When the devastating earthquake struck Port-au-Prince in Haiti last January, it killed 250,000 people, injured another 300,000, destroyed 250,000 houses, displaced 1.5 million people and reduced large parts of the capital to rubble.
The people of the world responded with an outpouring of generosity. They donated money, volunteered in relief missions and reached out to Haitians in their own countries. The world's most powerful governments, the United Nations and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) collected the donated funds, pledged their own support in the emergency, and promised, in the words of UN Special Envoy Bill Clinton, to "build Haiti back better."
Graffiti on walls for month have said, "Welcome home Jean-Claude Duvalier," indicating that his return may have been in the works for awhile. So his return was no surprise ... who engineered his return and why? This is the first time that Duvalier, who is now 59 but was once the world's youngest head of state at 19, had returned to Haiti since he was forced out in 1986 by a popular uprising and U.S. pressure. Why? What can he possibility add that the UN Special Envoy Bill Clinton can't?
Former Haitian dictator Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier made a surprise return from exile to his Caribbean homeland on Sunday, saying he wanted to help in the rebuilding of his earthquake-battered nation.
"I was waiting for this moment for a long time. When I first set foot on the ground, I felt great joy," Duvalier said, while hundreds of enthusiastic supporters outside the airport chanted "Long live Duvalier!".
However, no current arrest warrants were known to exist against him, and as Haiti's existing constitution bans the practice of exile for Haitians, there was nothing legally preventing his return.
A VULTURE IN A DEN OF THIEVES ... AND THE MEAL IS COUNTED IN THE BILLIONS!
The Haiti Reconstruction Commission and the Clinton Foundation: Paralysis
How Haiti was abandoned
The outcome of the confused November 28 elections is still up in the air after a team of Organization of American States (OAS) experts last week delivered a report to outgoing President Rene Preval challenging the preliminary official results from the vote.
Preval has said he has "reservations" about the OAS report, which recommends that government technocrat and Preval protege Jude Celestin be eliminated from a second round run-off vote in favor of popular musician Michel Martelly. Could it be that Baby Doc is going to be the fall-guy for the UN and NGO's ... a reasonable conclusion why the promised donation of billions will not materialize.
Preval, accused by opponents of rigging the U.N.-backed November elections that took place amid widespread fraud allegations, had originally asked the OAS to help verify the disputed preliminary election results.
It was not clear whether Preval would reject the OAS report's recommendation or seek to discuss his reservations further with the OAS experts. Haiti's Provisional Electoral Council is the final arbiter of elections in Haiti.
The OAS report, which cited "significant" vote tally irregularities, confirmed opposition matriarch Mirlande Manigat as the candidate who won the most votes in the first round.
She did not gain enough votes to win outright but is in the second-round run-off. But whether this will be with Celestin or Martelly remains to be seen.
Election observers say that even if the CEP heeds the OAS experts' findings, it still has to complete a disputes settlement procedure before it can formally announce final revised results from the first round vote.
This means Haiti will not be able to hold a presidential election second round run-off before February, at the earliest.
Last month's protests and violence triggered by the December 7 announcement of the results killed at least four people and increased fears that instability could delay the hand-over of billions of dollars of reconstruction funds for Haiti from foreign donors.
