Commentary: Neither Cuba nor Haiti!
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| Published on Wednesday, July 9, 2008 |
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By Jean H Charles
Cuba is the lone bastion of communism in the Western Hemisphere, Haiti is one of the most capitalist countries in the region; both nations are inhospitable to the majority of their population. Cuba is living under a rigid de jure economic embargo imposed by the United States for the past fifty years. Haiti has been experiencing a de facto embargo for the same length of time by the rest of the world.
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| Jean H Charles MSW, JD is Executive Director of AINDOH Inc a non profit organization dedicated to build a kinder and gentle Caribbean zone for all. He can be reached at: jeanhcharles@aol.com |
With a combined population of some 20 million people, Haiti and Cuba could be the main engines that pull the whole Caribbean into a sustainable mode of prosperity. They are, though, two sleeping giants, degenerated into paper tigers that exhaust their population due to external and internal stress, consummating with little return the creative energy process of two generations of men and women.
Cuba, in spite of the strong embargo regulated by the United States Department of Commerce, is in a better position to take off from its lethargy than Haiti could do. It has an excellent educational basis from universal literacy to secondary and university level affordable to the majority of the population. It has health indices that might be equal to or even better than the health services of the United States. The Cuban doctors are true missionaries, who provide medical clinics free of charge to far-flung countries like Angola, or close to home like Guyana or Dominica.
In the context of environment and disaster preparedness, Cuba is again better equipped than any in the region. Successive hurricanes that have created havoc in Haiti produced very few fatal accidents in Cuba because the government has worked in sync with the civilian population to establish a protocol of conduct and evacuation that minimizes the lost of limb and life.
Cuba is ready to be the darling of global investors once it opens its doors wide to international business. It will be the replica of Ireland in this Western Hemisphere. With all these positive notes, why should we find Cuba inhospitable to its people? The Castro brothers (Fidel and Raoul) have been in charge of the country for half a century. They still believe that they know better in ruling the most detailed aspects of the lives of the ordinary citizens. To start with, the Cuban leaders fail to understand that the main engine of human motivation lies in the personal satisfaction not in the collective euphoria.
Mayor Mike Bloomberg is happy to serve the collectivity of the city of New York for one dollar a year after he has amassed his billions from his own personal enterprise. Bill Gates is the premier world philanthropist after pulling up billions of dollars from the sale of Microsoft software and components to the rest of the globe. Condemning experienced physicians to a paltry life of $ 300 a month is stupid at best and not in the interest of the country at worst. When prudish school teachers have to engage in selective prostitution with male tourists to compensate for their low salaries, the government is slowly destroying the moral fiber of the society.
It is the province of the government to regulate the entering of visitors and natives into the country. It is not the business of the government to inquire where the citizens are heading to, unless they are furthering a crime, (albeit the United States forbids its citizens from visiting a list of half a dozen countries). The ordinary Cuban citizen has no liberty to leave and return as he pleases, as most people of the world enjoy. Common sundries and toiletries, including underwear, are luxury items for the Cubans.
Since the passing of the baton of governance to Raoul Castro some steps have been taken to open up some restrictions such as cellular services and access to foreign currency. They are too timid and not in tune with the high expectation of the people. Cuba could create an immediate economic boom if it could preside over its own transformation into a capitalist controlled economy. It would follow the Russian, Chinese, and Vietnamese model into a path that has produced growth in the range of 10 to 12 per cent for those economies. Cuba could even look into the weakness of those former communist regimes to ensure that the transition is orderly, sustainable and profitable to the weakest link in the country.
The Castro brothers will ensure their place in world history as those leaders who have bypassed the fate of former dictators that muted into a mafia culture where the state assets are overtaken by the old bureaucrats perpetuating the misery of the populace.
Raoul, the baton is your hand! You can lead Cuba into an Ode of Joy with Beethoven playing the nuances that only the creator cum conductor can convey! Once you have done so, look upon your next door neighbor!
Haiti will be harder to leap into the path of development. Thirty five years of the Duvalier regime and fifteen years of the Lavalas government have completely decimated the country’s national economy. The ranking of the failed states category places Haiti in the company of such war torn countries as Sudan, Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia, yet Haiti is not at war. The tiny group of political bureaucrats, along with their cronies from the urban elite, has demonstrated no political will or social determination to create a nation that will be hospitable to the large majority. For the past two hundred years, including the present 2008 budget, no provision for funding the rural infrastructure has been a feature of Haiti governance.
The country is receiving more foreign aid than all the other Caribbean islands combined. The money is circulating or being recycled around the capital by the expatriates from the donor countries and by those few Haitians who know how to use the aid culture to help themselves, not those in most need of the financial and technical support.
MINUSTHA, the 9,000-strong United Nations peacekeeping force led by Brazil, was supposed to be a blessing for Haiti. It is, in fact, according to any standard you care to use, a curse for the country. Kidnappings, insecurity, hunger, political stratification are the order of the day. The United States government keeps reformulating its commitment and support towards Haiti, yet its involvement is counterproductive. A twenty million US dollar project to create jobs in Cite Soleil (one of the worst slums of the Caribbean) would have been a perfect economic boost for the 565 rural counties, at $35,000 per village, this funding represents more than any one rural country has seen for the past 50 years. As a pay-off the residents of the favella will return to their rural settings setting the stage for the urbanization of the capital city.
To conclude, it is my strong conviction that nation building is key to sustainable development. I am making the case that, at least in the Caribbean, the solution to prosperity is within reach.
Cuba must take the leap towards a true market-driven economy. Haiti must reconcile its majority peasant population with the urban elite, by investing first in the rural sector. Guyana must create one nation out of its Indian and Afro Guyanese people, irrespective of the past shortcomings and the corruption of the former black leaders. Last but not least, the few corrupt and venal leaders ( they know who they are!) of the Caribbean must rise up to the occasion and band together with progressive principals such as the governments of Jamaica, Trinidad, Barbados, Antigua, Dominica, Bahamas and Dominican Republic to create and maintain the paradise that God has endowed the whole region as a gift.
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