By: Roger Annis - HaitiAnalysis.com

The Quebec Federation of Labour (Fédération des travailleurs et travailleuses du Québec—FTQ) has issued a lengthy report (in French) by a delegation of representatives from its international affairs office and affiliates that visited Haiti from January 22 to 30. This present writing is a short summary and commentary on that report.

The visit of the FTQ delegation to Haiti signals a shift in attention and resources by the organization towards Haiti. The Federation has not been very present since the coup d’etat that removed President Aristide and the Haitian government from office in February, 2004. The needs of trade unions and other social organizations in Haiti for international solidarity are enormous, so any support and attention that they can receive is welcome.

Meetings

The delegation held formal meetings with many of the important unions in Haiti, including telephone workers (SOETEL), electricity workers (FESTREDH), transport workers (APCH and FTPH), tourism workers (ACIDT, an affiliate of the CTH), nurses (SPI) and postal workers (SPH). It held a two-day conference at the end of its visit attended by the unions with which it met.

The delegation held a less formal meeting with the CTH, one of Haiti's largest trade union federations. Its report is harshly critical of the CTH and questions how representative the union really is. More on this later in this writing.

Massive layoffs of telephone workers

The report paints a harsh picture of the consequences of the privatization by the Haitian government of the state telephone company, Téléco. Hundreds of workers have lost their jobs, and as many as 1,000 more layoffs are expected. The report is critical of the union at Téléco for not doing enough to organize and mobilize workers to oppose the privatization and to fight for compensation for those laid off. The delegation took some positive steps to support and encourage members that want to carry out a reorientation of the union and wage a serious struggle on this issue.

The president of the FTQ, Henri Massé, sent a strongly worded letter to President René Préval in September 2007 protesting the privatization of Teleco. Massé did not receive a reply. The letter was raised with government officials during the delegation’s visit and it appears the FTQ may be invited by the government to lend some expertise in negotiating benefits for workers who have lost their jobs.

Conference

A two-day conference concluded the delegation’s visit, entitled “Forum of National Dialogue.” App. 20 delegates from the unions with which the delegation met (though not the CTH) attended the conference, and there were also representatives of two ngo’s on hand—the Dominican Republic-based Plan Nagua and the Institut Karl Levésque. Plan Nagua played a key role in organizing the delegation’s itinerary in Haiti. It appears the conference may give impetus to greater coordination and organizing efforts by Haitian unions.

Delegation conclusions

The delegation met in Montreal on February 12, 2008 to discuss and approve its final report. The report says, “Haiti has, sadly, become a laboratory for neoliberal politics and for the strategic interests of multinational corporations.” The labour movement in Quebec and internationally has a responsibility to act in solidarity, says the report. Among its conclusions are the following:

* The desire of Haitian workers to struggle and organize for their rights remains very strong.

* Haitian society is deeply polarized, making social progress and trade union organization very difficult. Additionally, democratic and representative structures in many of Haiti’s unions are weak or non-existent.

* Urgent action is needed to oppose privatizations by the Préval government.

Appended to the delegation’s report is a 2007 report by the International Trade Union Confederation on the state of trade union rights in Haiti.

Social disaster in Haiti

There is a shameful and glaring absence in the FTQ report, and that is its refusal to address the terrible blow to Haitian workers rights delivered by the coup of February, 2004. The events of that year are not even mentioned. This is a glaring absence, given the crisis in Haiti today.

Four years after a foreign intervention took effective control of Haiti, the country is facing an unprecedented social and economic calamity. The unemployment rate is 70% or higher. Little or no investment is coming into the country. Half of Haiti’s children do not attend school. Health care is not available to most of the population. There is a massive exodus from the countryside into the cities under the combined effects of deforestation and decline of Haiti’s agricultural production. The promised democratic freedoms that the foreign intervention was supposed to provide are illusory. Haiti’s prison population has doubled since 2004. Kidnappings, killings and disappearances of political rights figures continue, notably the disappearance in August, 2007 of Lovinsky Pierre Antoine, coordinator of the September 30 Foundation social rights group. Violent assaults by UN forces and the Haitian National Police against poor neighbourhoods have declined since the elections of early 2006, but they are still taking place, whenever a local population organizes to repel the violence of the police and UN. There is a constant threat of a return to the worst of the human rights violations that marked the two years following the coup, under the UN-appointed, so-called “interim government” of Gerard Latortue.

Of course, the breakdown of Haitian society caused by the overthrow of the government has given rise to lots of crime and social violence (though this is greatly exaggerated in the international media). This is, in turn, used to justify the foreign police and military presence. But it is the foreign presence itself that is ultimately responsible for the rise in violence.

The United Nations maintains a 9,000-member police and military occupation regime in Haiti, known by its French acronym, MINUSTAH. It spends some $600 million a year. There is deep resentment in the Haitian population that such extravagant expenditure on police and military activity happens while almost nothing is directed towards the basic needs of the population. That’s why the food and hunger protests in early April throughout the country have often targeted the local headquarters of MINUSTAH.

The future of Haiti cannot be seriously discussed and evaluated without taking into account the consequences of the coup of 2004. The country has lost its sovereignty and its capacity to make decisions in the national interest. The FTQ will hopefully take a critical look at its own statements during this time--individuals speaking in its name in 2003 and 2004 lent their voices to the calls for the overthrow of President Aristide and his government.

Criticisms of the CTH union federation

The FTQ report contains a number of sharp criticisms of the Confédération des travailleurs haïtiens (CTH), one of the important trade unions in Haiti. The CTH is the only union in Haiti that is affiliated to the same international organization as the CLC and FTQ, the recently-founded International Trade Union Confederation.

The report questions the CTH’s claimed membership numbers. It says that certain affiliates of the CTH consider the organization to be undemocratic and its leaders authoritarian. It repeats accusations by unnamed trade union sources that the CTH sacrifices militancy and effective representation of its members in exchange for cosy ties with whatever government is in power. The CTH is criticized for its support to the U.S. HOPE Act, a recently-passed law in the U.S. that makes it easier for sweatshop manufacturers to locate in Haiti and exploit the country’s very low wages.

A reply to these accusations is beyond the scope of this writing. Briefly, the CTH and every other union in Haiti is not without its faults. Discussion of the HOPE Act and its meaning for Haitian workers is an important and legitimate discussion to have. But the accusations by the FTQ are sometimes inaccurate, all the time unbalanced. The CTH is one of many important unions in Haiti that are playing an important role in creating or strengthening popular movements to organize against the calamitous economic and social situation. It is the only union in Haiti that is affiliated to the same international organization as the CLC and FTQ.

The FTQ has a different appreciation of the coup of 2004 than the CTH. The latter opposed the coup. It correctly foresaw the disastrous consequences for the Haitian people. The FTQ and its ngo allies, on the other hand, lent their voices to calls for Aristide’s “removal” from office. They failed to vigorously protest the vast repression that followed the coup. (An estimated 5,000 supporters of President Aristide were killed in the two years following the coup, thousands of others were jailed or driven into exile, and sexual violence against women has risen dramatically--see September 2, 2006 issue of The Lancet, among many other sources).

The FTQ report says, “Nous rappelons à notre camarade de la CTH que la FTQ se tient loin du « Politique » et c’est la raison pour laquelle nos liens sont demeurés distants.» (Translation : We remind our colleague of the CTH that the FTQ keeps its distance from « politics » and this is why our relations have been and remain distant).

But if that is the case, how is it the FTQ lent its voices to sectarian calls for Aristide’s “removal” from office in 2004. Today, it says it has no official view on the 2004 coup, despite that fact that the coup was and remains a monstrous violation of the sovereignty and democratic rights of the Haitian people.

Furthermore, the FTQ and all other unions in Canada are deeply involved in politics. On its website, the FTQ says one of its strategies is, "Inciter ses membres à participer à la vie politique sous toutes ses formes et assurer une présence prépondérante des travailleurs et travailleuses partout où des décisions sont prises en leur nom." (Translation: To encourage its members to participate in political life in all its forms and to assure a strong presence of workers everywhere that decisions are made in their name).

It is an ABC of progressive trade union belief in Canada that many of the problems faced by working people cannot be solved by collective bargaining alone. Unions have a responsibility to fight for governments that represent workers interests. With this in mind, the FTQ actively supports the Parti québecois provincially and the Bloc québecois federally. Why is the CTH condemned for its sympathies and support to President Aristide’s government? Does it not have the same responsibility to engage in politics as unions in Canada?

Need for dialogue and exchanges to continue

Members of the Canadian Haiti Action Network who are active in the labour movement look forward to more exchanges and dialogue about the situation in Haiti. The findings of the FTQ delegation concerning the enormous political and economic difficulties facing Haiti’s people are a reminder to us of the urgent need to redouble solidarity with the people there, including our trade union counterparts.