Banner reads, We are people we have to live like people." (Photo: Marvens Compere for The Haitian Times)
The people of Haiti are once again facing attack, now with the use of Black nations as a cover for an impending invasion and occupation. Haitians are still resolute in fighting for their freedom.
Originally published in Fondation Frantz Fanon.
Is it enough to meet the Haitian people, to affirm a political solidarity far, far removed from compassion and morality, to forget the obligation to live the luminous beauty of their suspended lives in the rendered-ugly streets of Port-au-Prince?
The torrential rains carry the detritus abandoned by the privileged inhabitants of the heights to the port and the dreaded Cité Soleil. If structural racism is indeed present, it is expressed in the metaphor of compartmentalized garbage management.
Beyond the near-impossible management of household waste, there remains the refused arrival of a multinational force led by Kenya. The West delegating its dirty work to the African brothers of the Haitians who, in their time, had inspired their brothers in chains to free themselves from the horrors of the oppressor. Their only quest was DIGNITY.
Stunned and alienated by the idea of progress brought about by the white hegemony, the African brothers refused to understand that what they were going to impose on their brothers in blackness would be applied to them the very next day. In so doing, they are writing INDIGNITY in blood.
The Haitians who bear in their flesh the struggle of their heroes announce, with pride and courage, their refusal of this violent servitude.
Never a knee to the ground!
Never bow your head!
Resist, prepare to fight, fight, fight for the emancipation of peoples, for the right to self-determination and sovereignty of black people.
Haiti stands firm in the face of plans to systematically plunder its land.
But Haiti stands alone, ignored by its Caribbean neighbours, their backs to the wall, thinking they can avoid imperialist fury.
We have to understand: today Haiti, tomorrow one of the CARICOM states that has agreed to armed intervention will be next on the list of the financial system that feasts on the remains of murdered states.
The Haitian people, against their bankrupt leaders, against the long teeth of the WB and IMF, are preparing to resist.
The Haitian people are on their feet.
Will we leave them alone?
Will we warn our eyes from a foretold massacre?
Will we assume solidarity by simply weeping over the fate of Haiti?
Will we continue to praise Haiti's poets and art when we've contributed to its extinction?
What is the beauty of the freedom offered by the Haitian people worth if today we participate in re-chaining them?
With the Haitian people, let's save our Dignity.
Haiti needs Freedom, not tears.
Mireille Fanon Mendes-France is founder and co-chair of the Frantz Fanon Foundation. She served as former United Nations expert chair of the Working group on People of African Descent. Mireille works on issues of International law and has worked as professor at different levels of the National Education, at Unesco and as legal adviser at French National Assembly. Mireille Fanon Mendès-France is the daughter of the world renowned revolutionary, psychiatrist and political author, Frantz Fanon.
“Rwanda remains the poorest country in East Africa, except for Burundi.”
“Black unbelonging — black Americans as historical outsiders — is at the heart of our Constitution.”
“Atlanta was deemed the ‘poster child’ for progress in race relations because of the relationships between the city’s Black upper and middle classes and the white business elite.”
“To bury Black women’s oppression embodied in Black oppression once and for all, we need to transform society.”
“The city quickly issued a report absolving its police department of any blame.”
