Aristide and the Endless Revolution is a 2005 feature documentary directed and produced by Nicolas Rossier about former Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide and the coup d'etat that ousted him from the country in 2004. Rossier was the first media professional to get exclusive access to Aristide while in exile and the resultant interview is featured in the film, as well as interviews with many experts on Haiti, including U.S. Representative Maxine Waters, noted economist Jeffrey Sachs and Aristide's lawyer Ira J. Kurzban.
Jean-Bertrand Aristide won Haiti's first democratic presidential election in 1990 but was overthrown and exiled the following year. He was restored to his presidency in 1994 and won the next election in 2000 but 2004 brought another coup which removed Aristide from power once again. Although he was and remains extremely popular with Haitian citizens, many critics and opponents of the man contend that his government was rife with corruption and ineffective at addressing the country's severe economic woes. The role of the U.S. government in the 2004 ouster remains highly contentious. The film delves into the build-up of that event, as well as the history of Haitian independence and the rise of Aristide from poverty to presidency. Rossier speaks with many prominent figures in and outside of Haiti, including American author and academic Noam Chomsky, actor and activist Danny Glover and the Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs under President George W. Bush, Roger Noriega.
The film was released in 2005 and screened at many festivals worldwide, including Vancouver, São Paulo, BAFICI, Cuba, IDFA in Amsterdam and RIDM in Montreal. It won "Best Feature Documentary" and the audience award for best documentary at the Los Angeles Pan-African Film Festival. It opened on televisions in Canada CBC Radio Canada, France Public Senat and on selective PBS stations and Link TV in the USA and received critical praise throughout its theatrical and broadcast runs. The film was widely reviewed and garnered positive write-ups in many publications including The New York Times [1] and Variety . [2] Haitian activist Nadine Dominique - daughter of slain journalist Jean Dominique - declared that "the film deserves to be seen by Haitians ... [it] seems to be exactly what we need today". Paul Farmer, founder of Partners in Health and featured in the documentary, wrote that, "I saw it twice and showed it to friends in Haiti... [it is] a great tool." The film was nominated at IDFA in Amsterdam for the Amnesty International Doen Award.
Jean-Bertrand Aristide is a Haitian former Salesian priest and politician who became Haiti's first democratically elected president. A proponent of liberation theology, Aristide was appointed to a parish in Port-au-Prince in 1982 after completing his studies to become a priest. He became a focal point for the pro-democracy movement first under Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier and then under the military transition regime which followed. He won the 1990–91 Haitian general election, with 67% of the vote. As a priest, he taught liberation theology and, as a president, he attempted to normalize Afro-Creole culture, including Vodou religion, in Haiti.
A coup d'état in Haiti on 29 February 2004, following several weeks of conflict, resulted in the removal of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide from office. On 5 February 2004, a rebel group, called the National Revolutionary Front for the Liberation and Reconstruction of Haiti, took control of Haiti's fourth-largest city, Gonaïves. By 22 February, the rebels had captured Haiti's second-largest city, Cap-Haïtien and were besieging the capital, Port-au-Prince by the end of February. On the morning of 29 February, Aristide resigned under controversial circumstances and was flown from Haiti by U.S. military/security personnel, preventing him from finishing his second term He went into exile, being flown directly to the Central African Republic, before eventually settling in South Africa.
Gérard Latortue is a Haitian politician and diplomat who served as the prime minister of Haiti from 12 March 2004 to 9 June 2006. He was an official in the United Nations for many years, and briefly served as foreign minister of Haiti during the short-lived 1988 administration of Leslie Manigat.
Matthieu Prosper Avril is a Haitian political figure who was President of Haiti from 1988 to 1990. A trusted member of François Duvalier's Presidential Guard and adviser to Jean-Claude Duvalier, Lt. Gen. Avril led the September 1988 Haitian coup d'état against a transition military government installed after Jean-Claude Duvalier's 1986 overthrow. He was President until March 1990, in a period which according to Amnesty International was "marred by serious human rights violations". He was arrested in 2001, but released in March 2004 after the 2004 Haitian coup d'état overthrew Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
Jean Léopold Dominique was a Haitian journalist and noted activist for human rights and democracy in Haiti. His station, Radio Haiti-Inter, was the first to broadcast news, investigative reporting, and political analysis in Haitian Creole, the language spoken by most Haitian people. On 3 April 2000 he was assassinated as he arrived for work at Radio Haiti-Inter. An extensive though turbulent investigation failed to officially identify and bring to justice the primary perpetrators, who remain at large.
Boukman Eksperyans is a mizik rasin band from the city of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Grammy nominated for their debut album Vodou Adjae. The band derives its name from Dutty Boukman, a vodou priest who led a religious ceremony in 1791 that is widely considered the start of the Haitian Revolution. The other half of the band's name, "Eksperyans", is the Haitian Creole word for "experience", and was inspired by the band's appreciation of the music of Jimi Hendrix. The band was at the height of its popularity in 1991 when the presidency of Jean Bertrand Aristide was overthrown in a military coup d'etat. Like many other artists and performers, Boukman Eksperyans fled the country to live in exile. During their time abroad, the band performed and spoke out against the military dictatorship of Raoul Cédras. In 1994, after Aristide was restored to power, the band returned to Haiti, where they continued to play concerts, record albums, and perform at the Carnival celebrations.
Antoine Izméry was a Haitian businessman and pro-democracy activist.
The Raboteau massacre was an incident on April 22, 1994, in which military and paramilitary forces attacked the neighborhood of Raboteau Gonaïves, Haiti, the citizens of which had been participating in pro-Jean-Bertrand Aristide demonstrations. At least 23 residents were killed, though most groups estimated the true casualties to be higher.
Kevin Pina is an American journalist, filmmaker and educator. Pina also serves as a Country Expert on Haiti for the Varieties of Democracy project sponsored by the University of Notre Dame Center for Research Computing, the University of Gothenburg Department of Political Science, and the Helen Kellogg Institute for International Studies.
General elections were held in Haiti on 7 February 2006 to elect the replacements for the interim government of Gérard Latortue, which had been put in place after the 2004 Haiti rebellion. The elections were delayed four times, having originally been scheduled for October and November 2005. Voters elected a president, all 99 seats in the Chamber of Deputies of Haiti and all 30 seats in the Senate of Haiti. Voter turnout was around 60%. Run-off elections for the Chamber of Deputies of Haiti were held on 21 April, with around 28% turnout.
Jean-Claude Bajeux was a Haitian political activist and professor of Caribbean literature. For many years he was director of the Ecumenical Center for Human Rights based in Haiti's capital, Port-au-Prince, and a leader of the National Congress of Democratic Movements, a moderate socialist political party also known as KONAKOM. He was Minister of Culture during Jean-Bertrand Aristide's first term as President of Haiti.
Michel Joseph Martelly is a Haitian musician and politician who was the President of Haiti from May 2011 until February 2016. He is one of Haiti's best-known musicians for over a decade, going by the stage name Sweet Micky. For business and musical reasons, Martelly has moved a number of times between the United States and Haiti. When travelling to the United States, Martelly mostly stays in Florida. After his presidency, Martelly returned to his former band and sang a carnival méringue entitled "Bal Bannan nan", as a mocking response to Liliane Pierre Paul, a famous Haitian female journalist in Port-au-Prince.
The United Nations Mission in Haiti (UNMIH) was a peacekeeping operation carried out by the United Nations between September 1993 and June 1996. The Mission was reestablished (MINUSTAH) in April 2004, after a rebellion took over most of Haiti and President Bertrand Aristide resigned. This mandate ended in 2017, replaced by United Nations Mission for Justice Support in Haiti (MINUJUSTH), which saw the end of UN peacekeepers in Haiti after its ending in 2019.
The 1991 Haitian coup d'état took place on 29 September 1991, when President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, elected eight months earlier in the 1990–91 Haitian general election, was deposed by the Armed Forces of Haiti. Haitian military officers, primarily Army General Raoul Cédras, Army Chief of Staff Phillipe Biamby and Chief of the National Police, Michel François led the coup. Aristide was sent into exile, his life only saved by the intervention of US, French and Venezuelan diplomats.
Radio Haiti-Inter was the first independent radio station in Haiti. The station was notable for its use of the Haitian Creole language, spoken by most Haitians, while most other media broadcast in French, and also for its broadcasting of international and local news.
Nicolas Rossier is an American filmmaker and reporter best known for his biographical documentaries of the former president of Haiti, Jean-Bertrand Aristide and South African Nobel Peace Prize co-recipient F.W. de Klerk.
The Haitian National Truth and Justice Commission began its operations in April 1995 and ended in February 1996. Haiti's once diverse and lively civil society had been tarnished greatly as a result of the ousting of its first democratically elected president, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, by its military forces. This deposing of President Aristide is widely known as a coup d'état, and from 1991 to 1994, the country became known for its weak civilian government. The army was determined to return Haiti to the intimidated society existing during the Duvalier dictatorship seven years prior.
Antoine Adrien was a Catholic Priest and liberation theology advocate who served as Father Superior of the Holy Ghost Order in Haiti. He also served as Director of the "Petit Séminaire Collège Saint-Martial," attended primarily by children of the country's elite. Adrien was expelled from Haiti in 1969 by the Francois Duvalier regime which accused the Holy Ghost Order of harboring communists working to overthrow the regime.
Jean-Bertrand Aristide was a Haitian priest and president of Haiti.