Letter from the South African President & a Note from Ezili Dantò
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Who really abolished slavery?
by Myrtha Dèsulmè, Contributer, Jamaica Gleaner, June 3, 2007
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Carnegie Hall Video Clip

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Martin Luther King and the Man on the Road to Cite Soleil : The cry is always the same "we want to be free" by Jafrikayiti (Jean St. Vil)
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Africa: In Solidarity with Site Soley by Jacques Depelchin, Allafrica.com, March 22, 2007
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Hochschild's Neo-Colonial Journalism. Response to Adam Hochschild article in SF Chronicle by Marguerite Laurent, May 30, 2004

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Toussaint Memorial & Fort Du Joux
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"...Toussaint Louverture was certainly ahead of his time and a great visionary and warrior, and, in fact, he was kidnapped, tortured and murdered for his ideals...But, it turns out... Dessalines is the one who did what was necessary and then renamed the island, set forth its laws of existence and abolished colonialism. All over the developing world today, it is Toussaint’s then avant-guard idea that is in place and why Europeans prefer to exult Toussaint and teach that to Black and Brown people rather than to present Dessalines, whose idea of a Black-ruled independent nation is what all of Africa and the Caribbean and Latin American countries wish to bring to pass,” said Laurent..." From, Laurent on Glover's Proposed Haiti Film by Staff, San Francisco Bayview, May 23, 2007

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"...Both Toussaint Louverture and Jean Jacques Dessalines took up arms against the white enslavers and colonists. But because Toussaint Louverture fought for neocolonialism, he's the one revered by the whites. The whites still fear and hate Dessalines because he beat them and declared Haiti a Black independent nation. Down the annals of history, the impression has been propagated, to the interests of the whites, that Toussaint Louverture was sort of Ghandi-like and non-violent, which is totally untrue. (See also "Napoleon was no Toussaint" by Jafrikayiti). Toussaint Louverture killed his share of white enslavers and colonists as general of Haiti's indigenous army before Dessalines. And when Toussaint Louverture was kidnapped because he was too trusting of the whites, too compromising and too tolerant, it was time for Dessalines. Today, Haiti awaits a Dessalines. Ezili Dantò said this back on the day of Aristide's kidnapping. Haiti awaits a Dessalines. Read in particular "Moun ki fe bagay sa, jodi a -yo swaf dlo lan zye!: Haitian fratricide allowed for the Empire to eat up our divisions and make this February 29, 2004 Coup D'etat comeback" by Ezili Dantò on Feb. 29, 2004. (From
Ezili Danto's Comment that Jean-Bertrand-Aristide-Was-Too-Tolerant and-Compromising to Ben Dupuy on his interview with Peter Hallward )
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Toussaint Memorial & Fort Du Joux
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Venuezuela to Allocate $18 million dollars to Danny Glover by Cory Carroll in Caracas , May 21, 2007, The Guardian

· Chávez hopes venture will aid anti-imperialist fight
· Actor wants to educate US on Toussaint Louverture

http://film.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,,2084331,00.html

Photo: The Venezuelan president, Hugo Chavez (right), and actor Danny Glover embrace The Venezuelan president, Hugo Chavez (right), and actor Danny Glover embrace. Photograph: Timothy A Clary/AFP/Getty

Venezuela is to give the American actor Danny Glover almost $18m (£9m) to
make a film about a slave uprising in Haiti, with President Hugo Chávez
hoping the historical epic will sprinkle Hollywood stardust on his effort to
mobilise world public opinion against imperialism and western oppression.

The Venezuelan congress said it would use the proceeds from a recent bond
sale with Argentina to finance Glover's biopic of Toussaint Louverture, an
iconic figure in the Caribbean who led an 18th-century revolt in Haiti.

It will also give seed money for a film version of The General in His
Labyrinth, Gabriel García Márquez's novel about the last days of Simón
Bolívar, who liberated much of South America from Spanish colonialism.

Glover, 60, who starred with Mel Gibson in the Lethal Weapon series, and more
recently with Eddie Murphy in the film DreamGirls, is a civil rights activist
and supporter of Mr Chávez's radical leftwing policies.

A document from the congress's finance commission said the culture ministry
would be a partner with Glover and give $17.8m for "scripts, production
costs, wardrobe, lighting, transport, makeup and the creation of the whole
creative and administrative platform".

The project could mark a breakthrough for Villa del Cine, a new government-funded studio outside the Venezuelan capital, Caracas, which is part of Mr Chávez's effort to combat what he sees as American cultural hegemony.

Glover, who visited Caracas at the weekend, told the Guardian that he would
direct the film, titled Toussaint. "It's so advanced that you can taste it.

We've scouted locations within 75km [45 miles] of Caracas. I can do
everything I need to do with this film from here." He said he had been in
talks with the government, but was unaware that a decision had been made
until journalists tipped him off about the congress's announcement. "That's
the first I've heard of it," he said.

He suggested that there was still some uncertainty over whether the venture
would go ahead. "One of the major axioms in theatre is never talk about
anything until the deal is signed. There's a lot of deliberation that goes on
before something actually happens."

It appeared that the congress timed the announcement to coincide with a media
conference in Caracas hosted by the television network Telesur, a
Venezuela-funded regional answer to CNN. Glover is on the board.

It would not be the first declaration to run ahead of reality. Mr Chávez once said the director Oliver Stone planned to make a film about him, but it came to nothing. However at the president's request, Villa del Cine, which was
inaugurated last year, is making a film about Francisco Miranda, who lit the
fuse of South America's liberation. A lavish production with hundreds of
extras and battle scenes, its costumes and sets could work for the Haiti film.

Toussaint Louverture is a towering figure in the region's history. A freed slave of African descent, he led thousands of slaves in successful campaigns against British, Spanish and French troops before being betrayed, captured and exiled. He died in 1803, just before his followers succeeded in establishing the island's independence. William Wordsworth wrote a sonnet about him.

Glover said he wanted to educate the US about the story. "It's been essentially wiped out of our historic memory, it's been wiped clean."

The actor is chairman of the TransAfrica Forum, an advocacy group for African Americans and other members of Africa's diaspora, and a vocal critic of the Bush administration. Along with the singer Harry Belafonte, Glover is the best known celebrity supporter of Mr Chávez, whom he considers "remarkable".

He is a regular visitor to Venezuela.

Venezuela's congress, which consists entirely of Chávez supporters, also said it would give $1.8m to develop a screen treatment of The General in His Labyrinth, by a Venezuela-born director, Alberto Arvelo. Some rate Gabriel García Márquez's account of the final days of Bolívar along with the Colombian writer's better known novels, One Hundred Years of Solitude and Love in the Time of Cholera.

To build consciousness of what Mr Chávez calls "21st-century socialism", the government has funded nationwide screenings of Charlie Chaplin's classic film Modern Times, about the exploitation of US factory workers during the depression.

- Guardian Unlimited | Guardian News and Media Limited 2007

Laurent on Glover's Proposed Haiti Film


Venezuela giving Danny Glover $18m to direct film on Haitian revolution
Staff | Wednesday, 23 May 2007, San Francisco Bayview

http://www.sfbayview.com/index.php?option=
com_content&task=view&id=155&Itemid=15

Actor, humanitarian and San Francisco native Danny Glover and Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, who have worked closely together politically, plan to expand their partnership to moviemaking with a film about the slave rebellion that made Haiti the first Black independent country in the world. While celebrating this remarkable initiative, however, prominent attorney and performance artist Marguerite Laurent, founder of the Haitian Lawyers Leadership Network, hopes the film will focus on Jean-Jacque Dessalines, the revolutionary leader most Haitians credit with Haiti’s independence, rather than solely on Toussaint Louverture, the leader better known to Americans.

Glover, chair of TransAfrica Forum and a vocal critic of the Bush administration, is, along with Harry Belafonte, the best known celebrity supporter of Chávez and a regular visitor to Venezuela. It was from the press that he learned that the film deal had progressed from the talking to the funding stage, that Venezuela’s Congress had allocated $17.8 million for “scripts, production costs, wardrobe, lighting, transport, makeup and the creation of the whole creative and administrative platform.”

The project could mark a breakthrough for Villa del Cine, a new government-funded studio outside the Venezuelan capital, Caracas. “I can do everything I need to do with this film from here,” Glover said. He will direct the film, which he said will be titled “Toussaint.”

A freed African slave in Haiti, Toussaint Louverture led thousands of slaves in successful campaigns against British, Spanish and French troops before being betrayed, captured and exiled. He died in 1803, just before his followers succeeded in establishing the island’s independence. Glover told the British newspaper The Guardian that he wants to educate the U.S. about the Haitian revolution. “It’s been essentially wiped out of our historic memory; it’s been wiped clean,” he said.

“I truly hope someone gets to Danny Glover on this Louverture issue,” Marguerite Laurent wrote to the Bay View when she heard the news. “Toussaint Louverture was certainly ahead of his time and a great visionary and warrior, and, in fact, he was kidnapped, tortured and murdered for his ideals.

“But, it turns out today all over the developing world the independence that the former colonies enjoy is that which was espoused by Toussaint – who saw that the most he could do for Haiti was free the captives and get Haiti to be a Black-ruled French colony, with himself as governor for France.

“Dessalines is the one who did what was necessary and then renamed the island, set forth its laws of existence and abolished colonialism. All over the developing world today, it is Toussaint’s then avant-guard idea that is in place and why Europeans prefer to exult Toussaint and teach that to Black and Brown people rather than to present Dessalines, whose idea of a Black-ruled independent nation is what all of Africa and the Caribbean and Latin American countries wish to bring to pass,” said Laurent.

Pointing out that, like Haiti, Cuba and Venezuela would never glorify their former colonists over their own independence, she cautioned against preferring Louverture over Dessalines. “Dessalines is despised by the powers who continue to subjugate and colonize. Toussaint’s structure is now their accepted norm for imperial governance, the exploitation of Black and Brown labor, lands and resources.”

“I hope,” Laurent said, that “we don’t find ourselves with a Danny Glover film that claims Toussaint is the founding father of Haiti and its ideal of a Black ruled independent nation.”

**********************
Contact For Louverture Films and Carrie Productions:

Louverture Films, LLC
101 West 23rd Street, #283
New York, NY 10011 USA
Tel: 1-212 229 3960
Fax: 1-212 229 3963
Email: info@louverturefilms.com

and also, Danny Glover's Production Company:

Carrie Productions
Telephone and fax
Tel: 510 450 2500
Fax: 510 450 2506

Address
2625 Alcatraz Ave
#243
Berkeley, California 94705
USA

Forwarded Mail
From: "Jean Saint-Vil" <jafrikayiti@hotmail.com>
To: erzilidanto@yahoo.com, info@louverturefilms.com
CC: chan@members
Subject: RE: Laurent on Glover's proposed Haiti film
Date: Sat, 02 Jun 2007 20:59:32 +0000

Dear comrades,

There is a lot that needs to be said on this topic but, more importantly, there is still a lot of time and opportunity left to make the Toussaint film the success and powerful educational tool it can and ought to be.

I have been following this film project for many years now and I am convinced that Haiti can benefit a great deal from such a production. I am also convinced of Danny Glover's sincere desire to make an excellent product - otherwise this could have been on the screen long ago.

The points raised by sister Marguerite Laurent (see message below) are excellent and crucial ones. I have raised the same issue with Danny Glover when we met briefly at the bicentennial celebrations in January 2004.

Over the few minutes of conversation we had, I tried to impressed upon him a number of points, including 1) the great educational potential of his film, especially if a Haitian Kreyol version is produced and 2) the film manages to do justice to Jean-Jacques Dessalines, founder of the Republic of Haiti, who led the revolution to victory following the kidnapping and murder of Toussaint Louverture by the French.

I do not have any special access to the production team to know whether these two preoccupations have been taken seriously. But, at this juncture, I would encourage those who share these concerns to express them as was done by sister Marguerite Laurent. And, as we do so, let us make sure we do not fall in the trap of haters who are speaking evil of the project for motives that are simply hideous. For instance, I have read a piece from Stanley Lucas, of International Republican Institute fame, who attacks the Toussaint film project on account of Danny Glover's friendship with President Chavez.

Obviously, the imperialists and their stooges realize how powerful a
tool this film can be, if it is funded and produced by revolutionaries who will not have any "strings" attached that forces them to revise the script to please the white supremacist forces who fought the Haitian revolution and are still punishing the resisters.

This year we saw how the tragic story of the people of Uganda was exploited in "The Last King of Scotland". Lots of accolade to Brother Whittaker but, apparently, the film did not really tell the whole story. Rather, it served to reinforce Eurocentric myths and prejudices. For, while the buffoonery of Idi Amin Dada was thoroughly exposed, once again his European allies where presented as mere victims of the "African" demon. We are all too familiar with this paradigm. Who put Idi Amin Dada in power, who financed him, who did he finance in return? ...all of that is apparently unimportant....So many folks are happy Whittaker got the Grammy. Most folks remain puzzled by the title "Last King of Scotland" - Is it really Idi Amin who is being laughed at?

Here is an interesting article on this related subject...Le dernier roi d’Ecosse, Critique sans concession d’un film
http://africamaat.com/article.php3?id_article=912&artsuite=0

So, I am glad it is Louverture Films that is working on the film, rather than L'Alliance Française or some other self-imposed special "friends" of the Haitian people.

I am excited to learn that talented actors like Angela Bassett, Cheadle, Murphy etc... shall play the key roles.

I am still concerned that the importance of a Kreyol version has not been appreciated to the required level. But, something can and ought to be done to fix this.

I am still concerned about the adequate portrayal of Jean Jacques Dessalines in the final product. But, something can and ought to be done to fix this.

Based on information published on their website, here is how Louverture Films can be reached:

Louverture Films, LLC
101 West 23rd Street, #283
New York, NY 10011 USA
Tel: 1-212 229 3960
Fax: 1-212 229 3963

*****
Laurent on Glover's Proposed Haiti Film by Staff, San Francisco Bayview, May 23, 2007

See also:

Napoleon was no Toussaint: Spare us the insult! by Jean Saint-Vil (Jafrikayiti), Haitian Perspectives, Feb 27, 2007
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What White People Feed on: A Response to two racists articles on Haiti
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Black Napoleon by Adam Hochschild, New York Times
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Hochschild's Neo-Colonial Journalism. Response to Adam Hochschild article in SF Chronicle by Marguerite Laurent, May 30, 2004

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Ezili Danto's Comment that Jean-Bertrand-Aristide-Was-Too-Tolerant and-Compromising to Ben Dupuy on his interview with Peter Hallward

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Birth of a Nation: Has the bloody 200-year history of Haiti doomed it to more violence? Adam Hochschild| Sunday, May 30, 2004 |San Francisco Chronicle

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Toussaint Memorial & Fort Du Joux

Hugo Chavez Funds $19.7 Million for Danny Glover Films, May 22, 2007, Reuters

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2007/5/22/72441.shtml?s=en
and, http://www.reuters.com/article/filmNews/idUSN2137112620070521

CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuela will fund a film directed by Hollywood star
Danny Glover about Haiti's 18th-century slave rebellion against French rule,
as President Hugo Chavez seeks to revive interest in his region's battles
against colonialism.

Venezuela's Congress said on its Web site on Monday it had set aside $19.7
million for two films, one of which was Glover's movie about Haiti's
Francois-Dominique Toussaint Louverture, an iconic revolutionary leader in
the Caribbean nation.

The film would mark Glover's debut as a feature film director. According to
entertainment industry magazine Daily Variety, Glover started Louverture
Films to focus on Afro-Caribbean themes and to provide opportunities for
minorities.

Glover, co-star of the "Lethal Weapon" films with Mel Gibson, has long
expressed political sympathy for Chavez, an anti-U.S. leader who is forging a
socialist republic and politicizing the army and judiciary of the OPEC nation.
Chavez has encouraged Venezuelans to become better informed about Latin
America's historical independence leaders, drawing parallels between their
struggles and his government's antagonism with the United States.

Reuters 2007.

Did They capsize or were they rammed?
By G. Dunkel
May 21, 2007, Workers World

http://www.workers.org/2007/world/haiti-0524/

The agony of Haiti does not stop. There appears to be no limit to the indignities and cruelties that neighboring imperialist countries are willing to inflict on it.

The Turks and Caicos Islands, a small archipelago about 125 miles north of Haiti, is a British colony. On May 4, a small sailboat with 170 Haitians fleeing the grinding poverty in their homeland was a few minutes from landing there when a British patrol vessel rammed it and started towing it out to sea, according to the Haitian survivors.

A number of the passengers were knocked into the shark-invested waters.
Sharks killed 54 and another 30 to 40 drowned.

Less than half—70 men and 9 women —survived.

According to a May 8 dispatch from the Haiti Press Service, the bodies that the sharks left and the survivors will be returned to Haiti. Bodies in an advanced state of putrefaction will be buried in Turks and Caicos.

The British administration claims to have opened an inquiry into this affair, but denied Haiti’s request to be included. Jacques Edouard Alexis, the prime minister of Haiti, has publicly expressed his disbelief over the preliminary story the British concocted.

Haitians living in the Fort Lauderdale area of Florida formed the Support Group for Refugees and Repatriates (Groupe d’Appui aux Rapatriés et Réfugiés GARR), which issued a press release asserting that it was possible the U.S. Coast Guard was involved. GARR also feels that Haitian migration needs to be regulated, put in a global context related to economic development.

*

Articles copyright 1995-2007 Workers World. Verbatim copying and distribution
of this entire article is permitted in any medium without royalty provided
this notice is preserved.

Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011
Email: ww@workers.org

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Africa: In Solidarity with Site Soley by Jacques Depelchin
*********************

"When you make a choice, you mobilize vast human energies and resources which otherwise go untapped...........If you limit your choices only to what seems possible or reasonable, you disconnect yourself from what you truly want and all that is left is a compromise." Robert Fritz