[The following interview with a leader of the Haitian Workers Party (PTH) took place on December 10, 1981, in Santo Domingo, the capital of the Dominican Republic, which shares the Caribbean island of Hispaniola with Haiti.
(The PTH and the United Haitian Communist Party (PUCH) are the main working-class organizations opposing the bloody regime of Haiti's President-for-Life Jean-Claude Duvalier. Jean-Claude, known as "Baby Doc," was nineteen years old when he succeeded his father, François Duvalier ("Papa Doc"), who was the country's president from 1957 until his death in 1971.
[The interview was published in the January 25, 1982, issue of Inprecor, a French-language fortnightly published in Paris. The translation and footnotes are by Intercontinental Press.]
Question. On various occasions we heard in the international press that in the late 1970s the government of Haiti was following a new orientation. What can you tell us about this?
Answer. More specifically, this concerns the period between 1977 and 1980. At that time there was talk of promoting in Haiti the type of economy that Hong Kong has, by making the country into a kind of Western showcase in the Caribbean. In fact, Since 1972 a number of assembly factories have been set up. There is an economic free zone where about 40,000 workers are employed (in the neighboring Dominican Republic, there are
Duvalier's police in Haitian capital.
only half as many workers in the free zone).
The factories in this enclave only fulfill very fragmentary functions in the process of production. This is the case, for example, with production of baseballs. Nearly all the balls used in this sport that is so popular in the United States come from Haiti (although the Haitians prefer soccer).
Q. Have there been appreciable changes in the country's economy?
A. There has, in fact, been only very limited and precarious development. The free zone itself has stopped growing and the overall picture remains literally tragic. The rate of unemployment and underemployment is between 40 and 50 percent of the active population, and is around 65 percent in the capital, Port-au- Prince, a city of about 800,000 people.
While the per capita income averages $150 per year (placing Haiti in the ranks of the coun tries with the lowest income), 61 percent of the population gets only $60 per year and 17 percent of the rural population receives no more than $17. The threshold of absolute poverty is figured as an annual income of less than $300.
Life expectancy is between forty and fifty years, and the infant mortality rate is 14.1 percent. Illiteracy stands at the record level of 95 percent. In the capital it is estimated that 40 percent of the population has no housing.
Haiti has remained a basically agrarian country. The percentage of farmers in the active population is one of the highest in the world: about 80 percent. Agricultural production represents 43 percent of the gross national product. The big landowners hold nearly twothirds of the land, which they work with superexploited agricultural laborers and through sharecropping. The penetration of typical capitalist forms into the countryside is much more limited than in the neighboring Dominican Republic.
Q. Can you tell us something about the political developments in the 1977-1980 period?
A. Remember, that was period of Jimmy Carter's demagogy regarding human rights. The United States applied pressure on Jean-
Claude Duvalier to begin a certain degree of "liberalization. " Some openings did, in fact, take place. The press began to write more freely and, above all, there were radio stations that developed a large audience because of their independent and critical attitude toward the regime. The most significant of these was Radio Haiti-Inter.
At the same time, a significant theatrical movement developed. Theater pieces began to be performed in town squares and in the villages and, to the extent that they expressed the sentiments and aspirations of the people, they had a very great success.
In addition, the trade-union movement resumed some activity, and major struggles developed.
The same thing happened among students, where the communist-led National Union of Haitian Students (UNEH), founded in 1959, was reorganized. Moreover, we saw the birth of a movement that called for recognition of Creole as the official language.
For Jean-Claude Duvalier and his accomplices, the situation was becoming dangerous.
Q. How did they react?
A. They took the election of Ronald Reagan as president of the United States as a signal. They lost no time. On November 28, 1980, they struck against the whole opposition, deporting or imprisoning the most representative elements. Radio Haiti-Inter was closed; the theater movement was outlawed. All the political parties and groups were again forced into the strictest underground status.
Q. What are the political forces in Haiti?
A. Before the November 28, 1980, crackdown, there were two legal Social Christian parties. Today they have almost completely disappeared. In the underground, therefore, there are only parties of the workers movement and organizations tied to those parties.
The party with the most influence is the Haitian Workers Party, the PTH, which was founded in 1966. For a certain time it had a Maoist position, but now it follows an independent orientation.
The PTH is part of the Union of Haitian Patriotic and Democratic Forces (IFOPADA, after its initials in Creole), in which there is also a Catholic socialist tendency. The IFOPADA puts forward an anti-imperialist, antifeudal, and antidictatorial orientation, and it tries to gather together all the anti-Duvalier forces.
In the second place is the United Haitian Communist Party (PUCH), which has a pro- Soviet orientation. The main forces of the PUCH are in exile, and its best-known leader is Gérard Pierre-Charles. The PUCH is part of the Haitian Democratic Union (UDEH).
Finally, two new communist groups have been set up outside the country, the May 18 and Forward groups.
Q. Could you tell us something about the history of the Haitian communist movement?
A. The Haitian communist movement goes back to the early 1930s. Between 1932 and 1945 it was represented by the Haitian Communist Party (PCH). After 1946, following a split, there were two parties — one maintaining the PCH name, the other being the People's Socialist Party (PSP).
In 1948, the PSP dissolved itself, under the influence of the ideas then being put forward by former U.S. CP leader Earl Browder. ' Later the party reconstituted itself and was able to carry out legal activity. The communist movement, which had been legal since 1945, saw both these organizations dissolved in 1950.
In 1954 the People's Party of National Liberation (PPLN) was formed, and in 1959 intellectuals who had earlier been active in the PCH formed the People's Alliance Party (PEP). The PPLN and the PEP both described themselves as Marxist-Leninist. Both also underwent deep internal divisions that led to splits.
Finally there was a regroupment, out of which the PUCH and the PTH emerged.
For a whole period the PTH shared the criticisms that the Chinese Communist Party and the Albanian Party of Labor made of the Soviet leadership. But we changed our attitude toward these two parties in 1976, feeling that the Chinese had, themselves, adopted a revisionist line.
0. What is the PTH's attitude toward Cuba?
A. We feel now that we must stress solidarity against the imperialist threats rather than criticisms. We think, however, that the Cubans are under Soviet influence and base themselves on the Soviet Union's economic model.
Q. What do you think of the events in Poland? [This was before martial law was proclaimed.]
A. I want to point out that in Haiti there has traditionally been interest in what is happening in Poland. During Haiti's war of independence at the beginning of the nineteenth century, Polish soldiers in the French army came over to the side of the Haitian patriots.
Also, we have criticized the Polish revisionist leadership since 1966, at which time we established relations with Polish Marxist-Leninists. We think that Solidarity is a diverse movement, in which there are currents that are under the influence of imperialism. But on the whole, this is a mass movement against the bu-
But in 1945, when Stalin decided to dump Browder, the device he utilized was to have French CP figure Jacques Duclos write an open letter attacking Browder for having dissolved the U.S. Communist Party. Browder went into an immediate eclipse and was expelled from the CP in 1946.
reaucracy, which should be supported. Therefore, we solidarize with Solidarity.
0. Can you tell us something about the Haitian trade-union movement?
A. We should recall that between 1958 and 1965 there was a very strong union movement in Haiti. This movement was united, with a single union in the factories and only one federation on the national level, the Haitian Inter- Union Federation (UIH), which was led by the communists. After 1965, the regime used the repression to impose scab unions.
In 1970, there were new movements and a phase of recomposition began. In 1978-79 especially, there was work among the rank-andfile to reorganize a national federation. The communists regained control over certain unions and strikes took place.
The Social Christians, for their part, formed the Autonomous Confederation of Haitian Workers (CATH), with the aid of Venezuela, but this was an artificial operation that did not have much success among the masses.
The crackdown on November 28, 1980, opened a new phase of repression, which included, among other things, the elimination of communists from the unions.
O. What is the present situation?
A. The situation is bad in the sense that
Free Derose and Chery!
The life of Rock Derose, a leading Haitian communist, is in danger, according to a report in the January 17 issue of the English-language Cuban weekly Granma.
Derose, a member of the Secretariat of the United Haitian Communist Party
(PUCH), was arrested in Haiti in early November and charged with carrying out
"subversive activities." Arrested with him was Eloisie Chery, a seventy-six-year old communist. They are being held in the Dessalines garrison and are reportedly being subjected to brutal torture.
Derose, who became active in the Popular Youth League of Haiti in 1959, while he was still in high school, was arrested with other activists in October of that year. They were later released, following a threemonth strike organized by the National
Union of Haitian Students (UNEH).
Derose was studying abroad during the
Duvalier dictatorship's 1969 wave of repression, but he returned to Haiti to help rebuild the PUCH.
No jailed PUCH member has ever been brought to trial. They are kept imprisoned indefinitely, and many have been murdered in detention.
To save Derose and Chery from the same fate, urgent protests are needed to demand their immediate release.
there are no longer activities by the mass movement. All activity must be carried out in strictly clandestine ways. We are trying to organize rank-and-file committees, especially among the peasants. I want to point out that the PTH places very great importance on work among the peasants.
Q. What is your strategic perspective?
A. The PTH is an anticapitalist party that is carrying out an anti-imperialist, antifeudal. and antidictatorial struggle. We feel that it is necessary to prepare for armed struggle. How else, in fact, could Jean-Claude Duvalier and his ferocious dictatorship be overthrown?
The PUCH, too, was for armed struggle after 1969. But in 1978 it dropped that orientation in order to take greater advantage of the regime's "liberalization." It did not adopt a new position after the new wave of repression.
Q. Has Jean-Claude Duvalier been successful in consolidating his regime?
A. For years there have been conflicts within the regime. They reflect the antagonism between the landowners and the comprador bourgeoisie.? This is also tied to racial rivalry since the big landowners are Black, while the compradors are usually white or mulatto.
Today the compradors have the upper hand. They use, among other things, the position of Jean-Claude Duvalier's wife and her family — a powerful bourgeois family. They also control the police.
In addition, on several occasions the regime has been in serious conflict with Washington. For example, Jean-Claude Duvalier has always avoided creating too powerful an army, for fear that it might be seen as a possible alternative to his regime. He has concentrated instead
2. The term "comprador bourgeoisie" refers to those sections of the bourgeoisie that function as local representatives of foreign companies.
on building up his militia, the Tontons Macoutes, while Washington had an opposing view.
Q. Do you think that there is a conservative bourgeois alternative to Jean-Claude Duvalier?
A. I feel that it is very difficult for such an alternative to come together. That is, moreover, why Washington hesitates to let Jean- Claude Duvalier fall.
Q. Are there any other points you would like to make?
A. The Haitian people and all the victims of the Duvalierist regime need the solidarity of all the peoples and especially all the workers organizations in the world. It is absolutely essential that this solidarity be organized and demonstrated to a greater extent than has been the case up to now.
Notes
1. In 1943, as a gesture to his World War Il allies, Stalin announced the dissolution of the Third International. In the same year, the U.S. Communist Party, led by Earl Browder, was formally dissolved, and a Communist Political Association was established. According to Browder, this was in accordance with *the international line.