After 5-Year U.S. Intervention, Democracy in Haiti Looks Bleak

                  By Serge Kovaleski
                  Washington Post Foreign Service
 
                  PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti—Except for a few guards and maintenance
                  workers lingering behind locked gates, Haiti's Legislative Palace these days
                  is an empty shell. The historically corrupt and inefficient justice system
                  remains plagued by serious problems that "undermine individual rights, due
                  process and the rule of law," according to a recent U.N. report. And 60
                  percent of the population in the Western Hemisphere's poorest country is
                  still illiterate and gets by on less than $1 a day.

                  This is hardly the future that the United States and the United Nations
                  envisioned for Haiti five years ago, when 20,000 troops, most of them
                  American, dismantled a military dictatorship that came to power in a coup
                  d'etat and, in Operation Restore Democracy, reinstated the nation's first
                  democratically elected president, Jean-Bertrand Aristide.

                  The intervention, which began with U.S. soldiers flying into Port-au-Prince
                  on Sept. 19, 1994, set the stage for an ambitious international endeavor
                  designed to build democratic institutions in a country dominated by
                  dictators since it gained independence from France nearly two centuries
                  ago. It also aimed to develop economic vitality in a destitute and mostly
                  rural nation, improve the lives of 7 million inhabitants and, ultimately, stem
                  the flow of Haitians risking their lives in rickety boats to emigrate to the
                  United States.

                  After five years and $2 billion in U.S. aid, there have been modest gains,
                  ranging from the creation of a civilian police force, to the training of new
                  judges, to the doubling of school enrollment to 1.6 million students. But
                  overall, Haitian and foreign officials acknowledge, the effort accomplished
                  much less than what the Clinton administration laid out as its goals. As a
                  result, a large part of its legacy among Haitians is disillusionment--with
                  democracy, political leaders and the United Nations and foreign
                  governments that pledged their help.

                  "We walked with them because we had so much hope that salvation would
                  finally come for our problems," said Eddy Pierre-Luis, a jobless
                  Port-au-Prince resident who worked as an unofficial guide for the troops.
                  "But now, things are dark and getting darker. Democracy has not
                  improved our lives. It is just a word to me."

                  U.S. Ambassador Timothy M. Carney was only slightly more optimistic.
                  "Haiti is a long way from getting democracy," he said. "It lacks nearly all of
                  the elements that make up a democracy. Haiti can best be described as in
                  transition towards democracy. Overall, our expectations were too high.
                  Did we let ourselves be led by our hopes instead of analysis?"

                  The military intervention has gradually been reduced to a small U.N.
                  police-training mission, which is scheduled to end in November, and a
                  human rights mission that is slated to close at the end of the year. The
                  United Nations has plans to extend its role here, focusing on economic and
                  political development. But the 480 U.S. military personnel who have been
                  refurbishing schools and conducting medical training are to leave by the
                  end of January, ending the full-time American military presence. U.S.
                  reserves will come here occasionally to perform humanitarian work, but for
                  many Haitians the departure of the last of the U.S. intervention force
                  symbolizes a reduction in the U.S. commitment to make things work.

                  The obstacles to building a new Haiti have been manifold. The mission has
                  struggled with political leaders who have been criticized as being more
                  concerned with monopolizing power than sharing it, with judges who have
                  long relied on bribes to sweeten their low salaries and with a sharp rise in
                  crime, some of it politically motivated. Furthermore, Haiti's government has
                  failed to disburse its foreign aid money effectively and in a timely manner,
                  experts said.

                  International officials also have blamed themselves for not having a deeper
                  understanding of Haiti's problems and greater oversight of the way funding
                  and projects have been handled. But they also said their work has been
                  made more difficult by a degree of complacency among some Haitians,
                  which has come from years of reliance on foreign help.

                  "Nobody understood the complexities of development in Haiti," a
                  high-ranking official at one donor bank said. "The donors overestimated
                  the capacity of the government to channel funds to where they were
                  supposed to be channeled. It has been a real bottleneck."

                  For instance, an estimated $250 million in international assistance
                  previously allocated to Haiti languished for two years awaiting
                  parliamentary approval before the legislature disbanded last January. The
                  funds will remain in limbo until new legislative elections are held.

                  The terms of almost all 110 members of parliament expired eight months
                  ago as elections were indefinitely delayed by a protracted power struggle
                  between President Rene Preval and the legislature. Drawing criticism that
                  he is seeking to consolidate authority, Preval has ruled by decree. He
                  bypassed parliament in naming a new prime minister--a post he had to fill
                  to unfreeze aid programs that had been stalled for two years.

                  Haiti's provisional electoral council has proposed Dec. 19 for the first
                  round of new balloting, but it is unlikely that voting will take place then,
                  partly because of logistical reasons. These include the enormous task of
                  registering nearly 4 million eligible voters, issuing voter identification cards
                  for the first time and the extensive security planning needed for the thinly
                  stretched police. Tens of millions of dollars in additional loans depend on
                  successful completion of the elections.

                  Haiti's countryside, where two-thirds of the population live, has received a
                  disproportionately small amount of international assistance--as little as 20
                  percent. Most money has gone to programs in this dusty, overcrowded
                  capital--where gantlets of self-employed street vendors who make up
                  Haiti's predominantly informal economy hawk their wares--as well as to
                  other urban areas and servicing loans.

                  "A lot of hope has not been fulfilled, and I am not necessarily saying that it
                  is the fault of the international community," said Prime Minister Jacques
                  Edouard Alexis. "It is in part Haiti's own fault. . . . The main problem is that
                  those of us who are for democracy cannot get together."

                  Observers here say a stable democracy will remain out of reach until
                  Haitian leaders get used to power sharing. "The parties do not know the
                  art of compromise and concessions," said Eric Pierre, a Haitian official at
                  the Washington-based Inter-American Development Bank. "It is not in our
                  rules. There is a culture of suspicion in Haiti, and you see a lot of low
                  blows in politics."

                  As the international intervention mission winds down, it leaves behind a
                  weak and financially constrained state unable to meet the basic needs of its
                  people. Only a quarter of the population has access to safe drinking water,
                  and most Haitians have no electricity or phone service. About half the
                  children under the age of 5 suffer from malnutrition, and per capita annual
                  health spending is $21, compared with $38 in sub-Saharan Africa.

                  In a recent report to the U.N. Security Council, Secretary General Kofi
                  Annan expressed concern, saying there has been "slow progress . . . on
                  how to continue to provide essential government services . . . and how to
                  further the cause of democracy through the organization of legislative and
                  municipal elections. The process [has been] a difficult one, mainly because
                  of the weakness of key government institutions."

                  Reflecting widespread discontent, only 5 percent of registered voters
                  turned out for the last local elections in April 1997. There have, however,
                  been improvements to some aspects of life. The state-sponsored terror
                  during the years of the military government and the earlier dictatorships of
                  Francois Duvalier and his son and successor, Jean-Claude, has ceased and
                  given way to freedom of speech and assembly.

                  The Haitian National Police, an agency formed in 1995 and trained mostly
                  by the United States, has been a departure from the repressive state
                  security forces of Haiti's past. But a spate of recent incidents allegedly
                  involving the police, most notably the execution-style killings of 11 people
                  in Port-au-Prince, has raised new concerns about the force.

                  Still the Poorest

                  Haiti remains the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere despite the
                  five-year U.S. intervention.

                  Income** Life Infant Illiteracy

                  expectancy mortality rate

                  rate*

                  Haiti $ 250 57 72 60

                  Nicaragua 380 68 46 34

                  Honduras 600 67 45 27

                  Bolivia 800 60 69 17

                  Dominican Rep. 1,460 71 37 18

                  Jamaica 1,510 74 13 15

                  Latin America/

                  Caribbean average 3,320 69 37 13

                  *Death in the first year per 1,000 live births

                  **(gross national product per capita)

                  SOURCES: World Bank, U.N. Development Report
 

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