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June 18, 2013
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 Aristide’s Return to Haiti: A Long Night’s Journey Into DayPosted on Mar 22, 2011By Amy Goodman Late at night on March 17, former Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide boarded a small plane with his family in Johannesburg. The following morning, he arrived in Haiti. It was just over seven years after he was kidnapped from his home in a U.S.-backed coup d’etat. Haiti has been ravaged by a massive earthquake that killed more than 300,000 people and left a million and a half homeless. A cholera epidemic carried in by United Nations occupation forces could sicken almost 800,000. A majority of the population lives on less than a dollar a day. Now, Aristide, by far the most popular figure in Haiti today and the first democratically elected president of the first black republic in the world, has returned home. “Bon Retou Titid” (good return, Titid, the affectionate term for Aristide) read the signs in Port-au-Prince as thousands flocked to accompany Aristide from the Toussaint L’Ouverture Airport to his home. L’Ouverture led the slave uprising that established Haiti in 1804. I was able to travel with Aristide, his wife, Mildred, and their two daughters from Johannesburg to Haiti on the small jet provided by the government of South Africa. It was my second flight with them. In March 2004, the Aristides attempted to return from forced exile in the Central African Republic, but never made it back to Haiti. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and other U.S. officials warned Aristide to stay away from the Western Hemisphere. Defying such pressure, the Aristides stopped in Jamaica before traveling to South Africa, where they remained until last weekend. Just before this Sunday’s election in Haiti, President Rene Preval gave Aristide the diplomatic passport he had long promised him. Earlier, on Jan. 19, U.S. State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley tweeted, referring to Aristide: “today Haiti needs to focus on its future, not its past.” Mildred was incensed. She said the U.S. had been saying that since they forced her husband out of the country. Sitting in the plane a few minutes before landing in Haiti, she repeated the words of an African leader who criticized the past abuses of colonial powers by saying, “I would stop talking about the past, if it weren’t so present.” Mark Toner, the new State Department spokesman, said last week: “Former President Aristide has chosen to remain outside of Haiti for seven years. To return this week could only be seen as a conscious choice to impact Haiti’s elections.” Aristide did not choose to leave or remain outside Haiti, and the Obama administration knows that. On Feb. 29, 2004, Luis Moreno, the No. 2 man in the U.S. Embassy in Haiti, went to the Aristides’ home and hustled them off to the airport. Frantz Gabriel was Aristide’s personal bodyguard in 2004. I met him when he was with the Aristides in the Central African Republic then, and saw him again Friday as the Aristides arrived home. He recalled: “It was not willingly that the president left, because all the people that came in to accompany the president were all military. Having been in the U.S. military myself, I know what a GI looks like, and I know what a special force looks like also ... when we boarded the aircraft, everybody changed their uniform into civilian clothes. And that’s when I knew that it was a special operation.” Advertisement After landing in Port-au-Prince, Aristide wasted no time. He addressed the people of Haiti from the airport. His remarks touched on a key point of the current elections there: that his political party, the most popular party in Haiti, Fanmi Lavalas, is banned, excluded from the elections. He said: “The problem is exclusion, and the solution is inclusion. The exclusion of Fanmi Lavalas is the exclusion of the majority ... because everybody is a person.” Looking out on the country he hadn’t seen in seven years, he concluded: “Haiti, Haiti, the further I am from you, the less I breathe. Haiti, I love you, and I will love you always. Always.” Amy Goodman is the host of “Democracy Now!,” a daily international TV/radio news hour airing on more than 900 stations in North America. She is the author of “Breaking the Sound Barrier,” recently released in paperback and now a New York Times best-seller. © 2011 Amy Goodman Distributed by King Features Syndicate  TAGS:
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By Dave Y, March 27, 2011 at 4:48 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
@TDoff so, to summarize: No, you’ve never been to Haiti. No, you don’t have any
Report thisproof to back up your absurd claims. No, you have no idea what you’re talking
about, but yet you continue to post online because it doesn’t make a difference
anyway. Great. I’m glad I wasted the time.
By TDoff, March 25, 2011 at 2:16 pm Link to this comment
Dave Y, You apparently take this blogging-stuff seriously. You might want to survey all your friends in high places, and ask them whether they believe that any of the words you place on the ‘Net will make an iota of difference to anything or anyone, other than as an amusement. If they answer in the positive, be assured that they are merely choosing to humor you because of your obvious deficiencies.
Report thisBy Dave Y, March 24, 2011 at 7:47 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
@TDoff I have for a long time personally know the Latin American correspondents
Report thisfor the herald. You’re full of crap. And you’re knowledge of Haiti obviously is
based on your wikipedia readings and listening to the sanctimonious Amy
Goodman while playing AngryBirds.
By TDoff, March 24, 2011 at 5:32 pm Link to this comment
Dave Y, I’m sorry, but I took an oath never to revel my experiences, and whether I was or was not, an agent for the CIA operating in Haiti while ostensibly a reporter for the Miami Herald.
Report thisBy Dave Y, March 24, 2011 at 11:59 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
@TDoff any proof to your allegations about him being a CIA agent? or the Miami
Report thisHerald being a front for the CIA? Please offer.
Have you ever been to Haiti? Have you ever talked to any of the numerous victims
of Aristide’s regime? Have you even read the Human Rights Watch reports about
what happened under Aristide’s second term? I’d think not or else you wouldn’t be
buying into the bogus propaganda some in the ‘independent’ media are selling.
No doubt that Aristide was deposed by U.S.-orchestrated uprisings twice and that
the U.S. has meddled in Haiti for a very long time, including through its support of
the Duvaliers.
But the way Aristide is glorified in the press—particularly by Democracy Now—
is stomach turning.
By cruxpuppy, March 23, 2011 at 10:04 pm Link to this comment
Thanks very much for keeping Haiti and Aristide in view, Amy. Without your concern, there wouldn’t be any media attention.
Report thisBy FRTothus, March 23, 2011 at 8:04 pm Link to this comment
@TDoff, March 23 at 8:03 pm
>>Did you ever wonder, since the CIA has a record of
deposing democratically-elected Presidents around the
world, when/whether they will turn their attention
inward, here to the good old US of A?<<
Would JFK, Dallas, 1963 qualify? I can think of more
Report thisthan a few others.
By TDoff, March 23, 2011 at 6:19 pm Link to this comment
Dave Y., could this Michael Deibert be the same foreign CIA agent operating under a ‘cover’ name, who was assigned to operate through the Miami Herald, a known CIA front, first to prepare the propaganda for, then to justify, the completely fraudulent and illegal overthrow of the duly-elected President of Haiti?
Report thisAll of which was ordered by the fraudulent and illegal US administration of Bush the Lesser, in order to serve the purposes of the true CIC, Cheney the Manipulator, and his interests in Halliburton and KBR?
By Dave Y, March 23, 2011 at 5:13 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
From the website of Michael Deibert:
As questionable friends of Haiti such as Amy Goodman, Danny Glover and others
celebrate the return to Haiti of a man as politically and personally corrupt and
ruthless as any that I have ever reported on, it seems only fitting that, if they don’t
have the dignity or respect to do so, some foreigner should write a note of
apology to the many Haitians who fell opposing the man’s rancid and despotic
regime, or for simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
read the rest here: michaeldeibert.blogspot.com/.../note-on-jean-bertrand-
Report thisaristides-return.html
By TDoff, March 23, 2011 at 4:03 pm Link to this comment
Did you ever wonder, since the CIA has a record of deposing democratically-elected Presidents around the world, when/whether they will turn their attention inward, here to the good old US of A?
And who/what they would/will then enthrone?
Report thisBy Thurston, March 23, 2011 at 2:43 pm Link to this comment
Following up on EmileZ’s comment:
It’s usually a good idea, when referring to a recommended site or webcast, to save readers the trouble of searching for it themselves by taking ten seconds to include the link:
http://www.democracynow.org/2011/3/21/democracy_now_exclusive_interview_with_jean
Report thisBy alturn, March 23, 2011 at 2:36 pm Link to this comment
At least Obama is consistent in carrying out the party line and again demonstrating that he is not a believer in fundamental change. Aristide, after all, is an enemy of those who believe in the religion of all-powerful market forces. Men who look to share the wealth of their country with their people certainly are perceived a threat to today’s America.
Maybe the US is looking the other way because Haiti is in such a mess which the US is not exactly fully committed to help clean up. And besides, it has no oil.
“Sharing, indeed, is divine. It underlies all progress for man. By its means, My brothers and sisters, you can come into correct relationship with God; and this, My friends, underlies your lives. When you share, you recognize God in your brother. This is a truth, simple, but until now difficult for man to grasp. The time has come to evidence this truth.”
Report this- From “Messages from Maitreya the Christ”
By Thurston, March 23, 2011 at 2:35 pm Link to this comment
Thanks to Amy Goodman for this article. Tweeted.
A better translation of “Bon Retou” would be “Welcome Back” rather than the literal “good return”, which doesn’t make much sense to English speakers who are unfamiliar with French or its Haitian variant.
Report thisBy tedmurphy41, March 23, 2011 at 9:52 am Link to this comment
A bit of good news to come out from all the bad that has been hitting the headlines recently; somehow, I don’t think it will merit too many media headlines, if any.
Report thisBy EmileZ, March 23, 2011 at 8:58 am Link to this comment
MY GOD!!!
Your interviews with Aristide and his wife on Tuesdays show were so profound and so moving!!!
It was like H.H. The Dalai Lama with a sophisticated understanding of geo-political history!!!
Thank you so much for your excellent work and the same to your wonderful friends!!!
Report thisBy call me roy, March 22, 2011 at 8:41 pm Link to this comment
AMERICANS, STOP SENDING AID AND MONEY TO HAITI
Report thisWHY?
The Associated Press
Published: March 6, 2011
JACMEL, Haiti - It has become a running joke of sorts, a cruel one for Danny Pye: Nearly every week, authorities tell the U.S. missionary he’ll be freed from his Haitian jail cell “next week,” that the man who cared for Haitian orphans will be home with his own daughter and pregnant wife “next week.”
But the weeks go by, and almost nothing has changed since Pye found himself abruptly jailed in October.
“I’ve been told it was supposed to happen pretty much every week for the last five months,” Pye said during a brief talk at his cell.
There are no charges filed against the Pye, 29, a Christian pastor. He initially was ordered into 90-day custody pending an investigation into claims that he had taken property belonging to a U.S.-based ministry. The order even surprised ministry leaders, who thought they settled the dispute.
Pye was momentarily freed on Christmas Eve. But as he and his wife, Leanne, walked to their car, a police officer approached, handed Danny Pye a warrant, and marched him back to jail in handcuffs. Later, he was told that questions had arisen about the validity of his residency card.
Update: Mr. Pye was finally released a few days ago. No explanation was ever given.
That’s a shock, huh?