Fw: [A.N.S.W.E.R.] Emergency Campaign for Haiti

["Nello peacelink" <n.margiotta at peacelink.it>]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: A.N.S.W.E.R.-SF 
To: activist at actionsf.org 
Sent: Tuesday, October 05, 2004 8:58 PM
Subject: [A.N.S.W.E.R.] Emergency Campaign for Haiti


EMERGENCY CAMPAIGN TO
SUPPORT THE HAITIAN PEOPLE:
For Independence, Democracy, Justice

The A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition, in cooperation with the Haiti Support Network and 
other progressive forces inside the Haitian community, is initiating an 
emergency campaign in support of the Haitian people's struggle for sovereignty 
and democracy, and in opposition to foreign occupation. 

We urge you to join us in showing your support for the Haitian people. We must 
act now to show concrete expressions of solidarity. We will be sending urgently 
needed medicines to Haiti. The long-term need in Haiti is for the social and 
economic transformation of the island and for the Haitian people to be able to 
reclaim political and economic sovereignty over their country. People in the 
United States are making it crystal clear that the Haitian people do not stand 
alone. Two hundred years ago the Haitian people created what is now the second 
oldest republic in the Americas and the first free Black republic in the 
western hemisphere following the only successful slave insurrection in history. 

The humanitarian catastrophe facing the Haitian people from Hurricane Jeanne 
can only be understood in the political and social reality caused by IMF 
neo-liberal policies and the anti-people policies flowing from the U.S. coup 
that overthrew the democratically-elected President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. 
Cuba, by contrast, because it has sovereign control over its economy and 
resources, has been directly hit by hurricanes in recent years but has 
prevented any major loss of life. 

The Emergency Campaign to Support the Haitian People will include support for 
both
political/educational mobilizations and for the shipment of urgently needed 
medicines to Haiti. It will also publicize the struggle of those in Haiti who 
are the victims of repression. The Emergency Campaign to Support the Haitian 
People (ECSHP) will act in solidarity with those in Haiti who are heroically 
building opposition to the foreign occupation and its proxy government. The 
Haitian people are refusing to return to colonial servitude and we must support 
their right to be the masters of their own destiny. 

We urge everyone to support the Emergency Campaign by helping to organize the 
upcoming Sunday, December 5 indoor rally in Solidarity with Haiti that will 
take place at New York Technical College located in Brooklyn, New York at 6:00 
p.m. This program will feature Mario Dupuy, former Communications Secretary of 
State for President Aristide's government; Ben Dupuy, Secretary General of the 
National Popular Party (PPN); former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark, and 
other well-known leaders and personalities. This will be an exciting, 
inspirational and educational event and we hope you tell your friends and 
family to save the date. 

Help Send Medicine to Haiti

The death toll from the September 18 floods in Northwest Haiti caused by 
Hurricane Jeanne is now close to 2000 and climbing. Hundreds of thousands are 
homeless and destitute, their shops, livestock and crops swept away. 

And the worst is yet to come. The receding flood waters, laced with sewage and 
the bloated corpses of humans and animals, are leaving behind diseases such as 
cholera, dysentery, malaria and dengue fever. These after-effects will be less 
noticed but more lethal. 

The hearts of people around the world have gone out to the flood's victims in 
Haiti. Many individuals and organizations are sending food, clothing and money. 
But one of the most urgent needs is for medicine. 

Press reports have described hospitals and clinics knee deep in mud. Doctors 
have been performing amputations without anesthesia. Infections from the putrid 
flood waters are widespread while there are virtually no antibiotics or other 
medicines to treat the sick. 

In Port-au-Prince, a group of progressive Haitians have formed the Committee to 
Aid the Flood Victims (KOPEVI). Working in conjunction with the International 
Alliance for Health and Social Development (AISDS), directed by Father Jean 
Bien-Aimé and Dr. Max Mondestin, KOPEVI will collect and distribute medicines 
to doctors and clinics in the flood ravaged region. 

The Emergency Campaign will be purchasing medicines to send to KOPEVI, 
including Metronidazole, Mebendazole, Bactrim, and other antibiotics. These 
medicines will save lives, alleviate suffering and mitigate the effects of 
water-born disease. All the humanitarian efforts put together are not enough 
but these medicines will help. 

The Emergency Campaign to Support the Haitian People can only move forward with 
your support and with the generous donations and contributions of those who 
care about Haiti, those who want to provide immediate relief to those 
victimized by the storm and its aftermath, and those who want to help build a 
larger political/education mobilization to expose the role of the Bush 
Administration, the IMF and imperialism in perpetuating of the suffering of the 
people in Haiti. 

You can make an urgently needed contribution immediately to the Emergency 
Campaign to Support the Haitian People by going to www.answercoalition.org to 
donate by credit card online through our secure server. Credit card donations 
are not tax deductible. If you want to make a tax deductible donation to the 
Emergency Campaign, you can do so by writing a check made out to the Progress 
Unity Fund/Haiti and send it to Progress Unity Fund, 167 Anderson St., San 
Francisco, CA 94110. 

Background to Haiti's Unnatural Disaster:
The role of the IMF and the Bush Administration

The roots of this disaster are political, not natural. The Feb. 29 
Washington-backed coup against President Aristide removed a popularly elected 
government. All elected local officials, including mayors and councilpeople who 
would be on the front lines of relief efforts, have been replaced by the 
notoriously brutal former Tonton Macoutes and Duvalierists whom the people 
distrust and fear. The people also recognize that these forces are thieves apt 
only to plunder the relief resources. While Haiti's constitutional government 
might not have averted today's devastation, it surely would have been better 
able to respond if only because it enjoyed popular support, participation and 
enthusiasm. 

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank are also to blame for 
accelerating the deforestation which contributed to the flood's severity. For 
three decades, they have forced Port-au-Prince governments to follow neoliberal 
dictates to lower tariff barriers and grow cash crops. 

These policies have ruined hundreds of thousands of Haitian farmers who have 
then migrated to the cities. They cook with charbon, or charcoal, which is half 
the weight and efficiency of wood. Peasants remaining on the land have turned 
to cutting down trees for charbon to fuel the growing cities. 

These are the root causes of the disaster in Haiti, and in the weeks ahead we 
intend not just to send medicine but to organize events to make these root 
causes known and to support the democratic forces in Haiti working to change 
this status quo. 

Haiti's rain-induced floods were devastating because the country has been 
already ravaged by a flood of cheap imports, weakened by coups and despair, and 
neglected by a greedy bourgeoisie intent only on its own enrichment, not its 
compatriots' welfare. 

Democracy is a prerequisite for the development that can result in better 
infrastructure, housing, irrigation, reforestation, and governmental disaster 
preparation and relief. By overthrowing the popularly elected government, 
Washington, Paris and the Haitian ruling class made this year's disasters 
worse. 

The Emergency Campaign to Support the Haitian People is an urgent effort to 
bring humanitarian relief, specifically medicine, to Haiti. Recognizing that 
today's crisis in Haiti is the consequence of politics and policy, the 
Emergency Campaign to Support the Haitian People is also working to support 
those struggling for democracy and social justice. 

Join in this effort in solidarity with the people of Haiti today. Mark your 
calendars for the December 5th rally in Solidarity in Haiti, and please help 
with urgently needed support by clicking here to make a donation today. 




A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition
Act Now to Stop War & End Racism
http://www.ANSWERcoalition
info at internationalanswer.org
National Office in Washington DC: 202-544-3389
New York City: 212-533-0417
Los Angeles: 323-464-1636
San Francisco: 415-821-6545
For media inquiries, call 202-544-3389.



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