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New York Haitians and Dominicans Protest at Dominican Consulate

Grassroot Haiti activists show their anger towards U.S. treatment of Haitian immigrants

On Thursday a handful of activits took the streets in protest of what is occuring on the Caribbean island of Hispaniola and the United States involvement. Although their numbers were small, their voices drew attention to a situation gravely neglected by the American press.

Although their numbers were small, their voices drew attention to a situation gravely neglected by the American press. A handful of grassroots Haiti activists gathered on the corner of 43rd street and Broadway Thursday afternoon (July 7th) to protest the conditions on the island of Hispaniola. Grassroots organizer, Jackie Bierre said, ?We are here to make people aware, to make them realize there?s a massacre happening?.

Once again, the small Haitian nation is in grave turmoil. For the past 23 months, Haiti has been under imperialist occupation run by no other than the United States. On 29 February 2004 a U.S. lead expeditionary force kidnapped, then president of Haiti, Jean-Bertrand Aristide. The U.S. occupation was instantaneously joined by both Canadian and French United Nation troops. For the past two years UN ?peacekeepers? have brought nothing but massacre after massacre into a nation already stricken by poverty.

On February 2, 2006 Haitians had a chance to turn their country around as they headed to the voting polls by the masses. However, the colonial occupiers had plans of their own and after postponing the voting day several times, they held a counterfeit election. The agenda was to put Rene Preval in power. Preval is a man who advocates privatization, a U.S. business policy, which in turn produces massive layoffs of workers at state-owned companies, the destruction of social services and the demise of Haitian farmers. Jan Norden, a member and an advocate of grassroots Haiti, clutched a poster in front of the Dominican Consulate on Thursday afternoon, it read, ?Stop Deportations of Haitians from Dominican Republic?. Norden explained, ?A socialist revolution is what Haiti needs, it is the only way to put an end to the corruption and massacre taking place?.

Many feel that the real problem in Haiti is poverty and that no elections will ever hold the power to provide the stability needed to bring Haitians a life free of corruption, misery and fear. Grassroots Haiti advocates the need for a social revolution in both Haiti and its neighboring country, the Dominican Republic, where hundreds of thousands of Haitians are deported every month. Although the tension between the two countries is rising daily, grassroots Haiti feels that through unifying the two countries can come together to form a Haitian/Dominican workers revolution through which the people will take back the power.