 Okay. Okay, so we're live on Facebook now as well. So good afternoon, everyone. This is what the F is going on in Latin America. Code pinks. 20 minutes of hot news out of Latin America and the Caribbean airing every Wednesday, 12pm Eastern. And we stream live on Facebook. We will also be recording this and posting on our YouTube channel that we're building. So today I am really honored to introduce to all of you and have a conversation with Leonie. I mean, did I say that correctly. Yeah. Okay. I'm still getting my Spanish accent correct so now you're. And now I have to learn a little French and a little Creole. So, I'm really honored to have Leonie here with us because I had a chance to meet her yesterday at a hearing regarding Haiti. It was US House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs and the hearing was entitled Haiti on the brink assessing US policy towards a country in crisis. And I'll attach the link on our Facebook as well. So all of you can, if you're interested, you can listen to the full I think it was almost two hours of testimony. It was quite profound. And Leonie was one of the witnesses yesterday afternoon she is Haitian. Let me tell you a little bit about her. You were born in Haiti, raised in New York City, and she spent 20 years of grassroots community building in Miami's Haitian community. But she has a very impressive resume that I want to share with you briefly before we start talking about yesterday's hearing and the historical events that led up to many of the issues brought up yesterday. And she, I'll just go through this really quickly and you can jump in and add details as you like. You're so visiting professor at FIU School of Architecture, Executive Executive Director of Haitian America Foundation, Director of Research and Strategic Planning at Santhla where you are back at Santhla now. I'm going to turn to Haiti as Director of Lambie Fund of Haiti, which focuses on Haitians, Haiti's rural poor, and is a community led fund. You also have your own consulting firm. You're very impressive. And what have I forgotten? You have your own? Well, nothing, but really everything that I've done has been focused on Haiti and the Haitian community and really strengthening our capacity both here and in Haiti to improve our lives. I've been very fortunate that I've had the opportunity to do that for most of my professional life. It's a profound body of work and let's talk a little bit about your heritage as a Haitian. One of the things that yesterday's hearing, I have to tell all of you in the audience. I was sharing this with Leonie before we went live that we've covered the last several weeks with our webinars, the uprising in Ecuador, in Chile, and now Bolivia. And really, quite frankly, we would have been most correct to have started a year ago in the streets of Haiti. I mean, you've been leading, the Haitian people have been leading street activism and protest against your sitting government. The longest in this past year, but I would argue the longest in the in the history of America is defined by the United States 300 years starting with the French. So let's talk a little bit about yesterday's hearing in Congress. It was titled Haiti on the Brink, Assessing US Policy Toward a Country in Crisis. Why you were invited as a witness and what your takeaway of the hearing yesterday was. I was invited by Congresswoman Frederica Wilson, who is from South Florida, because Congresswoman, you know, South Florida has the largest Haitian population in the United States in terms of the diaspora. There are over 200,000 Haitian Americans living in South Florida, and she understands very well that Haiti and Haiti's development, Haiti is linked to the diaspora for multiple reasons. First of all, you know, most of many of us are from Haiti, and we, you know, when Haiti, as they say, when Haiti coughs with sneeze, and we provide in terms of remittances over 30% of the GDP. Last year alone, we set over $3 billion in remittances to Haiti. So we know that for emotional and economic reasons, we're tied to Haiti, and yet we're never invited around the table when it comes to discussing solutions for Haiti. Those of you in the diaspora are not included. Yeah. So, so Haitians, Haiti's own people are included. And American citizens. And American citizens. Let me add that we're American citizens. Funding the projects. Funding. With our tax dollars. And, you know, investing heavily in Haiti, and yet we, you know, with 3 billion, I guess I would say that we are the largest investors in Haiti. We have no international organization, no international donor that can match our contribution. And yet our, our vision, our perspective, the creativity of our solutions are never, never addressed by the by the United States or the international So, let's talk about some of the, some of the deeply rooted issues that that that you and your people want to address. One of the things that I shared with you before we went live was that I think it was, I think April of 16 I had mentioned that I was in Haiti and I had a chance to visit the US embassy, and we got a nice little PowerPoint presentation showing how much US tax dollar investment there has been made in Haiti. And the gentleman during the presentation said, Oh, you know, XYZ amount for these projects and he said I have to be very handed the return on investment has been very poor and of course that was just an appalling thing for us to hear on you know what that inferred on many levels. And so you and I were saying that the solutions keep coming from the same institutions and the same people. Right. And without consultation with really the people of Haiti I mean I remember once post earthquake I was staying at a hotel and I was sitting next to this woman who was asking the questions and I sort of programmed her and said what are you doing and she was working for USAID or one of those organizations doing judicial reform, working on judicial reform in Haiti. And so I kept asking her have you and she's writing a report, and there's another gentleman an academic from the US University, and they were both talking about, you know, the program and so I kept asking did you talk to so and so did you talk to so and so, and they didn't even know who the local players were so of course their projects are going to fail, because again, there is no real investment in understanding what the realities on the ground. So the realities on the ground are your specialty, your, your life's work. Can you share with us some of the community projects funds that you've been involved with on the ground in Haiti. I've worked, I've been very fortunate to work with great organizations underground. One of them was the Lambi Fund of Haiti, which is an organization that supports grassroots initiatives, not in the traditional, I'm going to tell you what you need kind of way but in the manner of, we will support your own initiatives and so we would go to, we go to world communities and are approached by community based organizations, real local stakeholders who tell us that they need to in order to become sustainable farmers, they need an investment, you know, for example, in a grain meal and an irrigation system. And so the Lambi Fund provides the fund with the provider that the organization itself manages the fund so what we used to do does is to offer training to the farmers so that they can manage the fund, they can execute the project. That was, that was one of the most profound, most educational experiences in my life as a Haitian, because I got to travel throughout the country and really meet the people of Haiti. Recently I've worked in a, with a small network of schools, again all Haitian-led, focusing on education as the passport out of poverty, but also as a means to build civic leaders. And so I work with ProDev, an educational organization in Haiti and that was, that also was very rewarding to be in an institution where children were treated with respect, teachers were treated with respect and the schools, the ProDev schools provided all children, especially living in challenging conditions, the opportunity to be in an enriching environment where they were treated as human beings worthy of receiving quality education. So these, gosh, these are really, we could spend all day talking about these projects and how profound they are to, to creating a nation of people, your own nation of people. Yeah, from the ground up, not from investment top down. Oh, absolutely. And, you know, there's another great foundation in Haiti called Folk Out that I've worked with. And they, I mean, they have created this urban part in, in the heart of one of the most dangerous gang, quote, unquote, infested neighborhoods in Port-au-Prince-en-Mar-de-Saint. And that is also one of the proudest experiences of my life is to see the interaction between the park and the people of this neighborhood who basically been forsaken because of the fear generated by gang activity. So it's, I've really been very lucky in terms of Haiti and even in my work here in Miami's Haitian community. Let me, let me ask you, there was a couple of things, oh gosh, I'm thinking like five things all at once to ask you here. The gang related activity that is due to what in many places throughout Latin America and the Caribbean, we see it as a result lack of economic development. Yeah, lack of lack of hope. You know, clearly when you have a population where over 50% of the current population is under the age of 25. This is what you sort of call a bonus, a demographic bonuses in most countries because having such a young population allows you to education and training to envision what you want to be in the future and really build that country's capacity to its youth. But you have a country where there is any, you know, to call it inadequate is is is a gross misstatement where you have a very dysfunctional educational system, very class driven, you know, because if you have money you get some education and if you don't, you're doomed to not be educated and so and you have that population, that useful population having access to the internet, having access to social media and having the ability to project themselves into societies that are much more affluent and much more respectful of their citizens. That generates anger that is also fueled by politicians, a lot of politicians are arming their own gangs in the absence of you know, a police force of 9000 for countries of 11 million, you understand that protection is not always guaranteed and so you have a lot of politicians who are arming their own gangs for their own purposes, businessmen arming gangs for protection, and so people taking them on to their own hands and the free flow and the free flow of arms and guns and ammunition from the United States doesn't help either. And so you have young, you have 15 years walking around with the latest piece of automatic, you know, rifles automatic guns so it's very distressing to see the waste of a young generation. This is, you know, this is something that me personally, we see in my travels at my work in Mexico and Honduras as well as arming of gangs of unemployed, particularly of the young people. This is something that came up. We touched that was touched on a little bit in yesterday's hearing and specifically the National Police Force there were some comments yesterday that the current president wanted to build a military in Haiti, the US obviously as opposed to that that that was mentioned several times quite overtly today, but there was conversation about developing, expanding the National Police Force. And this is this body of 9,000 that you meant just mentioned. 9 or 15,000 but very small, very small. But you know, as Pierre Esperance said, it's a group that has become much more professional. And so the violence that has been perpetrated in massacres for example in neighborhoods like in, is not necessarily attributed to the police, but to the emerging paramilitary forces that are doing elected officials bidding by trying to silence some of the most vocal opposition. Let's talk about last saline and what happened there and how that has been some of a lightning rod for some of the protesting going on. This saline is a neighborhood. One of those neighborhoods that we have a high concentration of poverty of unemployment of uninhabitable dwellings you know you have when you go there. You want to compare to the favelas in Brazil but it's really not even close to comparable you have 10 you have shacks basically people living in shacks, really horrible conditions, but a very high concentration as people left the countryside and move to the city you know Port-au-Prince was built for a population of 500,000. I think that right now and it's a very it's, it's, there is not much room for for expansion, because it's surrounded by mountains. So, the high concentration of poverty, the high concentration of population as I said people have left the countryside in droves and have moved to Port-au-Prince and so they leave in what people called ghettos and last saline, just like city so they is one of those neighborhoods and again, well you have a lot of gangs and a lot of political, the hotbed of political dissent. And so, as demonstrators have put the city on what they call lock, you know, lock down the paramilitary forces have gone into the neighborhood of las saline and basically massacred young people, massacred raped women, really wreaked havoc and inflicted incredible violence on that community. The problem is that there is still no investigation. Those who have perpetrated these crimes are known, but yet the justice system has yet to act on the accusations and the evidence presented and so it's another continuing sign of impunity. And that's, you know, protesters are always clamoring for you know they want justice they want the rule of law and las saline is an absolute wonderful example not wonderful but an important example of what happens in the country where there is no rule of law. So this is a country with no rule of law being heavily funded by the United States and various aid organizations. And maybe we should talk about why that's so I think in the opening statements yesterday. There was a comment made that Haiti basically summed up the geopolitical role of Haiti and why the United States basically tolerates funding. A government that operates with impunity, not unlike funding Honduras. And that statement was that Haiti, the current government of Haiti recognizes the quote unquote interim government of Venezuela under Juan Guaido, and that also Haiti is a trading partner with Taiwan, as opposed to mainland China. And also taking a position in Nicaragua that is aligned with the United States vision. So, yes, there was a statement that for geopolitical reasons. Haiti was not, well, the president of Haiti, the current President Moises administration was considered an ally, an important ally. And so in that regard, there's almost, there's, I'm not sure how to correctly say this without being offensive to some people in the audience that the funding from the US and related aid organizations continues to come regardless of the cry from the people on the streets for a more humane and just society. Yeah, I mean, I think that I think with the exception of President Harry Street, if I recall, money has always flowed into Haiti. The question is, how is it invested, whether it's come in or not, what difference has it made. And that was that was part of my opening statement. And when I said that, well, you know, the protest had been clamoring for accountability in Haiti, or, you know, how the Petro-Caribbean funds were spent or not spent. Talking about corruption and how many politicians siphoned a lot of these funds out of the country, our concerns as the diaspora was about how the USAID invested the funds. What were the returns of investment. And, you know, we still don't understand there's very little transparency as to how these funds actually benefited Haiti to look at 30 years of investments. We're talking about buildings and in Petro-Caribbean three billion. I dread to know what the actual numbers are in terms of US investment in Haiti. And as we say, we don't, as taxpayers, we have not yet been given a full picture as to what the returns on our investments are and why we keep investing in bad policy and bad strategy or ineffectual strategies. Because we don't step out of the box, as you and I were saying earlier, that we keep referring issues to the same institutions and the same people. The question is, do we want to step out of the box? Exactly. I think that these are very smart people who understand that if a strategy doesn't work, something else should be tried. And I know that there have been multiple parties, either diaspora concerns, who have presented them with alternatives. And so, you know, you begin to, it's interesting to note that, regardless of the political party, there's been this reluctance to change strategies to think outside the box. And most likely for geopolitical reasons. And self enrichment and all those other financial ties to corruption, etc. One of, now, there was a potential for elections in Haiti in January. Is that my understanding? Possibly, but doubtful. And what would elections accomplish, if anything? I know there was going to happen is that by law, the members of parliament are going to be out. There should have been elections in, there should have been elections this fall to replace members of parliament who are term limited. Because there were no elections, the parliament is going to be, there will be no form, there will be, there will not be enough members present to make any decisions. And so the president is going to be ruling by decree, unless something miraculous happens between now and mid January. There will be no, they're probably not going to be election and the president will by decree. So the country's, I mean, a sole leader, is that what, is that what that means? Accountability, if we talk about lack of accountability, it's going to be exponentially greater now that, as per the constitution, when there is no quorum, the president will rule by decree. So, yeah, wow, it's a dictator, basically. I'll say it. You don't have to. But it's kind of, you know, yeah, it's like, wow, so that the, yeah, the government lies in the hands of one of one person. Let me ask you about elections in Haiti, because this did come up yesterday as well. And there that there would be potentially be a call for elections, and that that isn't necessary. There were some comments that that wasn't necessarily what was needed that. And I think you and I had said that, you know, equating elections with democracy is is a fallacy. Yes, and it's, and it's sort of intentional because the parties know that the system as it is, and as it is supported by and let's just say that it is a system that is supported by by the international community. In order to encourage elections, free and fair elections, the international community has provided financial support to parties involved in the election, so that anyone who can bring together a group of people, create a platform and have a name can have a party which is which gets a nominal support I think something I don't remember the numbers, but between 15 to $20,000 of financial support. That's not enough to unreal elections, but for for folks who just want to make some money. That's a great opportunity and so at around election time, you have a whole cottage industry of parties that emerge and of course disappear after the elections. During the last presidential elections, we had something like 75 parties just emerge. There are about two or three or four parties that have a history of members activities or platforms, but for the, the most part, these new parties just come up. They just pop-up parties pop-up party like pop-up party. Yes. And so, and so the international community loves to point to this thing as you see, you know, there is all this civic engagement citizens engagement. There's an exchange of ideas, but that's not the case. The case. It's a money-making game. It's an absolute tragedy. Wow. And for the last elections, President Moise won by 500,000 votes, votes in a country where there are about 5 million registered voters. Wow. Wow. So the people in the streets demanding a change in government, I think it's, you know, it's, you've given us a much clearer picture as to why. I, when I entered, when I introduced this conversation today, I mentioned that, you know, we've been, we've started with the people rising in Ecuador, Chile and now Bolivia. But Haitians have been in the streets for the last 18 months, but also for the last couple centuries. I mean, the Haitian is, so let's talk a little bit briefly in the few minutes we have left, if you can give us a brief history of Haiti and, and you're such the beacon of example for fighting for national sovereignty and national identity. And so maybe you can, can you share some of that history with us just so our viewers can have a better understanding. You know, Haiti, quickly, Haiti shares this island called Hispaniola, which I hate, I hate that term Hispaniola, with the Dominican Republic. Haiti, so Haiti was colonized by the French and the Americans by the Spaniards. Haiti was the, the reason why it's called the pearl of the Antilles actually it's because it was the richest possession of the French Empire in terms of because of its sugar production. And you know that when you're talking about sugar you're talking about labor slave labor at the time. And so in Haiti was this huge plantation system that produced sugar which enriched many of the emerging bourgeoisie French bourgeois and led to the overthrow the French Revolution actually. And so it was this unheard of event that enslaved people have enslaved Africans. Recognize their own rights to human hood and to liberty and, and basically arm themselves organize themselves into indigenous armies and over through the French government. Napoleon's first defeat was not in Waterloo, but it was definitely in Haiti, in Saint-Omega at the time. And so we were the first to defeat Napoleon, we were the first to create our own independent nation, a nation that was truly founded on the notion that all people were had the right to their humanity and to their freedom. And we even supported other efforts throughout Latin America, namely Bolivar in Greater Colombia, which is now Venezuela. Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador to become independent. And that has you know, labeled us we were considered the cancer of the Americas because we were not only independent black, independent black nation, but we believe in exporting that notion I mean, when we invaded the Dominican Republic, the first thing that we did was to free the slaves and so we were targeted by multiple initiatives for failure, first by the French who crippled our economy, you know, the international community, we were, we were quarantined, we were embargoed, and so we're not able to trade with anyone. And so the French demanded that we pay quote unquote reparations for the loss of the sugar, for the loss of the sugar, the plantation and the slaves. They were property, yeah. And so Haiti was forced to not only pay the debt, but also sign an agreement with the Vatican. Which imposed religious education in most of our elite, educated in schools run by the Catholic Church. And so in addition to having to pay a debt, we were also forced to bring the colonizers back to educate our children. And that is followed, of course, by multiple attempts at occupation, not just from the, you know, from the Germans. And then in the early 1900s we were in there was an American occupation with lasted about 30 years where again there was a major effort to suppress indigenous forces of resistance, not just in terms of armed resistance but cultural resistance as well. And you will see increased attacks on our religion, a religion that has been the foundation of our spirit of independence, freedom, and that's for do. And during the American occupation, I have to say that the Marines who landed were all from the deep South, they were Jim Crow products of the Jim Crow system. And so the ferocity, their attacks on people on our culture was an incredible effort to take away from us this spirit of liberty. And so because of Haiti's position as a geopolitical position, you know, moving forward in terms of Cuba, the dictatorship that emerged in the late 50s, early 60s was viewed as an ally, because, again, it was sort of the polar opposite of Fidel Castro in a way. And so, well, ideologically opposite to Fidel Castro. So American intervention has continued throughout that time whether it be through financial support, technical support and you know it's just too much for me to encompass in one conversation. I have to say that American intervention, American assistance has been with us forever and one of the other interesting thing that they brought in the with the last occupation was also the missionaries. The missionaries have also had a very negative impact on Haiti. So you know what, what you're describing to us is, I just want to say first is just, it's so significant that the Haitian people were the first to throw off the, the yoke of slavery, and free yourself from the French Empire, This is something most mainland US citizens do not understand and it's a profound lesson to learn from the Haitian people and to understand, but so much of what you've just described to us. We see right now, well, I would argue I would argue since November 10, playing out in Bolivia, that this persecution of the indigenous people getting rid of their culture their their religious practices. The relationship to the land and their, their self reliance on the land, all of that is is in full vision. Right now, it's the same is the same historical playbook that we continue to see throughout this hemisphere. And I wonder if there's in just in closing this conversation, possibly only I could talk with you all afternoon. It's just, it's just fascinating to be with you. Is there one or two books that you could recommend to our viewers to give them, you know, Okay. Well, one, one recent book that I usually recommend is Bob McGuire's Who Owns Haiti. There's so many books that I can't anything by Wolf's Trio. Patrick Belgard Smith. But, but who owns Haiti. Bob McGuire is a really good, it's not too voluminous it's not a lot of reading it's a reader that different perspectives, but it's really it's a very good book to get an understanding of what's the current Haiti's current landscape. Okay, terrific. I will put that in the comments on our Facebook live video and I'm also going to share with the audience. The link to yesterday's hearing. We had some really significant comments from witnesses and also was really interesting relief to me to hear so many comments on the panel from the Congressional members. Yes, you on the Republicans as well, really, against us interventionism in multiple forms it was it we've never heard so many in one hearing, the show against us foreign policy out in a nation and that that was, that was a it was a relief to hear. Yes. Yeah, now we just have to do something with those opinions. So, okay everyone I'm going to let Leonie go now thank you so much you gave me much more time than I had asked you for and I'm so appreciate of it. And I look forward to further conversation with you. And we'll be back next week for the audience will be code pink will be in Cuba, and we will be airing what the F is going on in Latin America 12pm Eastern live from Havana next week. So, another Caribbean island with a profound history. Okay, we only thank you so much. Thank you very much.