"Haiti's New Bad Boy President," "Carnival King is New Leader of Haiti" are just two of the headlines in local and national news. Many Haitians here in the U.S. feel that the newspapers are making a spectacle of the election of Michael "Sweet Mickey" [Michael Martelly] to the highest political office in Haiti, the Presidency. Martelly beat his opponent Lady Mirlande Manigat, 67.57 percent to 31.74 percent but in accordance with the electoral process complaints can be filed up until April 16 when the votes will be closed. His flamboyant attire and sometimes raucous performances endeared him to some but distanced him from others. At first, his notoriety as an entertainer made it almost impossible for him to be accepted into a party to declare his political aspirations and to be thought of as a viable candidate.
State Rep. Marie St. Fleur, lauded by Haitians across the U.S. for her pioneering role as the nation's first Haitian-American lawmaker, gained further strides in the Massachusetts Legislature in 2003. A key lieutenant to powerful House Speaker Tom Finneran, St. Fleur was once again elevated to a leadership position, this time as chairwoman of the Legislature's Committee on Education.
An excerpt from by Winston James' book Holding Aloft the Banner of Ethiopia: Caribbean Radicalism in Early Twentieth-Century America (London: Verso, 1998) is presented
African American Research Center, Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Notes:
396 p., In 1804 French Saint-Domingue became the independent nation of Haiti after the only successful slave uprising in world history. Before Haiti explains the origins of this free colored class, exposes the ways its members both supported and challenged slavery, and examines how they created their own New World identity from 1760 to 1804.
Benedita da Silva, the first black vice-governor of Rio de Janeiro, is profiled. Through her efforts to keep hope alive for impoverished Brazilians, laws were recently enacted to protect the rights of Rio's street children and domestic employees.
