Meanwhile, Deputy Emmanuel
Fritz-Gerald Bourjolly, also member of the pro-government
parliamentary bloc, called Martelly’s proposal unconstitutional
and undemocratic, saying the President has no authority to
shorten senators’ terms. “That would be against the principles
of democracy,” he said.
Deputy Patrick Joseph from
Saint-Michel/Marmelade said that Martelly’s proposal “proves,
once again, his dictatorial tendencies.” He said Martelly’s
speeches on the development of the country are contradicted by
his actions and called on the Haitian people to “remain vigilant
to defeat anti-democratic plan of the President.”
Grande Saline’s Deputy, Wilbert
Joseph Deshommes, said he hoped that Martelly had “already
realized the illegality of the project” to shorten the senators’
terms. He invited Martelly to review “the evidence that the era
of dictatorship in Haiti is over.”
Some have noted that Martelly
appears clumsily willing to use the transitional provisions of
the 2008 Electoral Act against parliamentarians, while he
refuses to use the transitional provisions of the Constitution
for the formation of a Provisional Electoral Council to organize
elections.
In fact, the formation of an
electoral council to organize elections is once again delayed.
The coalition of clerics called Religions for Peace, which was
seeking to broker a compromise between the Executive and the
Legislature, has now withdrawn. The representatives of the
Superior Council of the Judiciary (CSPJ) installed on Martelly’s
patently illegal “Permanent” Electoral Council refuse to step
down. Martelly continues to keep his protégé Josué Pierre-Louis
at the head of any eventual electoral council, despite the
credible charges that Pierre-Louis raped one of his staff
members.
The evident hardening of the regime’s stance in the
face of growing popular misery, anger, and outcry augur serious
political confrontations in the coming weeks and months.
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