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A large-scale tourism project planned for the
Haitian island of Île-à-Vache targets “the
well-heeled tourist from traditional
markets…creating a place of exquisite peace and
well-being,” as described in the government of
Haiti’s
executive plan.
The project aims to attract four character
types: “the Explorers, the Lovers, the
Rejuvenators and the Homecomers.” The
corporations behind the project intend to build
1,500 hotels and bungalows along the island’s
beaches, an international airport, a golf
course, island farms, and tourist “villages”
with cafes, shops, and night clubs.
The government
touts the project as “community hand-in-hand”,
with “equitable distribution of benefits for
all.” It says the tourism will be “mothering
[to] nature” and is for the “general good.”
The community
sees it very differently. A grassroots group,
Collective for Île-à-Vache (KOPI) [Konbit
Oganizasyon Peyizan Ilavach], was formed in
December 2013 and immediately began organizing
multiple peaceful protests, strengthening the
voices of the local community, and connecting
with allies.
Community
members have been mobilizing because they
understand the multiple challenges ahead if the
project continues as planned. Problems will
likely include displacement of people from their
land, forced migration to the overcrowded
capital in search of work, loss of food
production in a hungry nation, further economic
impoverishment, and environmental and cultural
degradation.
The
administration has been making empty promises
and telling lies to the inhabitants of the
island, while systematically violating their
rights and using violence to repress and
intimidate those who have been peacefully
protesting.
Special police
forces, such as the Motorized Intervention
Brigade (BIM) and the Intervention and Order
Maintenance Corps (CIMO), have a permanent
presence on the island now. Preceding the
inception of the tourism project, there were
only three police officers. In the last two
weeks, a SWAT team has been introduced to the
island. [The team was described in one account
as more than 50 special police forces dressed in
black with masks.]
The
vice-president of KOPI, Police officer Jean
Mathelnus Lamy, was arrested on Feb. 21.
He was moved to the National Penitentiary
in Port-au-Prince on Feb. 25, where he remains
without official charges.
The “peace and
well-being” envisioned for the tourists have not
extended to the local population. On the
contrary, there is a sense of fear around what
is impending. It began when the government
issued an official decree on May 10, 2013 making
all of the offshore islands zones of tourism
development and public utility. The proposed
plans for the project were created by three
Canadian companies: Resonance, 360 VOX, and
IBI/DAA. They have little understanding or
attachment to community needs.
Since then, the
situation has gotten much worse. In August 2013,
groundbreaking for the international airport
flattened an old-growth forest, which was
considered community land. Truxton began
dredging a pristine bay known as Madam Bernard
without an assessment of the environmental
impact on marine ecosystems. Abaka Bay, which is
one of the two luxury hotels on the island,
illuminated the issue of waste management when a
recent human rights delegation spotted the
resort’s current method of waste disposal behind
the resort. Garbage – cans, plastic bags,
cardboard boxes, food – were just strewn
willy-nilly in the bushes (see photo). The
expansion of Abaka Bay is part of phase I of the
project.
Construction on
a new road began in late 2013, without any
notice, damaging a number of homes and taking
out up to 18 coconut trees, which were a
critical part of one household’s livelihood. No
compensation was offered for the losses, though
that is required by the Haitian Constitution.
The company working on the road and airport is
the Dominican Company Ingeneria Estrella.
We spoke to one elderly woman whose home is near
the airport and has been marked for demolition,
as she understands, by the Office of Land
Registry (DGI). She stated about the Estrella
workers, “They come in and out of my yard
without notice and they enter without even a
greeting.”
The collective
KOPI has been organizing with other grassroots
and human right organizations from
Port-au-Prince. The group’s demands are (1)
transparency and communication about the
project, (2) retraction of the May 10, 2013
decree stating that the island is for tourism
development and public utility, and (3) release
of KOPI’s vice-president, Jean Mathelnus Lamy,
who remains in the National Penitentiary, and
(4) removal of the special police forces from
the island. KOPI consists of 11 steering members
and seven additional members in each of the 26
localities on the island.
Largely, the
island community is not opposed to tourism. They
are in favor of development which is respectful
of their needs, which does not exploit nor
threaten to take away their land; a project in
which their participation is central and
integral. However, they strongly oppose the
current iteration of the project which is
systematically violating their rights.
Last week,
Prime Minister Lamothe visited the island again
with a government delegation consisting of the
Minister of Justice and a delegate from the
Ministry of the Promotion of the Peasantry.
Multiple communications were issued during this
visit from the
Ministry of
Communication and
Martelly-friendly outlets, including
Haiti Libre, show what appears to be the prime
minister talking to a supportive population
about social programs and distributing food.
The untold
story in these communications by Prime Minister
Lamothe and Minister of Tourism Stephanie Balmir
Villedrouin is that the population was told each
household would receive 10,000 gourdes, or about
US$220, during the visit to help boost
microenterprise. When the delegation arrived, no
money was distributed, but rather sacks of rice
and crackers. Close inspection of the picture of
Lamothe speaking, which was circulated by Haiti
Libre and the Minister of Communications, shows
the audience actually standing in a line for
this hand out.
While the
population protested the visit with burning
tires and blockades, there were few people
taking to the streets because of the SWAT
presence which accompanied the delegation.
Warrants were issued for the arrest of KOPI
leaders. Many of them have left their homes and
gone into hiding, unable to continue with their
daily livelihood activities.
Villedrouin continues to say publicly the
tourism development project is for the
community, while the lies, intimidation, and
repression continue. The population’s claims
were verified in a report issued on Apr. 2, 2014
[by eight Haitian human rights groups which
visited the area] to investigate the tensions.
Similar recent
foreign investment schemes in Haiti, like new
free trade zones, have not brought the
much-touted government line of better incomes.
Residents of Île-à-Vache are concerned that they
will have no power to enforce even the daily
minimum wage of $5.11, as has happened with new
sweatshops. Further, Haiti’s tourism industry -
when it was flourishing in the 80s – created a
collision of wealth and extreme poverty which
promoted other informal economies, such as the
sex industry which was illuminated in the film
“Heading South.”
Under the
platform “Haiti is Open for Business”, the
Martelly/Lamothe Administration continues to
entice foreign investments with images of
stability and security, building of
infrastructure financed by PetroCaribe, and
incentive policies such as a 15-year exemption
from local taxes and duties exonerations on the
import of equipment, goods and materials.
Tourism is one
of the development pillars of the government in
reconstruction/rebuilding following the 2010
earthquake. Tourism is supported by the Bill
Clinton, UN Special Envoy to Haiti, who speaks
of “Building Back Better.” The other economic
pillars include mining, free-trade zones, and
monocropping for export, all of which are direct
affronts to the livelihoods of the rural
peasantry and to food and land sovereignty.
The situation
on Île-à-Vache is indicative of all the woes of
Caribbean tourism and the model for what is to
occur across Haiti. The government continues on
its path to implement development to shape what
it is calling “an emerging country by 2030.” In
reality, these modes of development are further
displacing and increasing urban migration;
detaching and alienating the peasantry from the
land with few alternatives.
Villedrouin
does not speak about displacements, but rather
“relocation,” when addressing residents of the
island, while reporting to Reuters that only 5%
of the population will be displaced. Lamothe
promises there will be no displacements.
Simultaneously,
there are still displacement camps in
Port-au-Prince more than four years after the
quake. There is no relocation plan for the
residents of these camps, and in some areas of
Port-au-Prince there is still rubble remaining.
If this is the precedent for what happens to
those who are displaced in Haiti, then the
inhabitants of Île-à-Vache should be concerned
about their futures.
Will many
farmers and fishers from the island end up in
Haiti’s shantytowns, as have hundreds of
thousands of displaced farmers before them?
Those who were living in hillside shantytowns
had the highest mortality rate from the
earthquake. Île-à-Vache’s population continues
to be unsettled, uncertain of its future.
And so the
Île-à-Vache community sings in protest:
Caller:
Nou gen kasav (We
have cassava)
Nou gen kafe (We
have coffee).
Group Response:
Nou pa bezwen pwoje sa (We
do not need this project).
The following is adapted from a presentation by
Jessica Hsu of Other Worlds and Jean Claudy
Aristil of Radio VKM Les Cayes at the Executive
Symposium for Innovators in Coastal Tourism
conference in St. Georges, Grenada held from
July 8-11, 2014.
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