This sounds like it is actually written by a Haitian utilities workers who have simply raped Haiti over the past 10 years and likes what he has been doing. I have had a phone controlled by Teleco (one of those fine Haitian rape artiest that call themselves a utility) until three years ago when I finally got wise to the fact that when I visited their office and they told me that it would be fixed "this week" and nobody showed up for a period of five years somebody was being taken and that somebody was me. Since about 2000 of these workers (JOKE) have now been let go due to I actually am seeing them making an effort to get something done. I still drive by hoping that they all lose their job. People who spend most of their lives doing nothing when they claim to be working for the good of the State should be punished. Thus they should lose their jobs. I really don't care if the government sells the companies but it seems to me that they have been and will always be a poor manager of companies. This is shown, and still shows to be true that the Haitian companies like EDH (electricity, Haitian Customs, and Teleco are simply taking what they can from the country and it's people without any effort to make improvements. At least when the poor of the country make the the mountains bare of trees it is for a good reason, they need something to help them cook their food. Those in the state owned companies are devastating Haiti in much the same way but their reason is simply greed.

Thanks

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The above comment showcases the neoliberal view of the bourgeoise in Haiti. He does not mention how multinational companies and the anti-Lavalas political parties have stopped the Haitian governments from investing in and rebuilding Haiti's public institutions. The TELECO has been harmed from years of Haiti under embargo, foreign attack and multinationals attacking the sovereignty of Haiti. Once TELECO and the rest are lost they will never be returned. Haiti should not privatize and sell out its enterprise to foreign multinationals, it should instead reinvest and rebuild them. The labor union here makes a good message in explaining that the institutions should be revitalized and not sold off.

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The second comment does make any sense. Whether or not TELECO has been harmed was nothing to do with its level of service. If TELECO was being effected by embargos, then they wouldn't be able to pay their employees. Before this time, there weren't any news of the workers complaining at they weren't getting paid because if they weren't, they'd have been complaining as they are now. So they've obviously been getting paid. So if they've been getting paid, then WHY weren't they doing the work that they were being paid to do?!

Secondly, we all want Haiti to become developed. To do that, people are going to have to get over the "something for nothing" mentality. We look to the United States and how prosperous they've been. It hasn't come from state run utilities, it's come from competition. Look at the cell phone industry. Before Digicell came in, the industry had plateaued. Services in Port-au-Prince was adequate and hope for service in the other Departments was a future dream. Since they have come in, service with all companies has increased, and rates have dropped. I can guarantee that landlines will now have greater quality service.

Lastly, with the money that the government is now saving by not having to pay all those extra employees, they can now use those funds for other uses, like roads for example. You don't just buy a road and it magically appears. You have to hire people to do the work. So now what is happening is they are taking jobs from one area and (like telecommunications) and transfering them to another area (like transportation). The benefit of this is that they government won't pay them until the work has been done. So the work is guaranteed to be done. And once it is, those individuals are no longer on the government payroll. With these (and other) improvements, internal trade becomes easier and Haiti becomes more attractive to outside investors. They then come in and create more jobs for more people.

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[ed.'s note: this from the folks at Hati Analysis: The link at the end of the Haiti article is broken. It should go to:
http://www.haitilabor.org

haitianalysis@gmail.com wrote:
Can you fix that article. The piece was NOT written by HaitiAnalysis. It is a press release from the CTH- confederation of Haitian workers.

We helped get the piece translated, that is all.. ]

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Why would anyone actually stick up for privatization? The jobs building roads are important too but privatizing TELECO one of the major income earners for a independent state is just crazy talk. Yes TELECO has MAJOR problems but it should be fixed not sold to some foreign multinational!!!!!
NO TO PRIVATIZATION

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