America Conspired with France to Bankrupt Haiti

On January 1, 1804, the French colony of Saint-Domingue became the Republic of Haiti, after over a decade of fighting against French enslavement and colonization.  It was the most successful slave rebellion in the Americas and the only revolt of its kind that led to the creation of a state.  On December 15, 1815, after his defeat in Carthagena by Spain, the revolutionary Simon Bolivar arrived in Aux Cayes, Haiti.  He was seeking the aid of Alexandre Petion, one of the founding fathers of Haiti and the first president of the newly-liberated Black Republic.  Even though Haiti had freed itself from French colonization and had inspired and supported the Bolivian nations' independence from the Spanish, in 1825, France demanded that Haiti pay 150 million in gold francs in “reparations” to former French slaveholders.

Given the current economic crisis in France, restitution of the Haitian independence debt would be no easy task. When the indemnity money Haiti paid France is adjusted for inflation and a minimal interest rate, its value is well over €17bn.  In fact, in an interview on France 24, Ottawa historian Jean Vil put the current figure at over $40bn.

French President Francois Hollande confirmed that his country wouldn’t be repaying the historic independence debt owed to Haiti.  Speaking at Port-Au-Prince, Haiti’s capital city, the French president referred only to France’s “moral debt.”  "We cannot change the past, but we can change the future," added Hollande.  In Guadeloupe, Hollande said he would pay the debt owed to Haiti, but later retracted claiming he was referring only to a “moral debt.”

The historical debt dates back to 1825 when the French government demanded a fee from Haiti in order to recognize its liberation as an independent nation.  The fee of 150 million gold francs, later reduced to 90 million gold francs, was at the time 10 times the size of Haiti’s annual income and is thought to be worth over US$21 billion today.  Haiti was paying France back until 1947.

The government of Haiti issued an official demand to France in 2004 to pay back the money.  Haitian President Michel Martelly insisted the debt should be paid, stressing that it was a "grave injustice" that prevented Haiti from developing as fast as others.

The sum charged by the French was based on the amount demanded by slaveholders in compensation for loss of property.  According to several experts, by the time France issued its 1825 Ordinance, slavery had already been abolished.

During a visit to the Caribbean island of Guadeloupe.  Hollande said he would resolve the debt with Haiti, sparking joy on social media and from his audience.  His speech was delivered during the inauguration of a new slave memorial in the island, that looks at the history of slavery from antiquity to the modern day and pays homage to slave revolts and runaways.

“When I go to Haiti, I will, for my part, cancel the debt that we have,” the president said, as dozens stood in ovation.  Shortly after his declaration, reporters asked how the debt would be paid to the Haitians, to which Hollande clarified his original statement.

“That is impossible … the Haitian president did not understand that … The Haitians do not want our charity.  They do not want this kind of assistance, they want the means to succeed,” rectified the head of state.

Activists and intellectuals claim the money should be returned to Haiti, the poorest country in the Americas and one of the poorest in the world, due to the illegal procedure of the transaction.

In 2010, in the aftermath of the devastating earthquake that struck Haiti, Noam Chomsky, Naomi Klein and Cornel West, were amongst the academics who called for the debt to be scrapped scrapping describing it as “patently illegitimate … and illegal”.

Of all the targets of European empire-builders, Africa was nearest, and “black Africa” among the least advanced. Yet, save for its far south, it was the last to be grabbed. Its coast had been known to Europeans for centuries and was dotted with their trading posts.  But until around 1860 the interior was protected.  Fevers killed off intruding white men, roads were few and cataracts blocked access by a river.

Ripe for takeover as Africa was, the European grab for it was neither inevitable nor consistent. Britain at first opposed a carve-up but ended with the richest parts: today's South Africa, Ghana and Nigeria. Belgium's King Leopold II was one of Europe's least powerful rulers.  But once he had carved out the Congo basin as a personal fief, other countries were quick to stake claims. Otto Von Bismarck, chancellor of the strong new Germany, put in a bid for huge chunks of East and West Africa.

Europeans, quick to fight each other at home, were loath to do so for slices of a continent that they barely knew.  Besides, it would set a bad example for the natives.  So in 1884, the powers met in Berlin to share Africa out.  In some areas, ignorant of people and geography alike, they made frontiers simply by drawing straight lines on the map.  The Africa they seized was technologically in the iron age, and politically divided into several thousand units, some based on language and culture, others on conquest, paying tribute to their conquerors.  Much of the continent was in turmoil, as slaving gangs sent out by some of its own rulers spread war and sent communities fleeing.

Posing as parents to Africans, Europeans counted them, taxed them and ordered their communities into tribes or, where true tribes did not exist, invented them. Meanwhile, the best land was taken for plantations, and the minerals dug out and shipped off to be processed in Europe, a division of labour and, inversely, of profits which, except in South Africa, largely continues today. The storehouse was steadily exploited, but Africans saw little of its wealth.

The history of British anti-slavery can be divided into a number of distinct phases.  The first of these stretched from 1787 to 1807 and was directed against the slave trade. Of course, there had been initiatives before this date. The Quakers, for instance, petitioned Parliament against the slave trade as early as 1783 and a similar petition was submitted in 1785, this time from the inhabitants of Bridgewater in Somerset.  But by and large, these were piecemeal efforts, involving a relatively small number of people. It was the Society for the Abolition of the Slave Trade, organised in May 1787, which set the movement on its modern course, evolving a structure and organisation that made it possible to mobilise thousands of Britons.

While it took a bloody civil war to outlaw slavery in the United States, the United Kingdom outlawed slavery 32 years before the US, in 1833.  Lest anyone think that Britain had nothing to lose in outlawing slavery, remember that the UK controlled a string of Caribbean islands full of sugar plantations, including Jamaica, Trinidad, and Barbados.  Now, British government-funded research is unveiling which of today’s British fortunes are directly tied to slave ownership.

Researchers at University College London (UCL) have published a database of roughly 4000 British slave owners who were compensated by the British government in 1833 for the emancipation of their slaves.  Their Legacies of British Slave-ownership project also includes details of 613 companies that benefited from their histories of slave ownership.

The great irony, of course, is that Britain did not compensate the slaves for their slavery.  The British government compensated the owners for liberating their human “property.”  It’s as if we believed it to have been appropriate to compensated Germany and Japan for taking away their conquests in World War II.  The United Kingdom, the United States of America, apart from stealing Native land and gold, along with many European counties all became super rich from plundering Africa, India, China and the Caribbean.  The thorny issue of reparation thus far, never receives consideration due to the usual excuse of the time factor.  The matter is usually sidestepped in Britain with the carrot of trade agreements and special relationships with the former colonies. 

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