Heat is on Haiti’s PM to lead country’s recovery

Fen Hampson of the Norman Paterson School of International Affairs comments on the role of the Haitian government in the wake of the earthquake.

Publication: Hamilton Spectator
Date: Monday January 25th, 2010

The disastrous Jan. 12 earthquake has also shaken Haiti’s political standing in the world, catapulting its prime minister to a meeting in Montreal to face an unfamiliar treatment – the international spotlight.

Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive will represent Haiti’s bloodied, but unbowed government at the Canada-hosted talks.

Politicians and analysts say he must emerge from today’s six-hour meeting as a strong figure, nothing short of a symbol of his devastated country’s resolve to rebuild itself.

Bellerive received a warm welcome yesterday afternoon from Prime Minister Stephen Harper on Parliament Hill. Harper told Bellerive “you’re not alone” as he greeted him in front of Haiti’s blue and red colours and the Maple Leaf.

Afterwards, Bellerive said he was up to the job of leading the discussion in Montreal.

“First, we need to explain that, even with all our problems, we still want to have the leadership when deciding the vision of what should be done in Haiti’s future,” the Haitian prime minister said.

Canada’s Foreign Affairs Minister Lawrence Cannon called the talks a “critical step on the road to recovery” that would lead to a larger donor’s conference in the near future, when actual dollars would be pledged.

Foreign ministers from more than a dozen countries – notably U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner – eight international bodies, including banks, and six major nongovernmental organizations will convene in Montreal. Harper is expected to address the gathering.

Among the invited observers is Hamilton’s Dr. Kevin Smith, CEO of St. Joseph’s Health System, which partners with two Haiti hospitals.
Experts agree that keeping Haiti’s political leaders front and centre is the best way to ensure two key reconstruction goals are met: that international aid dollars aren’t squandered, and that Haitians can one day take control of their future after what has essentially been two centuries of rudderless despair.

“The Haitian people … need to know that their own government is getting its own handle on the crisis and moving forward,” said Fen Hampson, director of the Norman Paterson School of International Affairs at Carleton University. “The country’s political stability will ultimately rest on the Haitian government’s ability to deal with this crisis – not simply on what we and other donors do.”

David Malone, a former Canadian ambassador to the United Nations and a Haiti author, said Haitians prize their sovereignty even though it has been elusive during their long history of violence and political dysfunction.

Haiti is the second-largest recipient of Canadian aid spending, after Afghanistan, with $555 million earmarked over five years to 2011. And many expect that number to rise once the international road map for Haiti emerges after today’s opening round of talks.

The Canadian death toll in Haiti has risen to 20 and is expected to rise, Cannon said in Ottawa yesterday. Another 207 Canadians remain unaccounted for.

“Our focus is now on the repatriation of the remains of Canadian victims of the earthquake,” he said.