Retro: Dossier de corruption en suspens concernant Jean-Bertrand Aristide

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HAITI: Haiti Telecom Kickbacks Tarnish Aristideby Lucy Komisar, Special to CorpWatch December 29th, 2005

Two U.S. lawsuits charge that former Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide and his associates accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars in kickbacks from politically connected U.S. telecom companies. "Plus ça change," one might say in Haiti. The more the leadership in this corruption riddled country changes, the more things stay the same. President Aristide's sudden departure from Haiti in 2004 is stalked by controversy. His defenders say he was a champion of the poor hustled out of the country by a Bush administration fearful of his radical populism. His critics charge that he was a corrupt and cynical demagogue building power by appealing to the poor and repressing opposition. Lawsuits filed this Fall challenge the former priest’s image of political purity and raise claims that both he and U.S. corporate executives scammed illegal profits off the hemisphere’s poorest population. In one suit, a fired executive charged his former employer, the U.S. telecom IDT (Newark, NJ), with corruption, defamation, and intimidation under the New Jersey anti-racketeering law. In the second, the government of Haiti contends that IDT, Fusion (New York, NY) and several other North American telecoms violated the federal RICO anti-racketeering statute. Both suits allege that Aristide, now in exile in South Africa, and his associates, took kickbacks. The story that the suits reveal is emblematic of the business relationship between a powerful rich country and a tiny impoverished nation linked by technology – and corruption. It starts out ironically: with a Western policy, designed to protect U.S. companies from price competition, which acts to give poor countries a break. International phone calls access the routing systems of both the caller’s country and the recipient’s. The phone company where the call originates routinely pays a per-minute charge or "termination fee" for accessing the overseas system. The goal of this arrangement is to level the playing field in situations where most of the calling goes in one direction. There are, for example, far more Haitians in America who can afford to call family in their native land than there are Haitians in Haiti who have the money to dial America. Without the 23 cents termination fee, only the U.S. company would be paid and the Haitian phone service would not be reimbursed for maintaining its infrastructure. The U.S. established a system of fixed fees – the international settlements policy (ISP) – in the 1980s, based on a practice dating to the 1930s, to strengthen the bargaining position of American telecoms against foreign carriers. In spite of the rhetoric of free-market competition, the U.S. didn’t want foreign phone companies making deals that forced U.S. companies to compete against each another. The Federal Communications Commission fixed the per-minute rates and required all U.S. companies to pay it. Companies had to inform the FCC and competitors if they negotiated lower rates. The lawsuits charge that some U.S. firms cut secret deals to pay Haiti cut-rate per-minute fees while kicking back hundreds of thousands of dollars to Aristide and his associates. Instead of providing the Haitian phone company with money to build up infrastructure and services, the deals helped corrupt officials to loot the system.

Artistide's supporters are loath to believe that the charismatic former priest may have betrayed Haiti’s desperate poor who saw him as their savior throughout tumultuous years of alternating hope and despair. Elected president for a five-year term from 1991 to 1996, Aristide was almost immediately forced into exile by a military coup. Three years later, a U.S.-led force, acting under a U.N. resolution, invaded Haiti to restore him to the presidency. When Aristide’s first term ended in February 1996, he was constitutionally barred from succeeding himself. His close associate, former Prime Minister René Préval, served as president until Aristide was returned to office in February 2001. Citing evidence of fraud, the Organization of American States' electoral observation mission declined to certify the elections.

In February 2004, Aristide either resigned (the U.S. version) or was kidnapped (his story) and flown by the U.S. to South Africa.

Phone Home

Haiti’s phone system had become a contentious issue between the U.S., which demanded that it be privatized, and Aristide, who wanted it to remain government-owned. In the late 1990s, the Clinton administration cut off $500 million in promised loans and aid amidst charges by members of Congress that Aristide’s government was rife with corruption.

According to the lawsuits filed in Miami and Newark federal courts, the political corruption was a two-way street running between politically connected North American companies and Aristide's government. Haiti's Telecom sector is estimated at 400 million minutes a year, valued at $48 million. During the governments dominated by Aristide (1994-2004), Teleco (Télécommunications d'Haïti), the Haiti national telephone company, made agreements with foreign telephone companies, including IDT, Fusion Telecommunications, Skyytel (Montreal), Cinergy (Miami) and IPIP/Terra (Miami), granting them rights to connect to Haiti phone lines.
The suit by the Haitian government says that payments to Teleco were diverted or kicked back to Aristide's group through companies and bank accounts in the offshore Turks and Caicos Islands and the British Virgin Islands. A key company was Mont Salem in the Turks and Caicos. The offshore companies were described as "agents" or "consultants" for Teleco. These Caribbean tax havens are known for setting up shell companies and bank accounts that guarantee secrecy to the owners, who routinely use them to hide and launder the money of corruption, fraud, tax evasion, drug trafficking, and other crimes.
Details about the IDT charges are laid out in the case filed by D. Michael Jewett, who was IDT’s associate regional vice president for the Caribbean in 2003. That year, Jewett says, the company vice-president told him that IDT agreed to pay kickbacks to Aristide's Turks and Caicos bank account in return for a favorable phone deal in Haiti. Instead of the FCC-mandated 23 cents a minute for calls originating in America, Teleco was willing to accept only 9 cents a minute--with 3 cents kicked back to Aristide, Jewett said.
Jewett's Tale
IDT fired Jewett in November 2003, within a week after IDT got back its signed contracts from Teleco and Mont Salem. He fought for and won unemployment benefits, then hired a lawyer. He filed suits for wrongful dismissal in federal court in Newark in May 2004 and October 2005. He claims he was fired because he opposed the deal.
Jewett's version of events goes like this: The initial Teleco proposal called for IDT to deposit funds in a U.S. bank account. But fearing that it might pay and get no agreement, IDT decided to negotiate directly with Aristide. In August 2003, IDT executive vice president for International Business Development Jack Lerer met with Aristide in Haiti. A month later Lerer told Jewett the plan: IDT would deposit money in a Turks and Caicos account that Aristide had set up under the name Mont Salem. In September 2003 the deal was sealed: Teleco would receive 6 cents and Mont Salem would keep 3. Teleco's records were falsified to show Mont Salem as the carrier, not IDT.
Aristide's Miami lawyer, Ira Kurzban, refused Corpwatch’s request for comment on the telecoms cases.

Lawyers for the Haiti government say they know from Teleco billing statements that Mont Salem was paying Teleco 6 cents a minute for the minutes it was billing to IDT. They know from pleadings and a judicial order in the Jewett case that the rate in the IDT-Mont Salem agreement was 9 cents a minute. Putting the records together, the Haitian government lawsuit asserts that in one six-month period in 2004, IDT paid $302,588 in kickbacks to the Aristide group.
The U.S. Department of Justice, the United States Attorney in Newark, NJ, and the Securities and Exchange Commission have initiated investigations into the charges against IDT.

Offshore Adventures
One of the strongest links to Aristide is Mont Salem. Its Turks and Caicos incorporation papers show registration in June 2000 with capital of $5,000 – not much for a real company. Its registered agent was Timothy O'Sullivan of Miller, Simons and O'Sullivan, Turks and Caicos. The owner of shares was "M & S Nominees Ltd," (Miller and Simmons), listed at the same Turks and Caicos address. It fits the model of a classic offshore shell company designed to receive and launder money, rather than that of a real firm.
Where did the money go? Asked who the real Mont Salem owners are, Adrian Corr --lawyer for Miller, Simons and O'Sullivan in the Turks and Caicos--confirmed that "You can have nominee [strawman] directors," but declined to say if Mont Salem's listed owners were fakes. "I don’t know. You put me on the spot," said Corr. "I don’t want to answer any questions about this. I have lawyers retained; It's better you speak with them. It's [former New Jersey] Governor Byrne's law firm." His attorney Kerrie Heslin at Carella, Byrne, Bain, Gilfillan, Cecchi, Stewart & Olstein in Newark did not respond to numerous requests for comment.
Neither did Mont Salem's lawyer, Michael Weinstein, at Podvey, Meanor, Catenacci, Hildner, Cocoziello & Chattman, also in Newark.
IDT's CEO James Courter and the company's attorney in the Jewett case, Leslie Lajewski (Grotta, Glassman & Hoffman in Roseland, NJ), also declined to return phone calls and emails seeking comment.
The Federal court in Newark court dismissed the RICO claim on grounds of “standing” but accepted the whistleblower cause of action as well as Jewett’s claims of defamation and intentional infliction of emotional distress. The case will soon proceed to discovery, where his lawyer will be able to demand internal IDT records.
Meanwhile, more details are available from the president of Skyytel, a Montreal company which, according to the Haiti lawsuit, got a similar kickback deal. While denying payment of kickbacks, Colin Povall does acknowledge that Skyytel's 2003 agreement with Teleco provided for payment of 9 cents a minute to Mont Salem as Teleco's agent. Again, the Haitian telecom would reap only 6 cents a minute.

The Lawsuit The Haitian government-Teleco lawsuit filed was in Miami Nov. 2, 2005, under the U.S. RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations) statute. The defendants are: Former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. He lives in Pretoria, South Africa. Faubert Gustave, minister of the Economy and Finance 2201-4. He lives in Sarasota, FL Rodnée Deschineau, general manager of the government-owned Banque Populaire Haïtienne from 2001-4. He lives in Dorchester, Mass. Lesly Lavelanet, the brother-in-law of Aristide's wife, Mildred Trouillot Aristide. He controlled several companies, including Digitek SA and Global Spectrum SA. He lives in Coral Springs, FL. Fred Beliard, who lives in Cooper City, FL. Alphone Inevil, Director of Planning at Teleco from 1997 to 2002, then Director General to 2004. He lives in Lakeland, FL. Jean Rene Duperval, Director for International Affairs for Teleco from 2003 to 2004. He lives in Miramar, FL. Adrian Corr, an attorney with the law firm of Miller, Simons and O'Sullivan in the Turks and Caicos Islands.

"Mont Salem approached us," he explained. "We never met anybody in Haiti. Fred Beliard is the only one I met. He was dealing with some powerful people." Beliard, a Haitian, is accused in the lawsuit of participating in the kickback scheme. Povall said, "Adrian Corr, we only heard about him when it came to sign the contract; his name was on the contract." One of Skyytel's advisors is Ronald Beliard, who runs a telecom consulting company in Quebec and is related to Fred Beliard.
The Haiti lawsuit says that Skyytel paid Mont Salem $872,371 in kickbacks.
Another player in the alleged scheme is Fusion Telecommunications, a U.S. firm that the Haitian government lawsuit says made a suspect deal through a shell company. Run by former high-level Clinton administration officials, Fusion, according to the suit, made payments to Teleco via CW Holdings, a company with a bank account in Florida. Lawyers for Haiti do not know where CW Holdings is registered; they could not locate it in either Haiti or Florida.
Fusion, through its representative, Howard Rubenstein Public Relations in New York, acknowledged to Corpwatch that in mid-2001, "Fusion was instructed to make payments that it owed to Teleco to the account of CW Holdings in Bank Atlantic in Florida. In invoices that Fusion received from Teleco, Teleco accounted for Fusion’s payments to CW Holdings as payments made to Teleco. Fusion made payments to CW Holdings for three months until Teleco instructed Fusion to make all future payments directly to Teleco." The amount, according to the PR firm was "less than $1 million a month."
Fusion did not respond to queries about where CW Holdings was registered or the cost of the minutes it paid to that intermediary or to Teleco.
Up to the Courts
As the lawsuits make their way through various courts, Aristide, in exile in South Africa, is silent on the topic. His Miami lawyer, Ira Kurzban, was emailed Corpwatch's references to Aristide's alleged telecom kickbacks, but he declined to comment on them. In a statement issued after the Haiti lawsuit was filed, he declared it a "political investigation" by the current Haiti government, and noted that no one has been able to find "the money that the president supposedly took." He said that "there is none" and that "there are no Swiss bank accounts." None of the suits refer to Swiss accounts. His statement did not mention or refute the charges of telecom kickbacks or Aristide's receipt of them through a Turks and Caicos shell company.
If it turns out that an American company paid cut-rate fees for minutes, it violated U.S. Federal Communication Commission rules. If it paid kickbacks, it also violated the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which bans payment of bribes or kickbacks to get foreign contracts. It will be left to the Justice Department to file charges.
Meanwhile, in November 2004, to help U.S. companies negotiate better deals, ISP rules were ended in routes where U.S. carriers get termination rates at or below levels set by the FCC. For lower income countries such as Haiti, the benchmark is 23 cents, the old standard which, for Haiti, is no longer a guaranteed minimum. Jacki Ponti, the spokesperson for the FCC, refused, or was unable, to provide information about the current U.S.-Haiti rates.

Lucy Komisar is a New York journalist writing a book on the international impact of the offshore bank and corporate secrecy system.

piporiko a écrit:DOUBRICO1,
VOUS AVEZ DU GRAIN A MOUDRE.NOU MET FANTASME.....FORUM HAITI,BA NOU DWA S A...

Si w bezwen fè menm jan ak koken, frodè lot forom blokaj, manipilasyon pos nan pwen anyen kap etone m. Sitou pou yon ti pèsonaj asid, mechan ki di sali vle sou forum Haiti. Wou sanble ak ti koken kap joure nan lot forom

Nancy Roc ,encore elle!
Des preuves ,apportez des preuvess.
Simplement la Haiti democracy Project n'a qu'a payé un investigateur pour rechercher et identifier les comptes à Turks et Caicos.
Moi quand je vois le nom NANCY ROC je....

TCHIPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP!

Joel a écrit:Nancy Roc ,encore elle!
Des preuves ,apportez des preuvess.
Simplement la Haiti democracy Project n'a qu'a payé un investigateur pour rechercher et identifier les comptes à Turks et Caicos.
Moi quand je vois le nom NANCY ROC je....

TCHIPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP!

. cher ami elle faisait parti du staff de JBA en 91, il suffit que l'on ne soit plus parti du mouvement d'aristide pour ne pas etre crédible. bizarre bizarre

...

TCHIPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP![/quote]. cher ami elle faisait parti du staff de JBA en 91, il suffit que l'on ne soit plus parti du mouvement d'aristide pour ne pas etre crédible. bizarre bizarre[/quote]

Alain ,
Parlez de ce que vous savez .Avec vos stupidités que si quelqu'un était pro-Aristide il est habilité maintenant à le critiquer.
Regardez ce qui se passe chez nos voisins.
Les deux plus puissants partis politiques actuellement sont le PLD et le PRD.
Le PRD est né d'une scission dans le PLD à cause de conflits de personnalité ,principalement entre JUAN BOSCH et FRANCISCO PENA GOMEZ,certains disent que ce conflit était de base RACIALE.
Maintenant ces deux partis sont comme "lait et citron".Parfois le PLD fait des alliances à droite pour combattre le PRD.
Cessez avec ces bétises que des gens qui étaient membres du Parti Lavalas ,n'ont pas changé.
Cela n'est pas un secret pour personne que certains avaient rejoint la mouvance Lavalas ,avec le mème esprit élitiste présent au pays depuis 200 ans.
Automatiquement que la mouvance populaire était forte dans le Parti Lavalas ,ils sont devenus des ennemis de ce mouvement.
Je ne juge pas Nancy Roc sur ses activités passées,mais sur ce qu'elle fait et écrit depuis quelque temps.
Nancy Roc ,actuellement n'est pas différente de Guy Philippe

Et meme pire..

Maryse Narcisse vient de contre-attaquer en affirmant que c'est un dossier monte de toute piece par HAITI DEMOCRACY PROJECT.Des actions en justice seront intentees contre la "journaliste"Lucy Komisar.Elle est sur la feuille de paye de HDP.Mwen diw se yon bagay sispek wi....Manifestasyon fet Aristide la,fe moun pran lwa.Menm sou forum non,se pa vre DOUBRICO1?

piporiko a écrit:Joel,
fok mwen diw se yon certain MORELL ki vinn ak dokiman sa a.Ou konn mouche se menm chime washington yo.Li se yon manmb enpotan HAITI DEMECRACY PROJECT.Ou ka kwe se yon kanpay ki fenk louvri la a.Paske preske 50 mil moun te deyo semen pase ya,fok GNB san wont yo ap fe entimidasion.Yo pap 6....

[b]

Pipo,

Mwen konprann ekzakteman sa w vle di la a.Nèg yo wè yo pran lan gonm.
Yo monte yon kanpay ki san presedans pandan 8 a 10 zan pou yo sal non Aristide.
Bagay lan retounen kont yo .Jounalis etranje e menm ansyen anbasadè ameriken ap fè revelasyon sou revelasyon.
Yo di kareman se manti mesyedam sa yo t ap bay.
Se bouton panik lan wi mesye yo ap pouse la a.Ou wè tout ap pale Camille Leblanc.Konpè Plim ,Rebu elatriye.
Mesye yo yo pa konnen sa eleksyon ameriken yo ap pote pou yo.Mesye lan Kongrè yo ki ap vin chèmann yon seri de komite ,e ki ap vini tou pwisan si dapre sa ki prevwa ,ap genyen yon majorite Demokrat fò ak posibleman yon prezidan demokrat,mesye yo pran wi.
Mesye Demokrat sa yo ,pa vle wè GNBis paske dapre yo ,mesye sa yo ap bay moun nwa move non.
Tout tan MESYE HDP yo,alatèt yo STANLEY LUCAS ,e tankou w di Morrell ap atake Black Caucus lan.
Mwen si e sèten apre eleksyon Novanm yo ,mesye sa yo ap rele STANLEY LUCAS devan komisyon Jistis ak Zafè Etranjè.
Yo te eseye fè sa deja ,men moun ki ap pwoteje LUCAS yo,te gen tan voye misye lan yon misyon lan KAZAHKSTAN pou IRI .Apre Novanm ,yo pa p ka pwoteje misye ankò.

Bagay lan mare pou mesye sa yo,mwen pa blame yo pou yo fè sa y ap fè la a;si bagay IDT sa a pa koke lan kou Aristide ,yo chire;paske ni pèp ayisyen an ,ni zanmi ameriken yo pral retounen lan dengonn yo ,e fwa sa a yo pa p ka mande inyon ak rekonsilyasyon paske yo montre ke yo pa merite sa!

gade komantè sou dènye liv Randall Robinson lan.Yon liv ke yo di misye asire l ke tout manm Black Caucus yo li:

Unbroken Agony or the Kidnapping of a President:

http://www.randallrobinson.com

Joel a écrit:

piporiko a écrit:Joel,
fok mwen diw se yon certain MORELL ki vinn ak dokiman sa a.Ou konn mouche se menm chime washington yo.Li se yon manmb enpotan HAITI DEMECRACY PROJECT.Ou ka kwe se yon kanpay ki fenk louvri la a.Paske preske 50 mil moun te deyo semen pase ya,fok GNB san wont yo ap fe entimidasion.Yo pap 6....

[b]

Pipo,

Mwen konprann ekzakteman sa w vle di la a.Nèg yo wè yo pran lan gonm.
Yo monte yon kanpay ki san presedans pandan 8 a 10 zan pou yo sal non Aristide.
Bagay lan retounen kont yo .Jounalis etranje e menm ansyen anbasadè ameriken ap fè revelasyon sou revelasyon.
Yo di kareman se manti mesyedam sa yo t ap bay.
Se bouton panik lan wi mesye yo ap pouse la a.Ou wè tout ap pale Camille Leblanc.Konpè Plim ,Rebu elatriye.
Mesye yo yo pa konnen sa eleksyon ameriken yo ap pote pou yo.Mesye lan Kongrè yo ki ap vin chèmann yon seri de komite ,e ki ap vini tou pwisan si dapre sa ki prevwa ,ap genyen yon majorite Demokrat fò ak posibleman yon prezidan demokrat,mesye yo pran wi.
Mesye Demokrat sa yo ,pa vle wè GNBis paske dapre yo ,mesye sa yo ap bay moun nwa move non.
Tout tan MESYE HDP yo,alatèt yo STANLEY LUCAS ,e tankou w di Morrell ap atake Black Caucus lan.
Mwen si e sèten apre eleksyon Novanm yo ,mesye sa yo ap rele STANLEY LUCAS devan komisyon Jistis ak Zafè Etranjè.
Yo te eseye fè sa deja ,men moun ki ap pwoteje LUCAS yo,te gen tan voye misye lan yon misyon lan KAZAHKSTAN pou IRI .Apre Novanm ,yo pa p ka pwoteje misye ankò.

Bagay lan mare pou mesye sa yo,mwen pa blame yo pou yo fè sa y ap fè la a;si bagay IDT sa a pa koke lan kou Aristide ,yo chire;paske ni pèp ayisyen an ,ni zanmi ameriken yo pral retounen lan dengonn yo ,e fwa sa a yo pa p ka mande inyon ak rekonsilyasyon paske yo montre ke yo pa merite sa!

gade komantè sou dènye liv Randall Robinson lan.Yon liv ke yo di misye asire l ke tout manm Black Caucus yo li:

Unbroken Agony or the Kidnapping of a President:

http://www.randallrobinson.com

je comprends mieux c'est la faute aux autres c'est une campagne desésinformation. M Aristide a pleins de qualités c'est vrai oh oui.

[
je comprends mieux c'est la faute aux autres c'est une campagne desésinformation. M Aristide a pleins de qualités c'est vrai oh oui.

[b]Oui Alain,

Jusqu'à preuve du contraire ,c'est une campagne de désinformation. Ces gens ont trop de trous dans leur manche.
Quand on identifiera ces comptes à Turks et Caicos et prouver qu'elles appartiennent à Aristide ,je croierais ces gens.Ils ne sont pas à leur coup d'essai.Pourquoi les croire maintenant?
Je le dis encore ,ça fait tantot 4 ans que l'on parle de cette affaire.Pourquoi ce rebondissement?
Et puis surtout que IRA KURZBAN a remarqué que cette LUCY KOMISAR était un membre de la HAITI DEMOCRACY PROJECT!

La boucle est bouclee...

Editorial
Aristide est de retour

Ce n’était pas comme aux premiers temps ni comme en 1994, loin de là, mais la manifestation du 15 juillet me paraît être ce que Lavalas a obtenu de mieux en terme de participation depuis le départ de Jean-Bertrand Aristide le 29 février 2004. Des milliers de partisans chantant, dansant, célébrant les 55 ans de l’ex-chef d’État deux fois évincé du pouvoir, c’est peut-être aussi un des grands succès de foule que Port-auPrince a connus récemment. En tout cas, on sent remonter la ferveur aristidienne.
Elle s’est exprimée dans l’exaltation de manifestants ravis de se retrouver, réconfortés d’être nombreux ensemble et confiants dans le retour prochain de leur leader. Il faut dire qu’année après année, de commémoration en commémoration, les aristidiens cultivent la mémoire de leur mouvement et affichent une détermination – variable selon les circonstances et tactiquement adaptée – à marquer leur présence sur l’échiquier politique et à se démarquer des forces concurrentes ou alliées. Aujourd’hui, le slogan du retour qui a imprégné la manifestation du 15 juillet semble plus fort que jamais.
Mémoire pour mémoire, il faut rappeler que la réaction lavalassienne à la chute du président Aristide en 2004 n’a pas été sans casse. Les éruptions de violence le 30 septembre 2004 qui ont marqué la commémoration du coup d’État du 30 septembre 1991 ont dégénéré en émeute au centre-ville de Port-au-Prince et se sont poursuivies dans certains quartiers populaires les 1er et 2 octobre. Par la suite, il s’est développé une véritable guérilla urbaine alimentant la violence dans la région.
La différence est frappante aujourd’hui où un certain apaisement a été obtenu. L’action des forces de police, la poursuite systématique d’une politique de normalisation démocratique portée par la communauté internationale ont forcé les aristidiens à une reconversion stratégique. Celle-ci allie la participation au processus électoral à des activités de contestation pacifique avec pour objectif la reconquête du pouvoir.
La manifestation du 15 juillet en cours peut être interprétée par les dirigeants lavalas comme un succès significatif, un stimulant à occuper plus d’espace politique, une promesse pour les futures batailles électorales. Lavalas a cette particularité de bénéficier d’une réputation de savoir-faire organisationnel et d’une certaine efficacité dans la mobilisation populaire. Ce qui lui confère un avantage tactique sur les autres partis dans la mesure où il peut impressionner l’opinion port-au-princienne et porter la contestation à une assez grande densité.
Jusqu’à preuve du contraire, Lavalas est une force électorale dans l’agglomération de la capitale et, probablement, dans la deuxième ville du pays. Aujourd’hui, il est bien servi par une conjoncture de crise où la cherté de la vie aggrave les conditions de vie des masses déjà misérables, où l’impuissance des dirigeants à rétablir un gouvernement fonctionnel désespère les forces vives du pays et la communauté internationale assistante.
Dans quelle mesure, Lavalas peut-il se présenter comme une solution de recours aux yeux des masses ? C’est une autre histoire. Avec ou sans Lavalas, on peut redouter que la dégradation sociale accélérée continuera d’exposer le pays à des manifestations de ressentiment ou de désespoir des couches les plus démunies de la population.
Dans l’intérêt national bien compris, il faut encourager le parti de Jean-Bertrand Aristide à jouer le jeu politique. Ce parti fait du retour de son chef un objectif de lutte essentiel. De quoi dépend ce retour ?
Formellement, l’ex-président jouit de son droit constitutionnel inaliénable de rentrer dans son pays, mais il est évident que des considérations politiques, à la fois nationales et internationales, doivent être prises en compte pour une telle réalisation. Le principal intéressé est lui-même en mesure de les évaluer et de décider de l’opportunité d’un tel événement qui ne manquerait pas de remuer le pays. Entre-temps, ses partisans continueront d’agir pour en forcer les conditions. Dans l’espoir qu’il pourra jouer à nouveau un rôle politique décisif.

Par Claude Moise
jeudi 17 juillet 2008

karl X réclame la fin du tam tam. pourquoi ne pas laisser à la justice le soin de condamner les coupables.

Rodlam Sans Malice a écrit:karl X réclame la fin du tam tam. pourquoi ne pas laisser à la justice le soin de condamner les coupables.

Malice monkonpè volo kondanen pou ranbouse lajan, alos se gouvenman Ayisyen ki dwe mete jistis an branl pou rekipere lajan ki dwe rantre nan kès Teleco yo volo. Deba poko fini li fenk komanse, paske Preval sanble ap jwe koken.

Rodlam Sans Malice a écrit:karl X réclame la fin du tam tam. pourquoi ne pas laisser à la justice le soin de condamner les coupables.

. rassurez -vous j'ai mon avis sur la question. merci pour vos éclaircissement joel

Mwen remake si RICO1 tap viv sou epok STALYN a la moun li ta voye nan goulag...Li sifi li pa remen ta sale binette....Li tap pire ke VISHINSKY.Map mande m yon zafe serye konsa pou ki sa se obscur jounal ki lage bagay sa a?Si se WALL St ki te di mwen pat bal enpotans tou.Nou raple Judith Muller NYT se youn nan pot vwa pou te anvayi IRAK nan zafe "armes de destruction massive".Se te nad marinad.Alos procureur DOUBRICO1 .....

Media Frenzy

A Little Bit Hollywood, a Little Bit Washington


By RICHARD SIKLOS
Published: October 2, 2005

HOWARD S. JONAS, the founder, chairman and controlling shareholder of the IDT Corporation, is by most accounts - including his own - a maverick. "Wall Street can go to hell," he jotted in his 1998 memoir "On a Roll," which recounted his rise from selling roadside hot dogs near his boyhood home in the Bronx to taking IDT public nine years ago. "I'm going to ignore the quarterly numbers and run my business for the long run."
Emile Wamsteker


Howard Jonas, left, chairman of IDT, and James Courter, chief executive, amid switching equipment at their headquarters in 2002.



But lately, it seems, the feeling is mutual. Mr. Jonas, a serial entrepreneur and budding media mogul, has become a target of shareholder activists, who accuse his unusual and politically connected company of shabby governance.
One of Mr. Jonas's claims to fame is that he has managed to deliver revenue growth and decent profit margins in the tumultuous telecommunications business, particularly in the segment of selling prepaid calling cards to immigrants. Another is that IDT has recently been hiring media industry talent and buying up small entertainment companies in a bid to create a film, video and computer-animation hothouse in Newark, where IDT is based.

So far, many of IDT's entertainment offerings are horror flicks, straight-to-video fare for children or compilations of old TV shows. But next year it intends to release its first major computer-animated film, going up against the likes of Pixar and Walt Disney. Called "Yankee Irving," it's a Depression-era tale based on a bedtime story that Mr. Jonas, 48, made up to regale his nine children, about a boy with a talking baseball.
Besides making a foray into entertainment - which represented $187 million of the company's $2.45 billion in revenue in its latest year - Mr. Jonas has used IDT as a launching pad for several ventures around the world, from Net2Phone, the Internet telephone service, to a talk-radio network and a financial services business. Along the way, he has attracted some powerful admirers, including John C. Malone, the billionaire whose Liberty Media is IDT's biggest single shareholder, with a 23.5 percent stake.
A list of the company's directors reads like a Beltway Who's Who: James A. Courter, its vice chairman and chief executive, was a longtime congressman from New Jersey. Other directors are Jeane J. Kirkpatrick, a former ambassador to the United Nations; Jack F. Kemp, the former New York congressman and Republican vice presidential nominee; James S. Gilmore III, a former governor of Virginia; and Rudy Boschwitz, a former senator from Minnesota.

Pete Wilson, the former governor of California, is on the board of its IDT Entertainment subsidiary. Leon E. Panetta, the former congressman who was chief of staff in the Clinton administration, is on the board of the IDT Telecom unit. And until he resigned from IDT last week, William F. Weld, the former Massachusetts governor who plans to run for governor of New York, was both a director of the main board and chairman of its governance committee.
In other words, Mr. Jonas seems to be collecting political and business assets to help power his idea factory. "I think Howard Jonas is a generational genius and has the perfect counterpart in Jim Courter, who's a very, very solid business guy," Mr. Weld said.

The trouble of late, however, is that while IDT has grown by leaps and bounds as a business - revenue has increased nearly 40-fold since its initial public offering - its stock price has not. At $12.19 a share, IDT's shares are down 18.9 percent in the last 12 months and are trading at roughly their level in 1998.

At the same time, IDT has been attracting controversy aplenty. One dispute is with the government, over whether a share of IDT's revenue from calling cards needs to be paid into the Universal Service Fund, a Federal Communications Commission program to ensure telephone service in poor and rural areas. IDT says the issue will be resolved in its favor, but analysts worry that a negative outcome could cost IDT more than $200 million.
And then there was an attention-grabbing wrongful-dismissal lawsuit filed last year, in which a former employee accused the company of doing a questionable deal with the former president of Haiti, Jean-Bertrand Aristide. IDT denies the accusations, and Mr. Courter says the plaintiff in the lawsuit, which is pending in federal court in New Jersey, is disgruntled and has no evidence.

Other shareholder complaints have to do with the high volume of options IDT has issued to executives, hefty losses IDT incurred after buying Winstar Communications and the fact that it has been sitting on nearly $1 billion in cash from the sale of a minority stake in Net2Phone to AT&T at the height of the Internet bubble.

Frustration among investors bubbled up on the company's year-end earnings call last Tuesday, particularly when Mr. Courter said the company had identified its latest diversification opportunity - in energy - and had acquired a New York business that he did not identify but that he said had 50,000 customers. "One only needs to go to the gas station today to realize there are going to be opportunities in this business," he said.

Mr. Courter responded to a series of testy questions by telling investors to be patient. "I think the events as they unfold during the next number of weeks will reveal our strategy," he said.

In an interview two days later, he characterized the shareholder discontent as toothless, given that Mr. Jonas controls 57 percent of IDT's votes through multiple-voting shares. Mr. Courter explained that he and Mr. Jonas preferred the security of having all that cash on their balance sheet because it meant that they were not at the mercy of lenders. "I think the criticism comes from the fact that Howard controls the company, and that's going to be the fact 10 years from now," he said. "No Carl Icahn is going to be knocking on our door."

The reference to Mr. Icahn, the corporate raider turned activist who is pressuring Time Warner to unlock shareholder value, was deliberate. Some members of IDT's board recently received a big black binder from Providence Capital, a brokerage firm led by the activist investor Herbert A. Denton, whose Providence Recovery Partners Fund is an IDT shareholder. The material from Providence asserts that IDT's cash hoard, "opaque financial reporting" and "miscellaneous clutter" of business ventures have depressed the stock.
The ace card in Providence's deck, Mr. Denton says, is IDT's prestigious board. He says that by attacking the company's corporate governance, he can pressure the blue-chip names to force Mr. Jonas to unlock some of the value in IDT sooner or even encourage him to take the company private.
For instance, there are a few business arrangements disclosed in IDT's securities filings that Providence could seize on to cause a fuss: Mr. Jonas's sister, Joyce J. Mason, is the company's general counsel; and although the numbers are not large, IDT and related companies rent a property from Mr. Jonas, arranged insurance properties through Ms. Mason's husband, and paid more than $900,000 to a company owned by one of Mr. Jonas's children, which operates the cafeteria at IDT headquarters.

Mr. Boschwitz, who replaced Mr. Weld as head of the governance committee, said that he was not aware of Providence's binder, but that the committee had been evaluating its policies. "There is an effort to understand what we are doing on the part of the board, and, yes, it is a complex company," he said, adding, "People invest in the company because of Howard, and they're right."

Two firms that evaluate corporate governance give IDT a rather dismal assessment: the Corporate Library downgraded IDT's "board effectiveness" rating to an F from a D in May. And Institutional Shareholder Services rates IDT's board 1,369th out of an index of 1,452 comparable public companies for its governance practices.

Mr. Courter said that he did not reply to Providence but that he had taken the matter to his legal department. "It's preposterous," he said of the accusations of poor governance. "If you just looked at circumstantial evidence, someone could make a prima facie case that it doesn't look good. I know the real truth. I know how we behave."

Mr. Jonas declined to be interviewed for this column. But Mr. Courter said that Mr. Jonas had not received a single additional share or option since the company went public, and had drawn only a modest salary.
"He's not motivated by money," Mr. Courter said in an interview. "He wants to change the world - make it a happier place, a more peaceful place."
To accomplish this, he may first have to make peace with his shareholders

Rico chô devan band lan...

Marc a écrit:Rico chô devan band lan...

Marc,

bagay IDT sa a ,depi imedyatman apre koudeta a ,y ap chache koke l lan kou Aristide.
Yo te ouvri yon pwose lan Miami kont mesye ,Jij lan deklare pa gen evidans.

Di mwen si te gen evidans ,si mesye BUSH yo pa t ap prese prese mare l lan kou Aristide.
Mesye yo t ap bezwen jistifikasyon pou koudeta 2004.Gade pou wè jan près GNBis sòti pou yo resisite bagay sa a e se pou menm rezon an.

Tout bagay yo te akize Aristide yo ,se fabrikasyon e mesye yo wè yo pran lan gonm .Tout politisyen ki t ap kolabore ou byen sou pewòl IRI ak NDI yo tou pwofite pou yo leve kanpe keseswa Evans Paul,Leblanc ,Himler Rebu elatriye.

Près ann Ayiti an ,anba baboukèt ,menm Marcus si w tande l pè di bagay yo jan yo ye an e ou wè yo fèmen dyòl Radyo Lavalas lan RADYO TIMOUN!

Si pèp ayisyen konnen vre sa mesye sa yo te fè lan kanpay destabilizasyon gouvènman Aristide lan,franchman yo t ap blije kite peyi an!

Marc a écrit:Rico chô devan band lan...

Eske se entimidasyon. kote pwoblèm lan. Mwen pa di ni Pipo ak Joel ap jwe pwovokasyon. Men nap dyaloge.

poukisa wou sispetib konsa mwen pa ka jwe avek'w. Il ne faut pas tout prendre au serieux mon ami...