Haiti:
Outbursts of Anger

Sep 26, 2022

This article is translated from the September 23 issue #2825 of Lutte Ouvrière (Workers’ Struggle), the newspaper of the revolutionary workers’ group of that name active in France.

For several weeks, the poor of Haiti have been expressing their anger explosively. Demonstrations, revolts, and attacks on public buildings and mansions of the rich happen one after another. The wave was amplified in recent days by the government’s announcement of insane gas price increases. The prices of kerosene and diesel more or less doubled.

Haitian comrades in the Organization of Revolutionary Workers (OTR) devoted the entire September issue of their monthly to this social explosion. Here are excerpts from their editorial.

Expropriate the Wealthy Classes!

Insecurity, unemployment, and misery: ever since independence, the exploited masses have never known better under the leadership of the dominant classes. Even worse, after 218 years, the greed and irresponsibility of the bourgeoisie and its lackeys propel the whole country into the horror of armed gangs which dominate and exploit ordinary people. For a long time running, the rulers of this society have shown a thousand times that they no longer deserve to control the economy. It is up to the working class and the masses to organize to kick them away.

With all the aspects of social and economic insecurity and the extortions of armed gangs, the working class and the masses have borne the brunt of the torments of the ruling classes for many months. Having acquired the country’s means of production by violence and trickery, the rich classes cut their way to the top of society and are making it work for their benefit only.

Rising unemployment threatens the very existence of the majority of the population, but the bosses react with yet more layoffs. The outsourcing agencies, which had around 60,000 jobs in the 1990s, are on the verge of bankruptcy. Bosses export their capital to other countries considered safer and to other activities considered more profitable. Without any severance pay, workers are thrown onto the streets. Deprived of the ability to sell their labor power to live, they are condemned to freefall.

Given the high cost of living, the big merchants organize the black market. Consumer goods prices are constantly rising. Simply eating enough has become the hardest thing for a poor or even middle class family. “Let them die, as long as our bank accounts are full,” the importers and other traffickers say!

Gas and oil prices are rising. In a blur of hustle and bustle, importers and merchants sell the small quantities they bring in—but on the black market and for three times the price. It doesn’t matter to them that transportation prices fly beyond the reach of the population.

Kidnappings are on the increase. Murders and massacres are common in working-class neighborhoods. The rich travel in armored cars and surround themselves with hordes of security guards. All the while they keep financing and arming criminal gangs to control the population.

[...]

Only a revolution led by the workers alongside the poor farmers and other strata of the exploited masses will put an end to the rule of the capitalists and fat cats. Socializing the means of production is the indispensable condition. The survival of the vast majority of the population depends on this. Young workers, young intellectuals, and militants who see themselves in this struggle, let us set up the party of revolutionary workers which will organize and guide the exploited masses toward victory.