Haiti

HAITI

Mr. DeWINE. Mr. President, I will discuss tonight the situation in Haiti. I have come to the Senate many times in the past to discuss the situation in Haiti. Over the last 9, 10 years since I have been in the Senate, I have traveled to Haiti 13 or 14 different times. Haiti has been on the front page of the papers now and in the news for the last several weeks. The situation certainly reached a climax this weekend.

Once more, Haiti is at a crossroad. Once more, the U.S. troops, U.S. Marines, are back in Haiti. I commend President Bush for taking decisive action and sending the Marines into Haiti to stabilize the situation in this poor country. We have 20,000 Americans who live in Haiti. This country is in our own back yard. The President made the right decision.

But if we are to avoid this happening again and again and again, avoid the necessity of sending U.S. troops back to Haiti time and time again, avoid seeing the boat people coming toward the United States, avoid having to see the very sad scene of the U.S. Coast Guard having to pick these poor, miserable people up on the high seas and take them back to Haiti, if we are to avoid this in the future, and if the people of Haiti are to have any hope, then this country and the international community has to now take some very bold and radical steps.

Now is the time to change the future and to do some things differently. We have to do them in conjunction with the new coalition Haitian Government. The Haitian Government, by the way, cannot include and should not include the thugs, the drug dealers, the bad people who are part of this group of rebels who were marching on Port-au-Prince. These are not good people. They cannot be part of the government. But there are many good people in Haiti who can be a part, and are going to be a part of the new coalition government.

Briefly, in the time remaining in the Senate, I will make a few suggestions. These are suggestions made in regard to the long-term health of Haiti. They are this idea of bold and innovative and radical change of things that need to be done. First is trade. Congressman Clay Shaw and I have introduced in our respective bodies a bill, S. 489, a trade bill, a very modest bill. It would not cost any American job. It might cost some jobs in Asia, but certainly it would not cost any jobs in the United States. It would create some jobs in Haiti, give them modest trade preference.

It was not too many years ago there were 100,000 assembly jobs in Haiti. Today, there are only about 30,000. This bill would create very quickly, probably 60,000 or 70,000 jobs in Haiti, assembly jobs. Haitian people are an industrious, hard-working people. Anyone who knows anything about Haiti will tell you that. These jobs would be created very quickly. For each job that is created, each one of those individuals would support many people and their families. Haitian people want the same thing that people in this country want. They want to be able to make a living, to support their families, feed their children. This bill would go a long way to do that.

Second, the Haitian Government has inherited this new government, will inherit from past governments from years and years ago, a debt to the international community of $1.17 billion. Let's do something bold. Let's get together with the international community and say that debt needs to be forgiven. Let's get rid of it. Don't saddle this government with that debt. That is bold. That is different. We have done it in the past. The international community did it as far as wiping away some of the debt for Nicaragua, another very poor country in this hemisphere-not as poor as Haiti-but we did it a few years ago. It needs to be done for Haiti if this Government of Haiti will have a chance.

Third, we have to put resources in and work with the new Government of Haiti in regard to the rule of law, and to start with the courts. We can have free elections and try to bring back democracy, and have democracy, but there is nothing more important-frankly, nothing tougher-than to develop a court system that respects the rule of law.

Why is the rule of law important? Well, one reason it is important is, if you are going to have foreign investment in the country, if you are going to get people, companies to put money into a country and to invest and create jobs-which is what you have to have; you have to have jobs-then they have to be able to have some assurance that when they make an investment, their investment will be protected. You only do that through the rule of law, and you do that by having honest judges and cases that can be processed in court.

We can do that by mentoring the judges, by helping create the system in their country, the magistrates. We need to put extra effort into that. We have the ability in this country to do it. We have good programs through our Justice Department and State Department. We have done it in other countries. We can do it there.

In relation to the police, we were making very good headway a few years ago in Haiti. We brought into Haiti some great Haitian-American cops from New York City and Chicago and LA. They went down to Haiti. They mentored the new, young recruits, and things were working. I saw it myself. You should have seen the pride when I talked to these Haitian-American policemen from Chicago and LA and New York. They were so proud of what they were doing.

Unfortunately, President Aristide allowed it to become political. It then started to become corrupt, and all that good work started to go down the drain. That work can be revised. Some of those policemen who were trained are still in the country. Some of them were fired, kicked out by the politicians. They can be brought back. We can retrain some people, and that can be reconstituted, because Haiti has to have a good police force.

This time it is going to have to be separated somehow from the government politicians. It is going to have to be independent. It is going to have to respect the rule of law and not be politicized.

Fourth, we are going to have to restore aid to the government. A few years ago, when we became very disenchanted-what our Government did with the Aristide regime, I believe understandably so-we stopped giving any aid to the government. We gave aid to the NGOs and to the nonprofits and to the charitable organizations down there. I happened to think it was the right thing to do, and I supported that. But what that meant was, the government institutions suffered.

Today, with the new government that is starting to emerge in Haiti, we have to nourish that because if the institutions in a country do not flourish, it is hard to have democracy. So we have to reinstate, now, our direct aid. And other countries have to do the same. We are in this with other countries. They have to reinstate their direct aid. We have to reinstate our direct aid to the Government of Haiti so they can develop their institutions, whether they are the courts or the police or the other basic institutions of the country.

Fifth, Haiti is one of the most deforested countries in the world. It is a country that suffers from depleted topsoil. We have to work with them to develop better agricultural practices.

All the people are fleeing the countryside, going to Port-au-Prince, going to Cap-Haitien, creating more and more slums, with more and more people who cannot be fed, with more and more crime and all kinds of problems that you see with slums in cities.

That trend can only be reversed if people have a way of making a living and farming. So our economic development has to be focused on agriculture and good practices. USAID has to work with other donors around the world to focus on that.

Haiti is a relatively small country of 8 million people; it has hardly any topsoil left. It is deforested. The emphasis has to be put on sustainable agriculture and economic development.

Finally, we have to continue our assistance. The international community has to continue the assistance. We have to continue our assistance on all the good work that is being done in Haiti, including the amazing work in regard to fighting the AIDS problem in Haiti. AIDS is a huge problem, but there are excellent doctors who are working on that problem. Dr. Pape and Dr. Farmer are doing very wonderful work there.

So we have to be bold; we have to be radical, if we do not want to be back in Haiti in a couple more years with the Marines again.

Haiti is in our backyard. It will always be in our backyard. It will never be of strategic importance to the United States, but it will always be of importance. It will always be a country we will have to deal with. If not for humanitarian concerns-and I think it should be; I think we should worry about their humanitarian concerns-we will always be there because of the reasons I have mentioned.

No other nation in our hemisphere has a higher rate of AIDS than Haiti. No other nation in our hemisphere has a higher infant mortality rate or a lower life expectancy rate than Haiti. No other country in our hemisphere is as environmentally strapped as Haiti.

Despite its radical differences, Haiti remains in our own backyard. It is intrinsically linked to the United States by history, geography, and humanitarian concerns. It is linked to us by illicit drug trade and the ever-present possibility of droves of incoming refugees. Haiti's problems are-whether we like it or not-our problems.

To assure progress, Mr. President and Members of the Senate, we-Republicans and Democrats-in Congress need to join forces and approach Haiti with a united, bipartisan front. Haiti's dire humanitarian and economic crisis transcends partisan politics. Moreover, the United States must work with the international community over the long haul because any improvements will require a serious, sustained long-term commitment.

Conditions in Haiti will not change overnight. We must remain, though, committed to Haiti for as long as it takes for reforms to take root and for a democratic system of government to emerge.

Ultimately, the United States cannot "fix" Haiti, nor can the international community. But we can improve the situation, and we can help Haiti begin to help itself. Clearly, Haiti is at a pivotal point in its history, and so is the international community. We can either choose a path that builds upon Haiti's tentative democracy or choose a road that will lead to yet another dictatorial regime. This time, let's get it right. This time, let's not blow it.

Mr. President, I thank the Chair and yield the floor.