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COVID VICTIM Jack Lieberman a founding father of Little-Haiti
Dear FANM Friends and Supporters, It is with a heavy heart that I write to inform you of the passing of our Board Member and dear friend Jack Lieberman on August 30, 2020. We extend our deepest sympathies to his wife Marilyn, his two children, and the rest of his family at this very difficult time. For the past 50 years, Jack Lieberman fought tirelessly for social justice. Jack was a leader, an organizer, a fighter, a mentor, and an incredible human being. He was a human rights champion. As a teenager he was active in the Miami Chapter of The Martin Luther King's Southern Christian Leadership Conference and in 1968 he participated in the National Poor People's Campaign mobilization in Washington DC. After graduating college, he protested and spoke out passionately against the war in Vietnam. I've known and fought alongside Jack for the past 38 years. As a former Board member of the Haitian Refugee Center, Jack stood alongside the late Father Gerard Jean-Juste and other Haitian leaders to advocate for Haitian Refugees’ basic rights of due process and equal treatment. Jack was also a founding member of the Haitian Refugee Center, which became a headquarters for grassroots organizing in the 1980s. For years, he worked in collaboration with the late Father Jean-Marie Vincent in promoting democracy and economic reform in Haiti. In 2004, Jack helped form the Haiti Solidarity Committee which campaigned for the freedom of Haitian political prisoners. When Father Gerard Jean-Juste was imprisoned in Haiti, Jack chaired the “Committee To Free Father Jean-Juste” which helped organize the campaign that won his freedom. Despite the many obstacles he faced, Jack never tired or became discouraged. He kept fighting. He donated multiple materials to various organizations for numerous causes like he did so generously after the killing of George Floyd. He embodied the true meaning of selflessness and unconditional love for humankind. Jack will never know how many people he helped because his reach extended so far, his impact was global. A few weeks before his death, Jack posted on Facebook thanking his friends for their support during his illness. He then asked if they could also visit his wife's page and shower her with love. This is who Jack was. He was always thinking of others, always putting his loved ones before himself. Jack's passing reminds us that life is precious and short. Every moment counts. We must continue to fight for the most vulnerable and oppressed among us just like Jack always did. I am confident that Jack will continue to guide our fight for inclusion, equity, social justice, and peace from his resting place in the stars. Both Jack and his wife were in the hospital for a significant period of time. Please consider clicking on this link and donating what you can to help with their medical expenses. Rest in peace my friend, my brother. You will live in our hearts forever. Do not stand at my grave and weep I am not there. I do not sleep. I am a thousand winds that blow. I am the diamond glints on snow. I am the sunlight on ripened grain. I am the gentle autumn rain. When you awaken in the morning's hush I am the swift uplifting rush Of quiet birds in circled flight. I am the soft stars that shine at night. Do not stand at my grave and cry; I am not there. I did not die. In Unity, Marleine Bastien, MSW, LCSW Executive Director Family Action Network Movement (FANM) |
Debate schedule for the 2020 presidential election released
The schedule is set for the 2020 presidential and vice presidential debates — with the candidates squaring off later this September into October.
President Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden will meet on the stage for the first of three debates on Sept. 29 in Cleveland, Ohio, while their running mates, Vice President Mike Pence and California Sen. Kamala Harris, will face off on Oct. 7 in Salt Lake City, Utah, the Commission on Presidential Debates announced Wednesday.
Enlarge ImageError! Filename not specified.Donald Trump and Joe BidenAP; Reuters
All four debates will run for 90 minutes, from 9 p.m. ET until 10:30 p.m. ET.
Ticketing will be extremely limited for all four events.
Here’s a more detailed look at the debates ahead:
Sept. 29
First presidential debate will be held at Case Western Reserve University and Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland, Ohio. Fox News anchor Chris Wallace will moderate.
Oct. 7
The vice presidential debate will be held at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, Utah. USA Today’s Washington bureau chief Susan Page will moderate.
Oct. 15
Second presidential debate will be held at the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts in Miami, Florida. Steve Scully, senior executive producer and political editor of C-SPAN Networks, will moderate.
Oct. 22
The third presidential debate will be held at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee. Kristen Welker, co-anchor of “Weekend Today” and NBC News’ White House correspondent, will moderate.
Ghana Minister Invites African-Americans to Re-settle in Africa If They Feel Unwanted in the U.S.
BY BRENDAN COLE ON 6/10/20 AT 9:26 AM EDT
The debate about race following the killing of George Floyd has reverberated across the Atlantic Ocean, spurring the tourism minister of Ghana to appeal to its diaspora, including in the U.S., to "leave where you are not wanted," and return home.
A ceremony marking the death of Floyd was held at the W. E. B. Du Bois Memorial Centre for Pan-African Culture in the capital Accra during which Barbara Oteng Gyasi made the plea that her country is open to those fleeing racial tensions.
"We gather in solidarity with brothers and sisters to change the status quo. Racism must end. We pray and hope that George Floyd's death will not be in vain but will bring an end to prejudice and racial discrimination across the world," Oteng Gyasi said, according to Ghana Web.
"We continue to open our arms and invite all our brothers and sisters home. Ghana is your home. Africa is your home. We have our arms wide open ready to welcome you home.
News week
COVID: School has reopened in Haiti. But students, teachers are protesting on the streets
BY JACQUELINE CHARLES
Two weeks after schools were ordered reopened in Haiti, classrooms around the country remain empty because teachers are refusing to come to work over back pay and poor working conditions amid the global COVID-19 pandemic.
It is unclear how many schools are in essence closed, but since schools officially resumed on Aug. 10 — with national exams first and classes starting a week later — sporadic protests by teachers and students alike have erupted in several cities including Gonaives, St. Marc and most recently Jacmel.
While teachers have taken to the streets with their demands, students have done the same to demand that teachers return to the classroom. Some public-school students have gone as far as attacking fellow students at private institutions that are in session, to let out their frustrations.
On Tuesday, a clash in the southeastern town of Jacmel between police and a student protester, Joanès Dory, left human rights observers and a former minister of education horrified.
Two members of the Haiti National Police’s specialized Departmental Unit of Maintenance of Order, or UDMO, were videotaped punching Dory while dragging him down Avenue Baranquilla in the Saint-Cyr zone of Jacmel. Dory, who attends Lycée Pinchinat in Jacmel, was subsequently arrested and taken to the nearby police station.
“What happened this morning is totally unacceptable,” said Nesmy Manigat, who served as minister of education and professional training from April 2014 to April 2016. “In no country does this make any sense where you have police reacting like this when students are in the streets.”
A spokesman for the Haiti National Police did not return a call. Neither Haiti’s Minister of Education, Pierre Josué Agénor Cadet, nor a spokesman for the ministry responded to a text and email from the Miami Herald seeking comment.
The situation, says Manigat, is beyond the issue of teacher pay or closed classrooms. COVID-19, which temporarily shuttered schools, has only added to the inequality gap.
Even before the coronavirus pandemic forced the temporary closure of schools, education was already facing challenges. Parents spend about 80 percent of their income for schooling that is often lackluster, and mostly privatized with little government oversight. With education receiving about 11 percent of the national budget, the ministry struggles to not just give children a basic education but pay teachers on time and provide a bare minimum in terms of classrooms.
During the pandemic’s shutdown, children, who had already missed months of schooling last year due to violent anti-government protests, continued to fall behind because many lacked the technology or electricity or both for virtual learning. Students at wealthier schools were able to complete their studies and will return to classes on Sept. 7.
The reopening of most public and some private schools in early August was received with mixed reactions. Union leaders harshly criticized the decision, saying the government has not put in place the proper sanitary measures to help schools minimize transmission of the coronavirus, which continues to spread in the country.
“Some schools do not even have water,” said Magalie Georges, a career teacher and secretary general of the National Confederation of Educators of Haiti (CNEH). “They closed the schools in March when there were only two cases of COVID-19. Now they are opening it when there are thousands of cases. The health and security of the professors and students are in danger.”
Some Haitians abroad have tried to help. Fleur De Vie, a nonprofit education charity based in New York, recently contributed 5,000 masks for schoolchildren in 14 communities around the country. But the needs are much greater.
