The West Block Transcript – Episode 27, Season 13

THE WEST BLOCK
Episode 27, Season 13
Sunday, March 17, 2024

Host: Mercedes Stephenson

Guests:
André François Giroux, Canadian Ambassador to Haiti
Bob Rae, Canadian Ambassador to United Nations

Location:
Ottawa Studio

Mercedes Stephenson: There’s a vast power vacuum in what is quickly becoming the failed state of Haiti. Can it be repaired?

I’m Mercedes Stephenson. The West Block starts now.

The fight to lead Haiti is now in the streets. With the president stepping down, it’s feared one massive gang could soon be effectively running the country. What’s Canada’s role in efforts to help secure the island nation? We talk with Canada’s ambassador on the ground in Port-au-Prince and Canada’s ambassador to the United Nations.

Violence and chaos like this new aren’t new for Haiti, but this time the situation is actually quite different, and it’s worse. There’s no longer a president after the interim leader was forced to resign, after two years without elections and increasing gang violence. He had replaced the previous president who was assassinated.

What few military and police are left in the country, have turned from trying to quell violence between rival gangs, some of which are as well-armed as small militaries to facing a new threat. Instead of fighting each other, the gangs have joined together, forming a criminal alliance that plans on being a dominant force in the country. The leader of the most powerful gang in the country, a man named Jimmy ‘Barbecue’ Chérizier, who used to be a police officer, had a warning for those who plan to intervene.

Jimmy ‘Barbecue’ Chérizier, Haitian Gang Leader: (original in French) “The international community especially the United States Canada and France and the Core Group will be responsible for all the people who die in Haiti.”

Mercedes Stephenson: The deteriorating security situation in the country’s capital means many Haitians are facing famine while flights can’t in or out, and embassies including Canada’s have evacuated much of their non-essential staff. Canada’s ambassador to Haiti André François Giroux, however, is still in Port-au-Prince and he joins us now.

Ambassador, welcome to the show. Thank you for making time for us.

André François Giroux, Canadian Ambassador to Haiti: My pleasure. Thank you for having me.

Mercedes Stephenson: I imagine you are in the middle of what is an extraordinarily chaotic, violent and dangerous situation on the ground. Can you describe to Canadians what is happening in Haiti right now and what it’s like to be there?

André François Giroux, Canadian Ambassador to Haiti: Well one thing that we have to keep in mind is that Haiti’s been facing these street crises: humanitarian, political and security for quite a few years now. When it comes to security, so this has been ongoing, but the reality is what we’ve seen these past few weeks is the gang instead of just, you know, creating terror and pursuing their business model, which has been traditionally to kidnap people, to traffic drugs and just ask people payment for security, what we’ve seen is them working together, coordinating, and attacking, targeting some of the key infrastructure: the airport, the port, police commissariat.

As a response to all of this, the police have been doing a tremendous job and it has regained some control over the port. It’s trying to rebuild a security perimeter around the airport, but the reality is the PNH is not as strong as it should be. It needs to rebuild itself. That’s why we’ve been investing in the PNH, assisting with them. But, you know, this is the reality on the ground right now and obviously, that creates a lot of uncertainty and for that reason, people are a little more nervous and need to be much more careful.

Mercedes Stephenson: It is a very different situation to be talking about dealing with criminal gangs who want to seize power. We’re used to dealing sometimes, with very violent governments or extremists, but this is a bit of a unique situation. Can you explain to us who some of the key players are, who are joining together to try to essentially—I don’t know if I want to say seize power, I’m not sure they’re looking to govern, but they’re certainly looking to be the most powerful for in Haiti that are these extremely sophisticated gangs.

André François Giroux, Canadian Ambassador to Haiti: Yes. Why? Some people may ask why do we see the gangs working together now and not, you know six months ago, because their modus operandi has been more or less fighting each other to control respective territories. But what defector Prime Minister Henry was trying to do, was trying to create the conditions for a multinational security force to come. And that’s not good news for the gangs, as you can imagine. So the gangs are very worried, and then right now what we’re seeing is they’re trying to really make their territory even stronger, and try to prevent this multinational force to come.

Very opportunistically, some political leaders have associated themselves with the gangs and are for their own benefit, trying to immobilize the gangs and say we’re going to take power. We’re going to create security because we have this alliance with the gangs. And then if you put us in power, we will run the country and restore security.

The Haitian’s people are not fools. They don’t want a government—a country run by former criminals that are associated with gang leaders.

Mercedes Stephenson: And I think that most people would think that that certainly sounds like a better option, but how do you install that when you don’t have quite literally, the fire power necessarily to back that against gangs who in some cases have been assessed at having near peer combat capabilities to parts of the Canadian military?

André François Giroux, Canadian Ambassador to Haiti: Yes, it is challenging and we expect that as this government of national unity forms itself, the gangs will do everything to make it fail and create insecurity to prevent the multinational security force to come.

The government that Haitians are trying to put together will have two main mandates, which will be to create a clear path towards elections and welcome the multinational security force. So yes, the gang will continue to create insecurity.

The police is doing, again, a tremendous job, but it needs reinforcement and that’s why that multinational mission needs to come as soon as possible.

We, Canada, over the past year, year and a half, we’ve identified this as a critical issue and that that’s why Prime Minister Trudeau a year ago, announced $100 million just dedicated to support the national police in equipment, training, technical expertise. In addition to that $100 million, we’ve also mobilized the international community.

Mercedes Stephenson: Canada has supported Haiti verbally, but when it’s come down to it, when President Biden wanted Canada to lead the multinational force in Haiti, we declined. There has been deep concern from the leadership of the Canadian Armed Forces and of the RCMP that the risk was simply too high. The Haitian police who were training were not even going to Haiti to train them, we’re pulling them out to train them in a third-party country because the risk was associated as being so high. So it seems like Canada is saying all the right things, but it seems like when there’s a risk to take on, to actually get involved, there’s hesitancy there. Do you think that’s true?

Mercedes Stephenson: I know that a number of your staff has been pulled out because of concerns about security. You have bravely stayed behind to try to assist Canadian citizens. Do you believe that you are going to be able to stay in the embassy? Or do you think it’s likely that you’re going to have to evacuate essential staff out of Haiti completely?

André François Giroux, Canadian Ambassador to Haiti: You know we have to be ready for every eventuality, but the last thing we want to do is close our embassy and leave.

Mercedes Stephenson: Are you living in the embassy compound right now to be able to stay safe? I’m noticing the shutters closed behind you and I’m sure there’s a number of security precautions you have to take.

André François Giroux, Canadian Ambassador to Haiti: I don’t disclose my location, but I can assure you that I’m well-equipped. I have water, food and good security. So I’m not worried for my own personal safety. I mean, we have to be careful. We reduce our movements on the ground as much as we can. But we are very much here, operational and we’re carrying on with the work that we have to do.

Mercedes Stephenson: Ambassador, the United States obviously has considerable military strength in the region, both in terms of ability to intervene, respond, and potentially rescue their embassy staff. Canada does not have that same strength. Would you like to see military assets from the Canadian Armed Forces in the region or special forces deployed to the embassy to help to protect you?

André François Giroux, Canadian Ambassador to Haiti: As I had a chance to explain before, we are making every contingency plan and I take great comfort knowing that the U.S. is well-tooled, here as well, and is a good ally, and Miami is not too far. But I would say for the time being, we’re definitely ready for every opportunity or every occasion. And then we are, as you can imagine, coordinating very closely with all of our good allies in the region.

Mercedes Stephenson: What advice do you have for Canadians who are in Haiti right now? I know they’ve been told to shelter in place, but obviously this is an extremely dangerous and stressful situation. Is the Government of Canada able to offer them anything more than that?

André François Giroux, Canadian Ambassador to Haiti: Well right now, and then please keep in mind that our travel advisory for the last year and a half has been don’t come to Haiti. If you are in Haiti, it’s time to leave and go back home. So the people, the Canadians that are here, are here because they know the lay of the land. They know what to expect, and I know they’re very resilient. Our advice is shelter in place, make sure that you have a reserve of water, food, medicine, like I do, and don’t move around unless you really have to.

Mercedes Stephenson: Certainly our wish for you, too. We know events don’t always comply with that, but we thank you for joining us and we wish you the very best. Please stay safe, and we appreciate your service.

André François Giroux, Canadian Ambassador to Haiti: Thank you very much.

Mercedes Stephenson: And for a view from home, here’s a quick listen of how some Haitian Canadians are feeling about the crisis.

Alix Adrien, Haitian Canadian: “I mean, in the past month, I’ve had members of the family, they have been kidnapped. So that’s been an ongoing situation now for the past, I guess, seven, eight years.”

Frantz André Haitian Canadian: “We really don’t know what to tell them. You know they are crying, really crying on the phone, saying get me out of there.”

Mercedes Stephenson: As the situation on the ground deteriorates, up next, we talk about the options to get help into Haiti.

Mercedes Stephenson: There have been many efforts to help Haiti in the past, but most have not gone well.

In 2004, the UN Force MINUSTAH was established and quickly known for rapes and extra judicial killings.

In 2005, a massacre of Haitians by Brazilian soldiers working for the UN.

And in 2010, Haiti’s first cases of cholera, killed at least 10 thousand after UN peacekeeper arrived from Nepal, where the disease is common.

And there are many more examples. So how can the UN help this time without repeating history’s mistakes?

Canada’s ambassador to the United Nations Bob Rae joins us now. Ambassador, nice to see you, sir. Thank you for joining us.

Bob Rae, Canadian Ambassador to the United Nations: Nice to meet—nice to see you again, too, Mercedes. Good to be with you.

Mercedes Stephenson: Ambassador Rae, what is the situation in terms of trying to secure the situation on the ground in Haiti and this external force that is still supposed to be coming in? Is that possible?

Bob Rae, Canadian Ambassador to the United Nations: Yes, it’s possible since the security situation is bad. But it’s—it can be remedied and I personally know that the Haitian national police have been responding in a remarkable way, to protecting state institutions, to pushing back against the gangs, but they simply don’t have enough equipment, enough ability to kind of get at it in the major way that’s required. And that’s why we believe the United Nations agrees that we need a multinational force, which will begin to address the serious deficit that the Haitian national police faces at the present time. But it can be done. It absolutely can be done. We just have to get the political will, the financial will and all the other things that are required to get it done. And Canada’s very committed to being part of that solution.

Mercedes Stephenson: Ambassador Rae, one of the reasons I always enjoy speaking with you is because you say things like they are and you’re not afraid to really, sort of speak truth to power. It strikes me when we look at Haiti; this is a county that has been through terrible devastation, terrible poverty, terrible violence. It is in our hemisphere, but we don’t talk about it very much. We talk about supporting the government, but Canada doesn’t want to lead the international mission. We don’t actually want to put RCMP or military on the ground, in part because there’ll be such a danger to our troops, but that leads me to well we’ve allowed it to get that out of control. Why do you think that Haiti has been largely abandoned by the international community and by North America, when it comes to making a serious effort at getting this country rebuilt and their security under control? Do people just not care?

Bob Rae, Canadian Ambassador to the United Nations: No, actually I don’t think it’s about not caring. I think it’s about struggling to find a way of supporting the people of Haiti without supporting actors which frankly, are corrupt and not helping the situation. And I think the challenge has always been that, you know we come in with massive amounts of money. If you look at what happened after 2010, and the experience after 2010, we came in with a lot of money. Money spilled all over the place. Money was taken over by some of the ruling families of the country and immediately extorted, went out to Miami or New York or Montreal or somewhere else, and it wasn’t used for the benefit of the Haitian people. And I think we’ve got to avoid that kind of a production at all costs.

The other thing is this is urban fighting. This is dealing with urban gangs, and we have to be quite specific and careful about making sure that we do everything possible to extract the kids out of the gangs. And there are countries that are going to be involved in this doing this, helping make this happen.

But I would like to kind of talk back a little bit against your narrative on abandonment. Nobody’s abandoned Haiti. Haiti has received billions, tens of billions of dollars from countries in the last 25, 30 years, and received a lot of money. And not all that money has been put to good use, and I think we’d be deluding ourselves if we thought that wasn’t a problem. So we have to strengthen Haiti’s institutions. We have to require accountability. We have to make sure money is going to where it’s needed, how it’s needed, and we have to make sure that it’s not just piled all—piled on all of a sudden, because we’ve got to deal with the long term development needs of the country with an effective plan that’s really going to work. And we are dealing with an unprecedented network of gangsters who are violent, who are very well entrenched, who are well-armed and well-equipped, and it’s going to be a very tough struggle to bring down.

Mercedes Stephenson: So how do you operate in that environment, then, if you’re dealing with these gangsters who there’s obviously questionable morality about engaging with them, but they’re the guys who seem to have the power right now. You have a government in name that’s trying to form, but doesn’t have an ability to execute, and a long history of rich politicians, sucking money out of the country and redirecting it to their homes in Miami. How do you come into that and find a solution that isn’t just the international community taking over and running things for a while? Or is that something we should be looking at, like post-World War II in Japan?

Bob Rae, Canadian Ambassador to the United Nations: No. No. I don’t think taking over—we’ve tried that before. I mean, frankly, Mercedes, that’s the model that we followed—we fell into without really thinking about it. And we can’t do that again. That’s a mistake. We have to let the Haitian political institutions do the job. We need more cooperation. And one thing we do need—and I have to say this very deliberately—is we need greater effort from the Americans on the export of arms from their country to Haiti. We have to understand that the largest source of guns in Haiti, and frankly in the Caribbean, is the United States of America. And we’ve talked to the Americans about this. I’ve been very open in talking to people about it, and there has to be an effort by the United States to reduce the export of arms. The United Nations resolution talked about that very directly, and the statement that was made by the Security Council last week, talked very directly about the importance of an arms embargo, which means there are countries like Canada and the United States, and the EU and others, that have the means to actually enforce an embargo, need to enforce the embargo.

Mercedes Stephenson: What is the consequence, regionally and for Canada, if we fail in Haiti?

Bob Rae, Canadian Ambassador to the United Nations: Well, I mean, the way I put it is this, is there are two issues for me. The first one is that the security of any country is only as strong as the weakest link. And the security of any region is only as strong as the weakest link. We have issues of crime in the Caribbean. We have issues of insecurity. We have questions about, you know, how do we build stronger economies, more resilient economies? And we need to understand that when things really collapse in Haiti, it has a devastating impact on the region. There’s also, I think, a need to recognize that we have a neighbour who’s taken some very hard hits, and the people are suffering badly and they’re hurting. And so when people are hurting and they’re suffering, we have a responsibility to respond and to be helpful. But we also have a responsibility to do it right, and to do it in a way that works for them and also works for us, works for everybody. We know it’s not going to be easy, but we are definitely not walking away from this situation. Canada has stepped up in a number of ways and we’re going to continue to do it. And frankly, I’m very proud of the fact that over many decades we have helped.

Mercedes Stephenson: Ambassador Rae, thank you so much for joining us today, sir. We appreciate it.

Bob Rae, Canadian Ambassador to the United Nations: Good to be with you. Take care.

Mercedes Stephenson: Up next, preparing for a showdown over the planned carbon tax hike.

Mercedes Stephenson: Now for one last thing…

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will have to spend a fair chunk of this coming week defending the planned increase to his signature carbon tax, which is scheduled to kick in on April 1st.

Multiple Conservative premiers from Alberta’s Danielle Smith, to Ontario’s Doug Ford, have called for a pause.

Doug Ford, Ontario Premier: “If they don’t start, you know, putting money back into peoples’ pockets and instead of filling their pockets, guess what? They’re, they’re—they’re going to get annihilated. As I said before, they’re done. Done like dinner.”

Mercedes Stephenson: Some of Mr. Trudeau’s political allies, though, are supporting what those Conservative premiers are saying, including Newfoundland and Labrador’s Liberal Premier Anthony Furey. He’s encouraging the government to rethink the hike.

So far, the pleas are falling on deaf ears. Justin Trudeau has been categoric that there is no plan to slow down or stop. And he says that those who are asking for such a thing are putting popularity over policy.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau: “But my job is not to be popular. My job—although it helps—my job, my job is to the do right things for Canada, now and do the right things for Canadians a generation from now, and that’s what I’ve been focused on. And yeah, not always popular. But I know that doing the right things today that support people today, that deliver that better future a generation from now, two generation’s from now, is going to make a huge difference in the path we take forward.”

Mercedes Stephenson: But as April 1st draws closer and Canadians struggle with the cost of living, the tax increase is an easy target for the federal Conservatives, who have a series of political shenanigans planned in the House of Commons to embarrass the Liberals over the increase and are holding rallies across the country.

Pierre Poilievre, Conservative Leader: “Axe the tax. Axe the tax.”

Mercedes Stephenson: Mr. Trudeau’s justifications and explanations ranging from principled environmentalism, to the argument that the rebate puts money back in the pockets of Canadians, have failed to convince people that this is a good idea.

So, will Mr. Trudeau revisit his insistence that the hike has to go ahead? Well, that might in part depend on whether he’s starting to think about his about his legacy as prime minister versus his chances of re-election.

Thanks for joining us so much this week. And we’ll see you right back here, next Sunday.