Haitian President Michel Martelly on Friday launched a plan to restore the nation’s armed forces, despite fears their revival could be divisive in a country bloodied by past military coups and rights abuses.
In a ceremony marking a 19th-century independence battle, Martelly apologized to past victims of the Haitian army that was abolished in 1995 by former Haitian president Jean-Bertrand Aristide, himself once ousted in a 1991 military coup.
Martelly, a former pop star, said Haitians would prefer to have their country protected by its own army rather than by foreign troops who have acted as peacekeepers in the impoverished Caribbean nation since 1994.
“This has been going on for 17 years and that is 17 years too much ... This should stop and it will stop,” he said, speaking in front of the presidential palace at an event attended by ministers, dignitaries and diplomats.
Martelly, elected in March on a nationalist platform pledging Haiti’s renewal after a devastating earthquake last year, announced the setting up of a civil -commission to prepare a road map for restoration of the military.
After consultation with various national sectors, this plan would be presented on Jan. 1, independence day in what is the Western Hemisphere’s poorest state.
Martelly’s words drew applause from the crowd and shouts of “Long live the army!”
However, donors and rights activists say they fear the restoration of an institution accused of past abuses could be divisive and divert resources from more pressing challenges of rebuilding after last year’s earthquake.
“Our main concern is about what function would this military play in Haiti and who will integrate it,” Amnesty International Haiti researcher Gerardo Ducos said, adding it was expected former military officers would rejoin.
“We know the army in the past was involved in repression ... We need a full vetting process,” he said.
Public opinion has soured toward the more than 12,000-strong foreign UN peacekeeping force in Haiti. Its image has been badly tarnished by recent allegations of sexual assault and accusations that Nepalese UN troops brought a deadly cholera outbreak to the country. More than 6,700 Haitians have died from cholera since last year.
“We’ve had enough of the foreign soldiers that brought cholera here, causing thousands of Haitians to die ... That’s why we need our army to replace them,” said Lochard Jeremie, 25, a student whose father was an army surgeon.
Others expressed misgivings, saying attention and resources should be directed toward priorities such as providing housing for the approximately 500,000 quake homeless still living in tents and tarpaulin camps.
“I don’t think the priority now should be restoring the army when we have so many people under tents and the government says it hasn’t the money to get them out of the camps,” 26-year-old Port-au-Prince resident Joel Lacroix said.
It was not immediately clear where the money to set up and equip an army would come from.
A draft plan foreseeing a 3,500-strong force and an initial cost of US$95 million has circulated in recent weeks, along with a proposal for a national spy service.
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