Via the blog Let Haiti Live: Aba Elections, Down With Elections. Excerpt:
As I travel back to Port-au-Prince tomorrow for a week of pre-election extravaganza in the midst of a deadly cholera outbreak, I am reminded of this timeless poem from Haitian poet Felix Morriseau-Leroy, “Aba Tout Kandida/Down With All the Candidates”.
Today I read two stories about presidential campaigning standing in stark contrast to the reality for most Haitians. In the first, a missionary working in St. Louis du Nord, Curtis Rogers of NWHCM, talked about working in the cholera clinic there yesterday and hearing a presidential candidate flying over town repeatedly to drop flyers. Loud music blared through the streets as well. Curtis wrote, “It was an interesting comparison between the people in the clinic and the outlandish expense and use of the helicopter.”
The second story, “Haiti’s Canal Crews Brave Muck to Help Stem Cholera was in the New York Times (http://nyti.ms/bKTUak) talked about men braving the putrid water and waste in a canal, clearing it by hand to reduce danger during flooding, when a truck passed by playing a campaign jingle. One of the men noted, “The money they use for that could be money for what I am doing here.”
