‘Those that got killed were those that were not in harmony with nature’. So claims Haitian voodoo priest Reginald Bailly, recently interviewed by a popular television broadcaster on the role that voodoo has to play in responding to the earthquake in Haiti. Such beliefs in the God-sent nature of the earthquake are echoed in the leadership of the religious right: televangelist Pat Robertson recently stated that the earthquake is a providential payback for Haitians making ‘a pact with the devil’. Robertson was politically incorrect, but he reflects the thought of a silent number persuaded by some sort of fatalist explanation for the devastation wrecked by the earthquake.
These tendencies threaten abandonment of Haiti as a hopeless cause. But far more dangerously they threaten the Haitian state with disregard of Haitians themselves. There is a real danger that chances of building a successful Haitian state anew will be thwarted if the Haitian people lose faith in the state and public policy, and the opportunities they can provide for dignified self-improvement. International governments and citizens alike have a role to play in seeing that this does not happen.
Faith in the state has been shaky for some time among the Haitian people and has long been a rival of the voodoo tradition. In two decades of patchy democracy the state is consistently ranked among the most corrupt countries in the world. For example, Haiti was ranked 168th in Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index’s 2009 survey; an abysmal nine places from the bottom with a score of 1.8 out of ten. The backdrop to this is two centuries of independence from France characterized by political and economic exploitation by France and the US, and no fewer than 32 coups in a long line of incompetent and tyrannical regimes.
Whereas governments have come and gone like tropical storms, voodoo and the ancestral gods have always been there for the Haitians. Voodoo has permanence and unequivocal public support that neither the state nor the Catholic Church has had in Haiti. It is the most consistent way of life that Haitians can rely on, giving identity and significance to what it means to be Haitian.
Notorious Haitian dictator Papa Doc realized this when he forged a personality cult intended to surround him with a voodoo aura, including dressing himself in the costume of a voodoo god. The idea was to present himself as a messenger to the gods. By doing so he believed the divided allegiance of the people between voodoo and the state could be bridged. Events such as the assassination of John F Kennedy, whom Papa Doc had previously placed under a curse, bolstered his reputation for voodoo sorcery and quasi-divinity among the Haitian people.
Any bridge of allegiance forged between the state and the people through the democratic era following the downfall of Papa Doc’s successor Bébé Doc, in 1986, has all but completely been undone in post-earthquake Haiti. The role of the state in carrying out its mandated functions has been passed to foreign medical teams, foreign capital, foreign governments, the United States military and faith-based missions. What operations the Haitian government does maintain are largely under the direction and financing of non-Haitians.
While relief agencies are keen to assure donors their money will bypass the Haitian state this will almost certainly undermine the long-term goal of rebuilding a strong and independent state in Haiti. What is needed is a track record of good public policy that citizens can believe and participate in. Instead, some Haitians are already declaring they want America to rule their country. Haitians lacked faith in the state prior to the earthquake and now that foreign agencies are treating Haiti like a failed state it is not surprising there is so little hope among its people.
These are critical times for Haiti. The judgment that the Haitian earthquake is an opportunity to build a new order in Haiti has become mantra among development and NGO quarters. But built by whom? We should not forget that post-earthquake Haiti will be at the mercy of the competing agendas of powerful external interest groups. In order to fill the vacuum of belief that Haitians can control their own fate foreign governments need to come under more pressure to support Haiti’s right to self-determination and aid its capacity to do so.
Fatalism in voodoo will always be a force to contend with but the American public can help by directing donations to relief agencies that also work to build the capacity of Haitian civil servants. Regard for the state can then begin to be fostered among Haitians. Maybe faith in the state will ultimately emerge, and Haitians will accept their own endeavors for self-improvement as being in harmony with nature.