[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 80 (Tuesday, June 10, 1997)]
[House]
[Page H3582]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




               THINGS ARE NOT QUIET ON THE SOUTHERN FRONT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore [Mr. Young of Florida]. Under the Speaker's 
announced policy of January 21, 1997, the gentleman from Florida [Mr. 
Goss] is recognized during morning hour debates for 5 minutes.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, is all quiet on the southern front? No, not 
really. Despite the resounding silence from the press and the White 
House on the current situation in our neighboring country Haiti, things 
are far from quiet. In fact, things are so bad that the prime minister 
quit yesterday.
  Over the past few weeks, we know Haitians have rioted in the streets 
of Port-Au-Prince and other towns. Incidents of assaults, rock 
throwing, and general lawlessness have resulted in death, injury and 
damage. Yesterday, as I said, things took a turn even for the worse 
when Prime Minister Rosny Smarth submitted his citing, in fact, the 
recent fraudulent elections.
  Obviously, this is bad for democracy because at this time it appears 
that only one major party is participating in the elections, and that 
is not exactly democratic, but it is also bad for reform in Haiti, 
because with Prime Minister Rosny Smarth leaving, so goes one of the 
few champions of the tough but necessary economic program that we had 
envisioned for Haiti. Economic reform is all but a thing of the past in 
Haiti anyway, and without economic reform there is absolutely no hope 
for a Democratic future in Haiti.
  So through all of this upheaval, one interesting and frankly 
disturbing fact seems to have surfaced, and that is the fact that the 
Haitian National Police have had to be supplemented with our military 
personnel to deal with basic law and order issues in that country. As 
one diplomat quoted in a wire report recently, ``It is clear the 
military presence in Haiti is not just building roads.'' Our ``road 
builders,'' including Special Forces, have been seen responding to the 
riots carrying on, doing the law and order business, extensive activity 
in the areas of drug control, those types of things.
  Not only do these reports suggest that our troops on the ground are 
outside of the range of the mission we understood them to be on, which 
was road building, but it also suggests that our soldiers are at more 
risk than we have been led to believe. I think it is time for a little 
candor from the White House about what is going on.
  We asked the White House, what is going on? So far we have not heard 
anything. Official silence reigns as well on the topic of Haiti's 
recent disappointing local assembly and Senate elections, which is the 
real reason behind the Smarth resignation and what should have been the 
starting point for the creation of a new judicial system and permanent 
electoral council forum in Haiti, which are mightily needed. Because 
without a judicial system, there is no hope for democracy in Haiti 
either.
  Because the electoral council has decided not to handle blank ballots 
properly, they have wrongly allowed some candidates, like the infamous 
Fourel Celestin, to get past the finish line when according to the law 
they did not win the election. So we now have people who did not win 
serving as senators in Haiti.
  Action on this issue is pending in the Parliament, but the Haitian 
electoral council is pushing forward for another round of elections, no 
matter what, this coming weekend. The fact is that each successive 
election in Haiti has disenfranchised and disenchanted ever more of the 
Haitians voters, a point illustrated well in the single digit turnout 
in the last election in April, which, as I say, were fraudulent 
elections. Yet, I understand less than 10 percent of the people turned 
out to protest that fact.
  What, we ask, will another election under a still darker black cloud 
do to advance democracy in Haiti? At the very least, the American 
taxpayers have a right to hear from the administration that enough is 
enough and that their tax dollars will not go to assist the Haitians to 
run another questionable if not fraudulent election this weekend.
  Mr. Speaker, all is not quiet on the southern front. We know that. 
What we do not know is when the White House is going to tell us what is 
going on, when our troops are coming home, and whether or not that will 
be before the ruinous Haiti policy that the White House has put forth 
puts us back where we started more than 4 years and 3 billion of the 
U.S. taxpayers' dollars ago, sadly enough, with thousands of Haitians 
now today who believe that a dangerous trip across the windward passage 
to Florida offers them more hope than staying in Haiti.
  Is that a policy that we want to back? Certainly not. I think it is 
time for the White House to give us some explanation and to end the 
silence of what is really going on in that tragic country where our 
friendly neighbors are suffering. All is not quiet on the southern 
front.

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