Voodoo priests' leader Max Beauvoir dies in Haiti

The Associated Press

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Voodoo chief Max Beauvoir has died in his homeland of Haiti, where the mixture of beliefs from West Africa and Catholicism is recognized as an official religion. He was 79.

A government statement said Beauvoir died Saturday in Haiti's capital of Port-au-Prince after an illness. The cause of death was not immediately known.

On his Twitter account, President Michel Martelly described Beauvoir's death as a "great loss for the country."

Born in 1936, Beauvoir was a biochemical engineer who earned degrees abroad and became a Voodoo priest when he returned to his Caribbean homeland in the 1970s.

He became Voodoo's supreme chief, or national "ati," in 2008 and led Haiti's main priests' organization. Beauvoir was widely known as a passionate guardian of the Voodoo faith, which has often been sensationalized and misunderstood.

Voodoo, or Vodou as preferred by Haitians, evolved in the 17th century when colonists brought slaves to Haiti from West Africa. Slaves forced to practice Catholicism adopted saints to coincide with African spirits. Followers believe in reincarnation, one God and a pantheon of spirits.

Many of Haiti's 10 million people consider themselves followers of both Voodoo and Catholicism.

LAUNCH OF THE MISSION OF THE HOSPITAL SHIP THE USNS COMFORT

On Friday, September 11th an official ceremony took place to launch the humanitarian medical mission of the American Hospital ship the "USNS Comfort" in Haiti, at the Haitian Coastguard Naval base Amiral-Killick situated to Bizoton.

The mission "Keeping Promises" of the hospital ship enters within the framework of the continuous support of the American government for the Haitian people, in association with the Ministry of Health and the Population.

The hospital ship arrived in Haiti on Thursday, September 10th and will leave the bay of Port-au-Prince Sunday, September 18th, 2015.

Free medical care will be supplied in Port-au-Prince at the Amiral-Killick naval base of the Haitian Coastguards (in Bizoton), and at the Saint Luc Hospital (in Tabarre 41), from September 11th at 8 am in the morning and until September 18th. Every day, patients will be examined on first come, first served basis, until the hospital ship reaches its capacity.

The medical care will include general, pediatric care, dental, ophthalmological, orthopedic and other treatment. The Comfort’s team will also assist their Haitian partners at the level of the veterinary services and with projects of engineering, and will also participate in medical exchanges.

 

Amnesty International honors Human Rights Prize at the Trinidad and Tobago Film Festival 2015 (TTFF/15)

For the second year in a row, Amnesty International will award a human rights film prize at the Trinidad+Tobago film festival (TTFF), which runs from September 15–29.

Established in an effort to support the promotion of human rights in Trinidad and Tobago and the Caribbean, the Amnesty International Human Rights Film Prize will be awarded to the maker of the feature-length Caribbean film screening at TTFF/15 which best highlights a human rights issue.

“We are enthusiastically continuing our cooperation with the Trinidad+Tobago Film Festival this year as we remain convinced that films and filmmakers play an important role in promoting human rights,” said Chiara Sangiorgio, thematic adviser at Amnesty International.

“What may seem a remote and abstract UN instrument can suddenly become a close reality when analyzed through the camera lens—something affecting a friend, a neighbor, our country. Through this prize we wish to more formally acknowledge the efforts of filmmakers and activists in the Caribbean to raise awareness about human rights in the region.”

This year four films—all documentaries—will be in competition for the prize, one more than last year. They are:

Casa Blanca

Director: Aleksandra Maciuszek

Country: Cuba

Citizens of Nowhere

Directors: Regis Coussot and Nicolas Alexandre Tremblay

Countries: Dominican Republic, Haiti

The Last Colony

Director: Juan Agustín Márquez

Country: Puerto Rico

My Father’s Land

Directors: Miquel Galofré and Tyler Johnston

Countries: The Bahamas, Haiti

“We are pleased to see more films selected for this year’s Festival grappling with human-rights issues,” said Jonathan Ali, Editorial Director of the ttff. “The range of issues considered is also noteworthy. Both Citizens of Nowhere and My Father’s Land deal with the status of Haitians and people of Haitian descent in the Caribbean, a timely subject. The Last Colony considers the sovereignty issue in Puerto Rico, also timely, given the economic crisis there. And Casa Blanca is an intimate look at the status of the elderly and the mentally disabled in Cuba.”

The winning film will be chosen by a three-person jury. This year’s jury comprises Blanca Granados, Head of Industry at the Cartagena International Film Festival in Colombia; Jason Nathu, an attorney-at-law responsible for the Human Rights Law Clinic at the Hugh Wooding Law School in T&T; and Chiara Sangiorgio, Amnesty International’s London-based coordinator of the campaign for the abolition of the death penalty.

In addition to receiving a trophy, the winning filmmaker will also be given a cash prize of TT$5000. The ttff and Amnesty International will also assist the winning film in getting screened as widely as possible throughout the region.

Last year’s winning film was The Abominable Crime, a documentary directed by Micah Fink, about Jamaica’s LGBT community. Since then, Amnesty International USA has supported the screening of The Abominable Crime at the Pulitzer Center in New York City. There was also a screening of the film in Mexico City to celebrate the opening of Amnesty International’s regional office for Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean, and both the film and associated tools have been promoted through Amnesty International’s activists.

Amnesty International is a global movement of more than three million members, supporters and activists in over 150 countries and territories. The organisation exposes human rights violations and campaigns for justice around the world. It is independent of any government, political ideology, economic interest or religion, and is funded mainly by its membership and public donations.

Convicted cocaine trafficker running for parliament in Haiti

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 A candidate headed into next month’s runoff for Haiti’s parliament was convicted of cocaine trafficking in Miami-Dade County, the Miami Herald has learned.

Ernst Jeudy, 58, who is seeking to represent one of Haiti’s most lucrative tax bases, the city of Delmas, was charged with cocaine trafficking and possession with intent to distribute after Miami-Dade police said he checked in a tote bag at Miami International Airport. The controlled substance — nearly a half-pound of cocaine — was detected by a dog.

“The above defendant was taken into custody,” said the police report obtained by the Herald. “The defendant was found guilty...sent to 3 1/2 years.”

Jeudy’s 1987 guilty plea for cocaine trafficking, escaped Haiti’s Provisional Electoral Council. The council, known as the CEP, qualified Jeudy along with 1,845 other candidates to run for 139 legislative seats in last month’s violence- and fraudmarred Aug. 9 vote.

Jeudy’s conviction and presence in the race is yet another example of Haitian officials’ failure to require a police background check. The oversight, human rights advocates and others say, contributed to the attack of polling stations during the vote and could lead to a parliament of legal bandits.

“The legal department of the CEP didn’t do its job,” said Pierre Esperance, the executive director of the National Human Rights Defense Network, which published a report earlier this year questioning the moral characters of 31 candidates who were “in conflict with the law.”

Asked about Jeudy’s case, Pierre-Louis Opont, the president of the elections council, told the Herald that officials received a document on Monday regarding the case indicating that Jeudy had been convicted in the U.S. for drug trafficking. The document was accompanied by a letter from Jean Martin, the Fanmi Lavalas challenger who finished behind Jeudy with 9.8 percent of the votes.

“The CEP is currently checking this information with representatives of the U.S. government in Haiti,” Opont said.

With more than 6,000 elective posts up for grabs and 41,000 candidates, elections officials cannot research everyone, he said, adding that “the CEP cannot ask for what the law doesn’t require.”

Leading political party pulls out of Haiti's legislative elections

Reuters - A leading political party in Haiti announced on Tuesday that it was pulling out of next month's legislative elections, saying it was the primary victim of violence during the first round of voting in August.

It was not immediately clear whether the pullout would disrupt the second-round runoff on Oct. 25, when Haitians are also due to cast ballots for a new president.

But the move was seen as another setback for stability in the impoverished Caribbean country, long rocked by political turmoil.

The Vérité (Truth) Party, which announced its boycott of the upcoming poll, is widely seen as a leading political threat to President Michel Martelly's Haitian Tet Kale (Bald Headed) Party, which takes its name from Martelly's trademark shaved scalp.

It cited violent attacks on polling stations in the capital of Port-au-Prince and about 50 of 1,500 voting centers around the country on election day on Aug. 9 as the reason it was withdrawing from the next round.

Party leaders have been seething, however, ever since an earlier decision by Haiti's Provisional Electoral Council (CEP) to strike Vérité presidential candidate Jacky Lumarque from the October ballot.

Lumarque, the rector of Quisqueya University, one of the country's top educational institutions, was barred from the presidential race when the CEP determined he did not have the legal document, known as a "discharge," required of public officials to show they did not misuse public money while in office.

Lumarque was a member of a presidential commission on education under former President Rene Préval. His supporters say he did not distribute any money and thus did not need a discharge.

Haiti's highest court, the Court of Auditors, agreed but the CEP still moved to sideline Lumarque from the presidential contest.

He had been seen as a top contender for the presidency, alongside Jovenel Moise of Martelly's Tet Kale. Martelly himself cannot run for re-election.

Haiti's parliament dissolved in January after scheduled legislative elections in 2011 and 2014 were canceled. Since January, the 119-member Chamber of Deputies has sat empty and the Senate, with only 10 of its 30 members, has failed to hold a quorum.

 

AGRITRANS EXPORTS IN GERMANY ITS PREMIERE CARGO OF BANANAS

The first cargo of bananas of the project Agritrans, based in the Northeast of Haiti, was headed to Germany last Tuesday before President Michel Martelly and Prime Minister Evans Paul.

More than a hundred tons of organic bananas will be exported according to the new project manager.

A contract was signed recently with the German company Mark Port for 93 million euro for a duration of three years. This contract anticipates the export of 160 thousand metric ton of bananas a year.

President Martelly greeted the work of the group Agritrans which benefited from a 6 million dollar loan from the government to realize the project.

For the Head of State this is a glimmer of hope for the country, which must be repeated.

The project was launched in November, 2013, at the University Henry Christophe (Limonade) and has brought together more than 3,000 farmers from various associations.  Its aims is to produce organic bananas intended for export. Two million seedlings will be planted on thousands of hectares, for this initiative.

In order to reach its goals, the FEPA / Agritrans consortium will use modern farm equipment, pumps for irrigation, and an artificial lake with a capacity of 700,000 gallon. The project is projected to create approximately 3,000 jobs.

 

JUSTICE

Clifford Bandt will be judged following the reopening of the Courts

The Highest Court of Appeal transferred Clifford Brandt's file to the county court of Port-au-Prince, announced Dean Bernard Saint-Vil.

During an interview Bernard Saint-Vil specified that the case is currently at the public prosecutor's office before being transferred to the court for trial.

The dean Bernard Saint-Vil also specified that Clifford Brandt will be judged after the reopening of the courts.

The Protestant sector now has two candidates!

Last Tuesday, dissatisfied with the decision of the Mediation Commission, which had appointed the journalist Clarens Renois as the only candidate to the presidency for the Protestant sector, more than 150 Protestant leaders, managers of missions, churches, schools, organizations, leagues of ministers and Christian institutions came together at the Plaza Hotel Plaza to overturn this decision.

During this meeting, these leaders approved by a large majority Pasteur Jean-Chavannes Jeune and challenged Clarens Renois whose talent they recognize as former journalist, but whose commitment to Christianity and its beliefs they questioned.

Sheets of paper were distributed to the audience as ballots, containing the names of 9 candidates for the presidency: Amos André, Jean-Claude Rénold Bazin, Nelson Flecourt, Jean-Chavannes Jeune, Maxo Joseph, Jephté Lucien, Jean Palème Mathurin, Clarens Renois and Jacques Sampeur.

At the end of the vote Jean Chavannes Jeunes was elected, as expected, as the only candidate for the presidency to represent the protestant sector in the next elections. Out of the nine candidates, Pasteur Young person obtained 95 of the votes and Clarens Renois received 0 votes.

According to these religious leaders the Pasteur Chavannes Jeune, the candidate for the presidency running for the "CANAAN" party was chosen because his personal experience, his commitment to God and tireless work for 40 years in the church, as well as for his accomplishments: building schools, churches, hospitals among others...

The participants promised to pray for all the candidates and to support Jean Chavannes Jeune by any means, in order to help him be successful.

It should be noted that the members of the Mediation Commission did not answer the invitation of this group of Protestant leaders and none of the candidates was present at this meeting, having not been invited.

Clarens Renois and Chavannes Jeune have thus been appointed by two groups from the Protestant sector, as the only candidates to the presidential election... Note that the withdrawal of the other candidates to the presidency of this sector, was not requested by either of the two groups.

 

The United States is against the "establishment of a transition government in Haiti”

In a note Pamela White, the Ambassador of the United States to Haiti said she didn’t support having a transition government in Haiti, a demand made by several opposition parties.

"The Government of the United States considers that elections on October 25th and December 27th will open the way to the political predictability. We cannot go back, because it would be ' lava men siye ate.”

I know that there are many groups that want to stop the elections, and want the resignation of the CEP (Electoral Council) and that are pressing for a 'transitional government.” But this country needs a real government. Private enterprises are not attracted by transitional governments which do not offer long-term stability. This country needs a president, a parliament and mayors democratically elected. The American government has already financed 25 million dollars of the electoral process and recently committed an additional 5 million dollars for the second round.

We encourage all the political parties to respect the superiority of the law, and to stop causing disorder in the street."