Protest wants aid, not occupation for Haiti

Despite rain and wind last Jan. 25, at least 150 local Haitians and their supporters rallied during evening rush hour at the famous Powell & Market Cable Car Turnaround in downtown San Francisco to “Stand with Haiti.” Organized by the Haiti Action Committee, speakers called for true solidarity with the plight of the Haitian people since the catastrophic Jan. 12 earthquake, demanded that Haiti’s legitimate President Jean-Bertrand Aristide — who U.S. operatives kidnapped in a 2004 coup and is now exiled in South Africa — be brought back. The demonstrators called for emergency food, water and medical aid, and not foreign military armed occupation.

Local Haiti Action Committee member and trade union activist Dave Welsh sang a few inspiring songs and spoke about additional actions taking place that week to stand with Haiti.

Pierre Labossiere, co-founder of the Haiti Action Committee, said: “U.N. troops have been firing rubber bullets at Haitians ... while food and aid are not getting distributed.” He reminded the crowd of “Haiti’s rich mineral resources, like gold, copper, silver, uranium and oil, that profit-motivated foreign companies ... have always enriched themselves with, at the expense of the cheap labor extracted from the Haitian people, like beasts of burden ... as shops are closed in the U.S. and go to Haiti, for slave wages.” Labossiere concluded his remarks with: “Stand with the people of Haiti; we are all Haiti, Haiti is us!”