Aristide on IMF and World Bank

[Patrick Bond]

I had a chance to work in Aristide's Washington office in 1995, and I 
must say, having worked for lots of politicians, this was the only 
one who actually encouraged popular protest against his government's 
policies, so that he would have a left flank when it came to 
negotiations with the ubiquitous IMF, Bank and US AID teams. By 
October 1995 his left flank was so strong that his prime minister 
resigned in frustration. But regrettably it was never strong enough 
to do more than cul-de-sac the IMF/Bank/IFC/AID plans. Maybe the 
breakthrough comes in a potential next term? Maybe...


> >     In a book being published next week, "Eyes of the Heart,"
> >Aristide
> >explains that the austerity programs championed by the IMF and
> >World Bank
> >offer "a choice between death and death" in poor countries. For
> >instance:
> >"Haiti, under intense pressure from the international lending
> >institutions, stopped protecting its domestic agriculture while
> >subsidies
> >to the U.S. rice industry increased. A hungry nation became
> >hungrier."
Patrick Bond
email:  pbond at wn.apc.org * phone:  2711-614-8088
home:  51 Somerset Road, Kensington 2094 South Africa
work:  University of the Witwatersrand
Graduate School of Public and Development Management
PO Box 601, Wits 2050, South Africa
email:  bondp at zeus.mgmt.wits.ac.za
phone:  2711-488-5917 * fax:  2711-484-2729