For Haiti, a Slow but Promising Road

This week marked the first anniversary of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide’s return to power. So far, Aristide has exceeded international expectations. He has toned down his anti-capitalist rhetoric, disbanded an army filled with thugs, nurtured a civilian police force and overseen imperfect but reasonably fair elections. Now, he must fully embrace privatization and trim government bloat in order to get at least $1 billion in foreign aid from the United States and other sources.

Vice President Al Gore delivered the aid message during a visit Sunday. The Haitian president is back at the helm thanks largely to the Clinton Administration, which deployed 20,000 troops under U.N. auspices to end the murderous reign of the corrupt military regime that had sent him into exile.

Intervention has paid off with a significant reduction in the number of Haitian refugees fleeing to U.S. shores and with greater stability on an island that is close to U.S. borders. The payoff has been even bigger in Haiti--the end of an era of terror. But the nation remains brutally poor.

Unfortunately, Haiti’s biggest backer of privatization, Prime Minister Smarck Michel, a businessman, resigned recently because of opposition from Aristide’s followers to the sale of state-owned businesses. His successor will be chosen by Haiti’s nascent Parliament, which Aristide called into special session on Wednesday.

The government is the largest employer, so Aristide’s reluctance to reduce public-sector jobs is understandable. Haiti’s nine state-run companies employ 12,000 workers, and at least half would lose their jobs if the companies were sold. New investment resulting from the sales would eventually create even more jobs, proponents say, but it’s hard to be patient on an empty stomach. Unemployment hovers around 65%. Protesters stoned a motorcade in which Tipper Gore, the vice president’s wife, was riding earlier this week, and some demonstrators shouted anti-American slogans. The protest was dismissed as the result of a local dispute between the director of a health center run with U.S. funds and poor neighbors. Political violence, however, must not be underestimated as long as U.N. troops remain in Haiti.

U.N. peacekeepers cannot get bogged down in Haiti. They are expected to leave in February, around when Aristide has promised to give up his post after free elections have selected the next president. So far, Aristide is holding to his vow not to run again.

Haiti is on the slow but right road to recovery. The next key step in addressing the nation’s widespread poverty will take place with the selection of a new prime minister by the Parliament. It is dominated by Aristide’s liberal backers. They must not be allowed to thwart privatization, but the sale of state-owned companies also must not be allowed to enrich Haiti’s tiny and arrogant elite.