France's Rama Yade in Haiti: New Face, Same Old Agenda

By: Kim Ives - Haiti LiberteThere is something troubling about a photogenic 30-year-old black Muslim woman from Dakar, Senegal fronting for the new right-wing government of French President Nicolas Sarkozy.Rama Yade is France's new secretary of state for Foreign Affairs, French imperialism's version of Condoleeza Rice. She visited Haiti for 48 hours from Sep. 14-16 to encourage the neoliberal direction of President Rene Preval's government, a one-year renewal of the United Nations' military occupation of Haiti, and increased French foreign investment in what was once France's richest colony."He asked me to hasten my visit to Haiti to present the new face of France," Yade said of the millionaire Sarkozy, who has flaunted his political affinity with and admiration for President George Bush.Yade's first order of business was to shower praise on Preval and compare him to her boss, which may have done more to undermine Preval's credibility with Haitians than buttress it. "Preval reminds one of Sarkozy, who is very determined in many domains," she said. "President Preval has emerged as a deeply patriotic statesman, conscious of the huge responsibilities that weigh on his shoulders and on his nation."France's satisfaction with Preval's "patriotism" stems in large measure from his pointed abandonment of the demand made in 2003 by his constitutional predecessor, President Jean Bertrand Aristide, for some $21 billion in reparations from France for the "independence debt" extorted from Haiti over 122 years. In 1825, France used its gun-boats and economic clout to force the isolated and cash-strapped first nation of Latin America to pay it 90 million gold francs for property (both plantations and slaves) lost in Haiti's 1791-1804 revolution. Haiti paid that ransom for freeing itself - the first time in modern warfare that the victorious nation had to pay a war's cost - until 1947, a debt burden which is largely responsible for Haiti's current economic underdevelopment and political instability.Outraged by Aristide's insolence, France joined with the U.S. and Canadian governments to orchestrate his ouster by kidnapping in February 2004.Asked during a press conference about the status of Haiti's historic demand (the first time the sovereign government of a former colony has asked for reparations for slavery and colonialism), Yade gracefully backhanded the issue. "Nobody has raised the question," she said, "in the course of my meetings with different sectors of Haitian society."This was no doubt because most of Yade's meetings were with the Haitian bourgeoisie, which hated Aristide and his call for reparations, having maintained cultural and economic ties to France even after Haiti's hard-fought independence war. For this reason, Haiti remains "a nation dear to the heart of the French as it has perpetuated a francophone outpost in a region which is mainly anglophone and hispanophone," Yade said.Yade brought in her delegation a number of French businessmen and parliamentarians who interfaced with their Haitian counterparts at the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Haiti (CCIH) in a convivial meeting on the day she arrived. As deals were brokered, she argued that there are great investment opportunities now because "Haiti today enjoys a converging of favorable elements: a freely elected president, a government which functions in a constitutional framework, and strong support from the international community." Having helped to overthrow one elected government only three years ago, France now salutes the "courage" of another more to its liking.Without clarifying whether she was addressing the coup, reparations, the 1804 revolution, or all Haitian history, Yade called on Haitians to "turn the page, not to forget but to move on." In other words, France has sabotaged your governments and plundered your wealth, but let's let bygones be bygones.Like a string of U.N. and U.S. officials before her, Yade called for a one-year extension of the UN Security Council mandate for Haiti's occupation, which expires on October 15. Mandates for UN military actions are usually extended for only six months. "France will support the renewal of the mandate because this mandate is important in helping to assure the country's stability and since the Haitian authorities want it," she said.At the same time, she gently mocked Preval's notion of converting UN "tanks into bulldozers," that is, using occupation resources to rebuild Haiti rather than repress rebellious neighborhoods.When UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon visited Haiti on Aug. 2, Preval asked him to "reinvent MINUSTAH [the UN Mission to Stabilize Haiti] and to turn it into an instrument to help reform justice and improve our basic infrastructure."But Yade responded that "the MINUSTAH is not an enterprise, but a United Nations mission," reinforcing the position of recently departed MINUSTAH head Edmond Mulet that "MINUSTAH is not a development agency" and "has neither the Security Council mandate nor the budget nor the means to be a development agency."Yade of course made the obligatory visit to the French troops participating in the MINUSTAH, primarily as police officers. She also met with President Preval as well as with Prime Minister Jacques Edouard Alexis and other ministers including Women's Conditions Minister Marie-Laurence Lassegue.It was announced that the Haitian government has sent a formal invitation to Sarkozy. Preval "wants Nicolas Sarkozy to be the first French president to visit Haiti," Yade announced.Yade is the junior partner of Bernard Kouchner, Sakozy's Foreign Affairs minister and the former head of the UN's Kosovo mission. As a long-time French government free agent, Kouchner was one of the chief architects of Haiti's current occupation, which he outlined, a year before the fact, in a Mar. 10, 2003 interview with the website Haiti Info. "The duty to intervene is accompanied by the duty to remain, to accompany," Kouchner said, referring to Haiti and Afghanistan. "In Haiti, it would be necessary to put in place a system that would guarantee democratic functioning and avoid that Father (sic) Aristide not pervert it."France, the U.S., and Canada now feel that they have put in place this "system" and that is why Yade and others are pushing for a one-year mandate so that UN troops can "accompany" Haitians down the path neo-colonialists like Kouchner favor.Yade also visited the northern city of Cap Haitien where she met local officials and inspected French cooperation projects.Repeatedly, Yade flashed her 1000-watt smile and summoned "this African history that we share" with her Haitian audiences as the sugar-coating on the "solidarity of France" and the "pacifying presence" of MINUSTAH that she had come to sell. While the Preval government may buy this "solidarity," the Haitian people remain skeptical.