Mourners attend the funeral of slain Haitian President Jovenel Moise on July 23, 2021, in Cap-Haitien, Haiti, the main city in his native northern region. -AFP Pic
Mourners attend the funeral of slain Haitian President Jovenel Moise on July 23, 2021, in Cap-Haitien, Haiti, the main city in his native northern region. -AFP Pic

On the surface, what happens on a seemingly hellish half-island of a nation that is Haiti, in the Caribbean, matters, at most, to the Western hemisphere where it belongs.

But, in today's climate of geopolitical rivalry between an ascendant and authoritarian China and a visibly floundering United States, Haiti matters a great deal to all of us, even those who are half a world away.

Haiti is a tiny republic of just over 10 million right by the doorstep of the US, an ex-French colony of freed slaves that America has intervened for over a century, from when just-assassinated president Jovenel Moise's predecessor, Vilbrun Sam, met the same fate in 1915 and which led to nearly two decades of direct US occupation.

It is a country regularly punctuated by violence and upheavals at its political summit as well as violence suffered by ordinary Haitians at the hands of rival gangs terrorising much of the country. Small wonder it also has the dubious distinction of being the poorest country in the Western hemisphere.

In addition, Haiti is also known for terrible diseases, such as AIDS, taking hold and now — in the midst of a global Covid-19 pandemic — for hardly any vaccines reaching its people yet. Natural calamities are another hazard, such as a devastating earthquake in 2010 that left the presidential palace in Port-au-Prince, the capital, in ruins till today.

Police officers guard the coffin with the body of President Jovenel Moise during the start of his funeral ceremony in Cap-Haitien, Haiti. - EPA Pic
Police officers guard the coffin with the body of President Jovenel Moise during the start of his funeral ceremony in Cap-Haitien, Haiti. - EPA Pic

If such terrible vicissitudes — both natural and man-made — are so often visited on such a tiny speck of the Earth that is Haiti and the nearby superpower, the US — seems unable to do anything to alleviate them — what realistic hope is there in other parts of the developing world that America really has their back and can, as promised, mould them in America's image?

As things stand, Haiti gyrates ever so wildly between elections, short bursts of optimism, dictatorships and general disappointments. Just as the US winds down after two decades of military misadventures and political disappointments in Afghanistan, talk is rife about intervention of some sort, including military, in Haiti. Or perhaps not.

US President Joe Biden, in withdrawing from Afghanistan, said America is done with nation-building abroad. That presumably precludes anything resembling nation-building in Haiti. Thus, at best, the US is likely to push for elections in Haiti to move forward.

How realistic an option is that, given the parlous state Haiti is in right now? Or is the US reaching for a repeat of another vicious political cycle that will slowly but surely end in further grief for Haitians?

If not elections, what then? Maybe that is not the right question. Elections may be necessary for a new Haitian leader to gain sorely-needed political legitimacy. But, the US will be mistaken if it assumes elections are a panacea that can substitute for a sustained effort at, yes, nation-building in Haiti.

For too long, Haiti has been an openly embarrassing sore that makes a mockery of any soaring American rhetoric about the power of its democratic example. The signal failure of that example is plain for all to see in America's backyard — Central America and the Caribbean where, any given day, flocks of desperate people seek to breach the border to get into the US.

It is this tattered example that informs and angers many in China today — and not just the top leadership in Beijing — that while they may rather quietly admire the freedoms Americans enjoy at home, likewise question, with justification, if those freedoms can be enjoyed by all wherever they happen to live and if not, why not.

There may be equal justification today for the US to take on China, given that China has become an economic juggernaut (with much American help, it must be said) and should loosen up somewhat politically so its mercantilist tendencies do not become the object of growing international hostility.

That said, the US must also acknowledge where it has failed across the globe and make amends so it, at minimum, does no harm to other countries.

The writer views developments in the nation, region and wider world from his vantage point in Kuching, Sarawak


The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect those of the New Straits Timess