Miami Herald Op-Ed: To help Haiti recover, cancel its debt
By MARLENE BASTIEN
In October, 79-year old minister David Duncombe broke a 46-day starvation fast at a prayer breakfast in Washington attended by members of Congress, African parliamentarians and religious leaders from Haiti and the United States. Duncombe led Jubilee USA's national fast urging debt cancellation for the world's most impoverished countries.
When asked why he would risk his life this way, Duncombe said he wanted lawmakers to see starvation first-hand and understand the devastating effect of debt on countries like Liberia and Haiti.
Today, the world's poorest countries spend more than $100 million each day to service debt often previously incurred by dictators -- money they can't spend on food, education, health services and other basic needs. In turn, the United States spends billions investing in health, education and other infrastructure in these countries because these burdensome interest payments prevent them from doing so themselves.
One of these countries is Haiti, the most impoverished nation in the Western Hemisphere. On Oct. 29, I spoke at a forum hosted by the Miami-Dade NAACP and the Jubilee USA Network (www.jubileeusa.org) to build local support for two bills currently in Congress, the 2007 Jubilee Act (HR 2634/ S2166) and the Haiti Resolution (HR 241). The former would cancel debt for all countries that need it to fight extreme poverty; the latter would fast-track debt cancellation for Haiti, which has faced a history of debt injustice.
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