Port au Prince and other Haitian cities are today the scene of the biggest popular uprising in decades of the suffered Haitian nation. Tens of thousands of protesters have taken to the streets to show their revulsion against the present government headed by Michel Martelly, who decided, against the thinking of the vast majority, to maintain the date of Sunday 24 to perform an “electoral masquerade” as it was qualified by opposition parties. However, a deafening clamor began to rise from the poorest corners of the city and even invaded with unprecedented violence the residential streets of Petion-Ville: this is the people displaying its true power of resistant, true to their independentist and anti-slavery roots of 1804, which has risen to generate an anti-imperialist offensive and write in the pages of their history a huge “ENOUGH”!

-Enough of the use of the Haitian territory as an invasive laboratory by the United States and its allies.

-Enough of the invasion of the MINUSTAH troops that, contrary to what its promoters state when they talk about “helping the Haitian people and performing a humanitarian mission”, everything that their action has left is repression, occupation, sexual abuse of boys and girls by soldiers trained to kill, cholera transmission, an epidemic that has caused tens of thousands dead.

-Enough of the Latin American complicity with the invading troops of the United Nations.

-Enough of the mockery and international hypocrisy derived from the shameful “aid missions”, led by the US mass murderer Bill Clinton, that only pursue further strengthening of the ties of dependency and domination of the Haitian people.

That is why, in recent weeks, Haiti has been clearly entering a pre-revolutionary stage, resulting in a popular mass rebellion in the past few days. Facing the criminal stubbornness of Martelly and his henchmen who want the electoral event to be held anyway, and a lukewarm position and epistolary response of the opposition party (with few exceptions), thousands of young people decided to take the future in their hands and large waves of people began to walk the streets, peacefully at first, raising slogans against the Electoral Council and calling for the resignation of the President. Facing the brutal repression from the police and the MINUSTAH troops, mobilized people began to exercise the logical and necessary popular violence in response. When this arises, in extreme circumstances (such as this) it always causes rejection reactions in petty bourgeois and oligarchic sectors (even in some clueless sectors of the left) who can not understand that the people’s patience has its very clear limits.

In today’s Haiti, everything that the people do in their self-defense against venal politicians and uniformed invaders, is more than justified.

Examples of these last hours are compelling: Students, workers and fighters of all generations crossed the boulevard La Saline, then they stormed the Bel-Air neighborhood and in the Delmas road, shouting “Martelly has to go! We are the government!“. In the Place Saint-Pierre, Police and many MINUSTAH peacekeepers attacked the crowd with gas, rubber bullets and jets of liquid that irritates the eyes and skin, but young people did not relent and began setting up barricades and roadblocks with burning tires. Molotov cocktails, stones and similar objects, were the answer to the violence of the uniformed and in few minutes the atmosphere became unbreathable because of the fumes, in a real pandemonium. Cars burned, headquarters of the official party destroyed, and word of mouth warning that “nobody leave the streets, we are the people’s power”.

When most protesters invaded with their chants and protests the “martellista” bastion of Petion-Ville, merchants closed their doors and some fanatics linked to the party of Martelly beat a young man who was defended quickly by others, while popular anger erupted in all its magnitude against vehicles and some government buildings.

It was at that precise moment that a story travelled through each one of the demonstrations like wildfire: “The government has decided not to conduct the elections on January 24 due to security reasons”. The explosion of joy thundered throughout the country, and slogans demanding that Martelly leaves office, redoubled. “Until he resigns, no one will go home”, shouted one of the Haitian fighters standing on the roof of a vehicle. And thousands of arms were raised making the V for victory.

That is the scenario for this time, despite the media undermining and misrepresentation of a nation that Latin America and the Caribbean owe so much to. For example, the libertarian wind that that in 1804 illuminated the continent and inspired the subsequent independence struggles. Now, what is needed is that, in each of the Latin American countries where bad governance issued troops to invade Haiti, everything possible is done to conclude that shame once and for all. And that the popular organizations of the continent raise their concrete solidarity with those who are on the streets, fighting with all means at its disposal for their definitive independence.

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