Thieving French Haitian Reparations

by Tre B.

I've been meaning to get around to learning about the history of Haiti for a good minute since it was the first independent African/Black republic in the Western hemisphere.  I also want to predict what will happen to Haiti, from an international relations standpoint, due to the recent earthquake.  The best way to figure that out is to examine the past.  It's a shame it took a tragedy for me to finally get around to it.

I still haven't learned enough to make a prediction about Haiti's future.  Although, my knowledge about other African countries leads me to believe that the US and Europe will figure a way to kick her while she's down while disguising themselves as generous benefactors.

Anyway, this is about some knowledge I stumbled upon in my research about Haiti...and it so happens to be a great case for reparations.  This knowledge sounded so stupid I had to check several other sources to see if it was true  Apparently, Haiti had to pay France for recognition as a legitimate country and "reparations" for lost future wealth due to the Haitian Revolution, which ended in 1804.  Basically, Haiti's independence caused France to lose on of it's major sources of wealth, so they made Haiti pay France for its freedom AFTER it had already won its freedom.  No, you didn't read that backwards.  Former slaves paid their masters reparations after gaining independence, which took them until 1947 to pay off.  The winners of the war paid the losers.  That would be like the US paying Britain after Britain LOST the American Revolution, or Castro paying Batista after the Cuban Revolution.  Don't believe it?  Look it up yourself.  I'll be damned if I paid someone for putting me into slavery and torturing me mentally and physically.  The only thing they may get from me is a dime's worth of lead delivered at high velocity through the barrel of a 50 cal. Desert Eagle.

There are several causes for Haiti's chronic poverty and under-development that may or may not be attributable  to the Amero-peans, but this is one we can definitely pin on them: a massive and unjustified debt burden.  I happen to be reading a book on economic development in the so-called Third World, and a common problem seems to be ridiculous debt burdens that the countries can't expect to ever be able to pay.  Unlike most reparations proposals, we can put a fairly accurate dollar amount on this one.  Just take the amount that Haiti paid to France (in principal and interest) and add interest to that, compounded annually since 1825 (when the first payments were demanded by France) and in give it to Haiti in the form of Silver and Gold bars at current exchange rates.  Of course, this is not all that's owed and France isn't the only culprit, but it's a definitive number we can work towards for now.

So Haiti is getting all this emergency aid right now, but all that is peanuts compared to what France owes them.  We need to be talking about this on our blogs, in our media and getting our so-called Black representatives in politics to turn this into policy, economic sanctions, whatever it takes,  and get the UN to pressure France into doing the right thing (because thieves usually don't return stolen items out of the goodness of their greedy hearts).  Let's deal with the immediate emergency for now, but when the dust clears, we need to start focusing on getting these reparations for the long-term development of Haiti and to set a precedent in the international African reparations movement.  France, you know what this is...the Haitian Robin Hood in this b****, get out the car, throw me the wallet and lay down!

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