WITH all the reporting on the dislocation and enormous sufferings of Haitian earthquake victims and the blame-shifting for what's not going right, citizens of the Caribbean Community should know that Caricom has received a mandate from what functions as a government in Haiti -- amid the rubble in Port-au-Prince -- to act as its "international advocate", or "voice" in the daunting task ahead for national reconstruction..

This development occurred last weekend when another Caricom fact-finding/assessment mission to Port-au-Prince met with President René Préval, his prime minister, Jean-Max Bellerive, and other Haitian government officials.

Included in the Community's team, headed by current chairman Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit of Dominica and Secretary General Edwin Carrington, was recognised elder statesman of Caricom and Jamaica's former long-serving prime minister, PJ Patterson.

Now functioning as the Community's special envoy, or point man on post-earthquake Haiti, Patterson disclosed the "advocacy" mandate during a telephone interview last week.

He said he would prefer to avoid going into details at this stage, but noted that Caricom was committed to doing its "utmost" in helping to sensitise nations of this hemisphere and the international donors and financial institutions to their obligations to the Haitian people "who are very much part of our Caribbean family" .

Well, following last month's Montreal Conference on Haiti, organised and hosted by the Canadian government, at which Patterson and Bellerive were part of the Caricom delegation, the Community will have the opportunity to give more meaning to its "advocacy" mandate at next month's United Nations 'technical conference' in New York on coordination of economic assistance and emergency relief aid to the earthquake-wrecked Caribbean state.

Envoy's advisors

To help make Patterson an effective special envoy, Caricom needs to give priority consideration to enabling him with a team of experienced advisors -- drawn from the region's public and private sectors, labour, church and women's organisations -- as well as academe and private individuals such as retired diplomats and educators with special knowledge about Haiti and its people.

Funding support for the work of Patterson and his team of advisors, it is felt, could be sought from regional (CDB) and international financial institutions, among others.

However, as plans are being laid by Caricom to give substance for its international "advocacy" role, there is one issue that the Community's governments should not be reluctant to address seriously. It is the pursuit of creative initiatives to influence France in honouring, as much as possible, its moral obligation to repay that historical debt incurred by the infamous financial demands made for Haitian independence.

This could be done by Caricom as an extension of an expected vigorous and sustained campaign to secure cancellation of all debts owed by Haiti, which has, as of last week, lost as many lives (some 240,000) as the four countries affected by the horrendous Asian tsunami five years ago.

It is argued that a government in Paris, of whatever ideological persuasion and standing in the international community, should not be allowed to remain contemptuous of Haiti's demand for reparations totalling approximately US$21 billion (the equivalent of an estimated 150 million gold francs) -- a sum that Haitians were compelled to pay for securing their freedom in 1804.

It should certainly not display contempt in the face of the horrendous tragedies resulting from that earthquake on the night of January 12; nor while Caribbean governments, organisations, institutions and peoples of all walks of life are scrambling to share what little they have with their fellow nationals of the Caribbean Community of which Haiti is one of its 14 sovereign member states.

And certainly not as Haitian children, mothers and fathers continue to die from hunger and lack of medical care weeks after thousands of earthquake victims were buried in mass graves and many more thousands reduced to refugee status in their homeland, crying out for food, water and medicine and robbed of what dignity they are still courageously trying to preserve.

Debt burden

It was amusing to read last week an Agence France Press (AFP) report out of Canada that the world's seven most industrialised countries (the G-7) had agreed to "cancel" Haiti's outstanding debts to them - debts "already relatively small after being reduced by past relief efforts".

France, which is among the G-7 nations, has agreed to cancel the remaining euro58 million that Haiti still owed it at the time of the earthquake disaster.

This kind of money can hardly cause even a ripple in the contaminated water that Haitian earthquake victims are being urged to avoid by health officials.

The UK-based charity, Oxfam, has reminded us that Haiti remains saddled with foreign debts amounting to approximately US$900 million, owed largely to international financial institutions.

The case for compensation from France had been officially submitted by President Jean-Bertrand Aristide before he was ousted in a coup - an American and French collaboration in which two emissaries of the then government in Paris had travelled to Port-au-Prince where they made "direct threats" to the former priest turned head of state, according to a subsequent published interview with him.

Some Haiti watchers in and outside of the Caribbean feel that France should be made to feel a sense of shame in the current heart-wrenching sufferings of Haitians.

Caricom's Special Envoy Patterson has made an interesting distinction in speaking of the region's role on behalf of Haiti. When Caricom participates at international fora it does so "not as a regional organisation", but he stressed, "a Community of 14 sovereign states, among them Haiti". It is a point that should not be overlooked by foreign governments and international financial institutions when they engage the 36-year-old Community.

The upcoming UN conference on Haiti may be a good opportunity to reinforce this concept as initial lobbying takes place for both cancellations of Haiti's international debt as well as telegraphing the message that Caricom intends to engage France in considering the Haitian compensation case.

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