Like the prow of a great stone ship, jutting out from the jungle on a mountain peak, the Citadelle Henri Christophe is the largest fortress in the Americas, designed to house up to 5,000 people. It was built between 1806 and 1820 by a former slave and key leader of the Haitian Rebellion. For years Henri Christophe had fought under Toussaint Louverture, the legendary black figure who transformed a slave rebellion in the French colony into a popular movement for independence. Toussaint Louverture died in 1802, but two years later his large and well-disciplined army succeeded in crushing the colonisers and establishing the world’s first black republic. Soon afterwards his lieutenant Jean-Jacques Dessalines was made emperor. His reign did not last, as he was assassinated in 1806.1
A power struggle ensued, resulting in the division of the country into two halves. The south was dominated by gens de couleur, a term for people of mixed race who had been free before the abolition of slavery. Former slaves went to the north, where Henri Christophe established a kingdom in 1811. In the following years he proclaimed himself Henri I, King of Haiti, and used forced labour to build extravagant palaces and fortresses. Christophe created his own nobility, designing a coat of arms for his dukes, counts and barons. They, in turn, dutifully named his son Jacques-Victor Henri as prince and heir. But Henri I slowly descended into paranoia, seeing plots and conspiracies everywhere. Rather than risk a coup, he shot himself with a silver bullet at the age of fifty-three. His son was slain ten days later.
The north and the south were reunited, but the social divisions remained. The elite were proud of their links with France, and looked down on the majority of the population, poor villagers descended from African slaves. For more than a century self-proclaimed monarchs and emperors from both communities succeeded one another, most of them ruling through political violence. The economy made scant progress, hampered, in large measure, by a crippling indemnity exacted by France in 1825 in exchange for recognising independence. The debt was not paid off until 1947.
The United States occupied the island in 1915 and stayed for two decades, further deepening the racial divide. Among those who reacted against the American occupation was Jean Price-Mars, a respected teacher, diplomat and ethnographer who championed the island’s African origins. He viewed Voodoo, a mixture of Roman Catholic rituals and African beliefs that had thrived on slave plantations, as an indigenous religion on a par with Christianity. After the Americans left some of his followers went further, developing a nationalist ideology that advocated overthrowing the elite and handing over control of the state to representatives of the majority population. They called it noirisme, from the French word noir, black, and argued that the social differences that had divided Haiti for so long were determined by deep evolutionary laws.
One such follower was François Duvalier. In an article published in 1939 entitled ‘A Question of Anthro-Sociology: Racial Determinism’, the young author insisted that biology determined psychology, as each racial group had its own ‘collective personality’. The true Haitian soul was black, its religion was Voodoo. The noiristes advocated an authoritarian and exclusive state, one which would place power in the hands of an authentic black leader.2
As a child François Duvalier was shy and bookish. He had two influential teachers in high school. One was Jean Price-Mars, the influential enthnographer, the other Dumarsais Estimé, an outspoken opponent of the United States. Both inspired him to take pride in his country’s African heritage. He tried his hand at journalism, railing against the elite, defending the cause of the poor villagers. He already equated blackness with oppression.3
After obtaining a degree in medicine from the University of Haiti in 1934 the twenty-seven-year old served in several local hospitals, occupying his spare time in researching Voodoo and writing about noirisme in the spirit of Price-Mars. He befriended Lorimer Denis, a humourless twenty-four-year-old who wore a hat and carried a cane, assuming the air of a Voodoo priest. Duvalier adopted his style, building a network of contacts with priests (houngans) and priestesses (mambos), seeing the religion as the very heart and soul of the Haitian peasantry. Together with Denis he worked for the Bureau of Ethnology, founded by his teacher Price-Mars in 1941 to counter a brutal campaign against Voodoo orchestrated by the state, as cult objects were destroyed and priests forced to renounce their beliefs.4
By the end of the Second World War Duvalier had spent two semesters in the United States studying public health. In 1945 he went back to the countryside to help fight tropical diseases. There he projected himself as a selfless man devoted to the poor peasants, a medical kit strapped to one shoulder, a syringe in one hand. ‘He suffers their pain, he mourns their misfortune,’ he later wrote about himself in the third person.5
In 1946 his former schoolmaster Dumarsais Estimé, a skilful civil servant who had risen through the ranks to become minister of education, was elected president and installed in the National Palace, a large, attractive edifice with a dome reminiscent of the White House built by the Americans in 1920. Duvalier was appointed director general of the National Public Health Service, becoming minister of health and labour three years later. But Estimé soon proved to be too radical for the elite: he expanded black representation in the civil service, introduced income-tax measures and promoted Voodoo as the indigenous religion of the majority population. In May 1950 a military junta under Paul Magloire, a burly military officer in charge of the police in Port-au-Prince, removed him from power. Duvalier lost his job, seething at the dominance of the elite. He learned a bitter lesson, namely never to trust the army.
He went back to practising medicine in the countryside, but soon joined the ranks of the opposition. After the government put a price on his head in 1954 he was forced to take to the hills with one of his most trusted friends, a young man named Clément Barbot. They were sought out by an American publicist, who was led blindfolded to their hiding place. Herbert Morrison found both men disguised as women, with Barbot concealing a machine gun inside the folds of his skirt. It was the beginning of the myth of Duvalier, the resistance fighter flitting from one hideout to another to avoid capture.6
In September 1956, after Paul Magloire granted an amnesty for all political opponents, Duvalier came out of hiding. A few months later Magloire lost the support of the army and fled the country with his family, leaving behind an empty treasury. By now there was a growing political desire for a break with the past, sufficiently widespread to pressure the military junta into orchestrating show elections. Antonio Kébreau, chairman of the Military Council, called for nominations to come forward.7
Duvalier declared his candidacy, together with a dozen other contenders. Ten months of political chaos followed, with crippling strikes, widespread violence and the fall of five provisional governments. By August 1957 two main candidates remained, François Duvalier and Louis Déjoie, a wealthy sugar planter and industrialist. Throughout the campaign Duvalier invoked the widely respected Dumarsais Estimé, promising to consolidate and enlarge the revolution his erstwhile schoolmaster had launched in 1946. He made promises to the workers and promises to the peasants. He used appeals to national unity and economic reconstruction. But most of all Duvalier adopted a mild-mannered, unassuming persona, radiating a doctor’s concern for other people. He and his family were too poor to own a home, as the kind man was devoted to his patients. He worked tirelessly into the night. He was adored by his people. ‘The peasants love their doctor, and I am their Papa Doc,’ he gently pointed out. He came across as an inoffensive man.8
The quiet doctor seemed easy to control. After he agreed to appoint Kébreau as the army’s chief-of-staff, the military junta took steps to weaken his main opponent. Army officers who supported Déjoie were dismissed, his supporters attacked, and finally campaigning in his favour was forbidden altogether.9
Duvalier was elected president on 22 September 1957. Twenty-two was his lucky number. ‘My government will scrupulously protect the honour and the civil rights which constitute the joy of all free peoples. My government will guarantee liberty for the Haitian people,’ he solemnly declared during his inauguration speech a month later.10
Duvalier’s first act was to remove his political rivals, who challenged the outcome of the election. Within weeks the ranks of the civil service were purged. Duvalier appointed his followers, regardless of expertise or experience. Two months later his allies dominated the executive and judicial branches of government, while the legislature was under his thumb.11
Duvalier recruited Herbert Morrison as director of public relations. During the presidential campaign, Morrison had bought a second-hand camera and taken hundreds of photographs, promoting Duvalier abroad. Photos with the caption ‘Champion of the Poor’ had appeared with the president-elect posing next to a poor peasant. Now Morrison travelled the island with his camera, snapping pictures to portray Haiti as a beacon of democracy. On radio in New York a year later he described Duvalier as ‘a humble country doctor, a dedicated, honest individual who is trying to help his people’. ‘It’s the first time in Haitian history,’ he explained to his American audience, ‘that the middle class and the suburban masses, the rural masses, have elected in a free election the man of their choice.’12
Clément Barbot was tasked with organising the secret police. Ordered to attack opponents of the regime, its agents did so with such brutality that it caused general indignation. Within weeks of the election boys as young as eleven were dragged off into the bushes and beaten with hickory sticks. Entire families ended up in prison.13
Antonio Kébreau, the army’s chief-of-staff, intimidated, imprisoned and deported the regime’s opponents. Labour unions were crushed and newspapers silenced, their premises occasionally burned to the ground. A radio station was wrecked. Suspects were accused of being communists and placed under arrest in the hundreds. A curfew imposed by the junta before the elections was maintained indefinitely.14
The seat of power, however, continued to be the army. The alliance between Duvalier and Kébreau was an uneasy one, born of mutual need. But as the junta helped him crush his opponents, they went too far, beating to death an American citizen who was a vocal supporter of Louis Déjoie. In December the American ambassador was recalled in protest. Duvalier exploited the affair, blaming the military for the violence. Kébreau was dismissed two months later.15
In the following months the army was whittled down in size, as many officers were discharged, transferred or released on early retirement, in particular the senior grades. A further opportunity to purge the ranks presented itself in the summer, after five American soldiers of fortune accompanied by two Haitian military officers landed near the capital, hoping to rally the population and besiege the presidential palace on 28 July 1958. All the insurgents were killed by troops loyal to the president.
The attempted coup was a blessing in disguise. A week later Duvalier addressed the nation on radio. ‘I have conquered the nation. I have won power. I am the New Haiti. Those who seek to destroy me seek to destroy Haiti itself. It is through me that Haiti breathes; it is through her that I exist … God and Destiny have chosen me.’ All constitutional guarantees were suspended, while the president was given full powers to take all measures necessary to maintain national security. Less than a year after coming to power Duvalier reigned like an absolute monarch, with few limits placed on his power.16
In the name of national security, Duvalier further starved the army of funds, developing his own militia instead as a deliberate counter-balance to the regular forces. Like the secret police, they were supervised by Clément Barbot. At first the militia were called the cagoulards, named after the hooded fascists who terrorised France in the 1930s. But soon they became known as the tonton macoutes, a Creole term for bogeymen. Within a year Barbot claimed to have a force of 25,000 militia under his command, although they probably never numbered more than 10,000, with a hard core of about 2,000 in the capital. The macoutes dressed like gangsters, with shiny blue-serge suits, dark, steel-rimmed glasses and grey homburg hats. They carried a gun, tucked away in a belt or an armpit holster. Duvalier alone could enrol a macoute, granting him permission to carry a weapon. The macoutes, in turn, reported back to Duvalier. In the words of the New Republic, a macoute was ‘an informer, neighbourhood boss, extortioner, bully and political pillar of the regime’. They were Duvalier’s eyes and ears. Few were paid, and all used their power to extort, intimidate, harass, rape and murder.17
The macoutes crushed or interfered with every liberty but one. The new constitution proclaimed freedom of religion in April 1958. At the stroke of a pen, the dominant position of the Catholic Church was undermined. Voodoo was no longer banned. For more than two decades Duvalier had studied the religion, systematically developing links with the houngans. Now he made good use of his knowledge, recruiting them to become leaders of the macoutes in the countryside. They were widely consulted, invited to the palace and asked to perform religious ceremonies.18
Duvalier projected himself as a Voodoo spirit. Since his early friendship with Lorimer Denis he had affected the manners of a houngan, often dressing in black, carrying a cane and adopting a taciturn demeanour. His model was Baron Samedi, the spirit of the dead and guardian of cemeteries. In popular culture Baron Samedi was often depicted with a top hat and black tailcoat, wearing dark glasses, cotton plugs stuffed in his nostrils, resembling a corpse prepared for burial in the countryside.
Duvalier wore thick, dark spectacles, and occasionally appeared in public with a top hat and tailcoat. He would mumble mysteriously in a deep nasal tone, as if chanting incantations against his enemies. He encouraged rumours about his links with the occult world. In 1958 the American anthropologist Harold Courlander came to pay his respects in the palace. He had known Duvalier from his early years at the Bureau of Ethnology. The visitor blinked in surprise as a guard led him into a pitch-dark room draped with black curtains. Duvalier, dressed in a black woollen suit, sat in front of a long table with dozens of black candles, surrounded by his macoutes wearing their dark glasses.19
One of the more persistent rumours began circulating after the macoutes intervened in the burial of a former rival in April 1959. They pulled the casket from the black hearse, loaded it into their own vehicle and drove off, leaving behind a crowd of stunned mourners. The official explanation was that the body had been removed to prevent a public rally at his graveside, but word soon spread that the president wanted to use his heart as a magic charm to strengthen his own power.20
There were plenty of other stories. The president sought council from the spirits while sitting in his bathtub, wearing the top hat of Baron Samedi. He studied goat entrails in the Salon Jaune of the National Palace. But Duvalier did not rely on rumour alone. Much as he purged the ranks of the government and the army, so he eliminated the houngans who refused to cooperate. ‘Never forget,’ he told them in 1959, ‘that I am the supreme authority of the state. Henceforth I, I alone, I am your only master.’21
Haiti shares the island of Hispaniola with the Dominican Republic, which occupies the east. To the west, a mere fifty kilometres across the Windward Passage, lies the island of Cuba. In January 1959 Fidel Castro and his guerrilla fighters entered Havana. It was yet another stroke of luck for Duvalier, as the United States began courting him with financial assistance and military advice. The following month US$6 million was extended in aid, refloating a regime that was experiencing a severe economic crisis. In an interview with Peter Kihss in the New York Times Duvalier proclaimed that he was no dictator, but merely a doctor concerned about rebuilding his country.22
Still, the Voodoo spirits can be fickle. On 24 May 1959 Duvalier suffered a heart attack. Illness implied weakness, and rumours spread about his declining powers. His father’s tomb was desecrated, the coffin destroyed and the remains scattered. His enemies were emboldened. Bombs exploded in the capital. Several politicians questioned his use of state funds. One senator even launched into a tirade against the regime. But even in this moment of extreme vulnerability Duvalier appeared to thrive, with the American ambassador visiting the palace on 2 June to demonstrate his support.23
A month later Duvalier signalled his resumption of power with a dramatic gesture, appearing with his family and advisers on the front steps of the National Palace to review a military parade. Thousands of enthusiastic supporters, carefully assembled by the macoutes, gave him a vociferous welcome. The president toured the streets of the capital the following day, accompanied by his director of public relations, Herbert Morrison, who took photographs of the event.24
Two months later Duvalier announced that a vast communist plot to overthrow the government had been uncovered. He demanded the power to rule by decree and suspend parliamentary immunity. He used his new prerogatives almost immediately, impeaching six senators who had taken advantage of his illness over the summer to criticise his rule.25
Duvalier now lived in self-isolation, surrounded by sycophants. His advisers assumed several official roles simultaneously, even though their authority was never specified, creating great confusion throughout the administration. Competence aroused his suspicion, even when it came from a loyal subordinate. As a result, he was involved in every decision, even though he seemed hardly interested in governance. He ‘spends all of his time on the political manipulation of persons’, wrote one American adviser.26
Tyrants trust no one, least of all their allies. Duvalier disposed of friends and foes alike, striking down anyone he thought was too ambitious or might develop a separate power base. No one was indispensable. During his illness his confidant and henchman Clément Barbot had maintained order. But as chief of the macoutes he was potentially dangerous. After Barbot held secret negotiations with the United States, on 15 July Duvalier summarily placed him and ten associates under arrest. Haiti’s Number Two, like so many other close collaborators of dictators, had failed to gauge the full extent of his master’s gift for dissimulation. Morrison, the president’s publicity director, then fell under suspicion for his friendship with Barbot, but managed to escape to Miami. Two weeks later the president reviewed the macoutes in front of the palace, flanked by his high command. For the first time since their creation two years earlier the militia were officially recognised. Duvalier asked them to ‘keep their eyes open’.27
One last bastion of resistance remained, namely the Church. They supported the students, who still had the courage to organise strikes, despite ferocious repression from the macoutes. In January 1961 Duvalier expelled the French bishop and four priests, earning him excommunication from the Vatican. His grip on the country was now almost complete.
The constitution imposed a six-year limit on the presidency. Two years before his term expired, Duvalier began preparing for his second mandate. As he turned fifty-four on 14 April 1961 newspapers hailed him as ‘Supreme Leader’, ‘Spiritual Leader of the Nation’, ‘Venerated Leader’, ‘Apostle of the Collective Good’ and ‘Greatest Man in Our Modern History’. It set the tone for elections to a newly created legislative body two weeks later. Every candidate took pains to proclaim their fealty to Duvalier. The president’s name appeared on every ballot. In Cap-Haïtien the macoutes rounded up people as they left church on Sunday morning, herding them into the polling stations. A seven-year-old child was made to vote. The following day the papers announced that the people had not only voted for the legislative candidates, but had also spontaneously approved a second term for President Duvalier.28
On Flag Day, when the creation of the Haitian flag by Jean-Jacques Dessalines was traditionally celebrated in the city of Arcahaie, Duvalier was welcomed by crowds of cheering villagers, watched over by the security forces with their guns in hand. In one extravagant speech after another the president was acclaimed by his underlings. The most extreme declamation came from Father Hubert Papailler, minister of national education, who explained that the people had taken the ballot boxes by assault in the hope that the present chief would reign not merely for six new years but ‘perhaps as long as God, from Whom he holds his power’. Duvalier watched, inscrutable behind his dark glasses.29
Duvalier’s inauguration took place on 22 May, an auspicious date containing the number twenty-two. For days on end the macoutes had scoured the countryside for volunteers, forcing men, women and children into a fleet of lorries. Those who resisted were whipped. No food was offered, even if the journey often took a full day. They were quartered in schools and warehouses, made to wait for the occasion. Every road out of the capital was barricaded. On the day some 50,000 people were escorted to the palace, where they dutifully showed their support, carrying banners, holding high portraits, cheering on command. ‘You are Me, and I am You,’ proclaimed Duvalier.30
The United States, with John F. Kennedy now in the White House, was repelled by the surprise elections. In mid-1962 economic aid was quietly suspended. Foreigners left in droves. As the economy deteriorated Duvalier used the United States as a scapegoat for all the ills that beset Haiti.
In April 1963, Duvalier released Clément Barbot from prison, even offering him a brand new car as a sign of reconciliation. Rather than display gratitude, his former henchman tried to kidnap Jean-Claude and Simone Duvalier, the president’s two children. The president unleashed a reign of terror with the macoutes, who used the opportunity to settle accounts and eliminate their own enemies. Hundreds of suspects were killed, and many more vanished. In the capital bodies were left to rot by the roadside. In less than a week, the United States issued five formal protests over incidents involving US citizens.31
A few weeks later the United States increased pressure by declining official invitations to attend the first anniversary of Duvalier’s re-election. The embassy began to evacuate its employees. Diplomatic relations were suspended. But Duvalier did not flinch, calculating that Washington needed an ally in its fight against Cuba. The celebrations went ahead on 22 May, with tens of thousands of assembled villagers dutifully dancing and singing his praises in front of the palace. Papa Doc appeared on the balcony, ‘in a calm so complete that it seemed narcotic’, according to one witness. ‘Bullets and machine guns capable of frightening Duvalier do not exist,’ he explained. ‘I am already an immaterial being.’ In New York, Newsweek declared him ‘utterly, irretrievably mad’. But on 3 June the United States asked to resume normal diplomatic relations. In Haiti the radio crowed over Duvalier’s ‘triumph of statesmanship’.32
A further victory came in mid-July, when Barbot and his brother were finally hunted down in the countryside and shot. Photographs of their mangled bodies were published in the newspapers.
Every crisis seemed to make Duvalier stronger. After yet another ill-fated invasion attempt by one of his exiled enemies in August he suspended all civil rights for six months, including the right of assembly. It was a symbolic gesture, since there were no liberties left to suspend. On 17 September 1963 Haiti officially became a one-party state, as all political activities had to be carried out under the aegis of the ‘Party of National Unity’. The party had never loomed very large, but a separate party machine provided another device for protecting the revolution. It also linked more people to Duvalier, reaching beyond the houngans and macoutes.33
‘I am the revolution and the flag,’ Duvalier declared over the following months. Neon lights in the centre of Port-au-Prince blinked the same message: ‘I am the Haitian Flag, United and Indivisible. François Duvalier’. The square nearby was renamed ‘Place de la Révolution Duvalier’. Plastic busts and portraits of the dictator, already prominently displayed in shops and offices, appeared in private homes. On radio, where his voice was heard regularly, Duvalier portrayed himself as the personification of God, exclaiming ‘and the word was made flesh’. But there were no statues. Duvalier modestly declined after legislators passed a law to approve the building of monuments memorialising their leader. Like Hitler, he believed that statues were for the dead.34
The adulation had a goal. Duvalier wished to become president for life. In March 1964 leaders of the Church, commerce and industry were successively summoned to the palace to demonstrate their loyalty. After waiting for hours in stifling heat they were made to read prepared scripts in public, imploring the president to stay on forever. Duvalier was unfailingly gracious. He thanked all of them effusively, especially those known to be critical of him. For days on end the press published telegrams demanding a change in the constitution. Psalms were read and hymns sung. On 1 April the president himself appeared in public, declaring: ‘I am an exceptional man, the kind the country could produce only once every 50 to 75 years.’35
Endless parades were held in the following months, as thousands of people were transported to the capital to beg their leader to stay on. A poster appeared, showing Christ with his hands on the shoulder of a seated Duvalier: ‘I have chosen him.’ The campaign culminated in a referendum held on 14 June. The ballot came with a printed ‘Yes’. Out of a total population of four million, some 2,800,000 voted in favour and 3,234 against, representing a 99.89 per cent victory. A new constitution was drafted to conform to popular demand. On 22 June the president took a solemn oath before the entire diplomatic corps. He was an hour late and began reading a ninety-minute speech. His audience had to stand, but after a while a German diplomat, through sheer fatigue, took his seat. Duvalier stopped, turned around and instructed a protocol officer to ask him to rise again.36
A few weeks later, in honour of the President for Life, the state press released a booklet entitled Catechism of the Revolution. It contained catchy phrases designed to be committed to memory. Chapter One set the tone:
Q – Who is Duvalier?
A – Duvalier is the Greatest Patriot of all time, the Emancipator of the Masses, the Renovator of the Haitian Nation, the Champion of National Dignity, Chief of the Revolution and President for Life of Haiti.
Q – By which name can Duvalier also be identified?
A – Duvalier is also the worthy heir of blood of the Dessalinien ideal, made President for Life to save us.37
Like the great independence fighter Jean-Jacques Dessalines, who had declared himself emperor in 1804, François Duvalier now had a life term. In September a decree ordered portraits of Duvalier and his hero Dessalines to be displayed in every classroom in every school, private, public or clerical.38
Haiti, by 1965, was in dire straits. American financial assistance, which in 1960 had amounted to slightly less than half of the country’s public expenditures, had come to a complete halt. The country was an exporter of coffee and sisal, but prices on the international market had collapsed. Tourism had dwindled, largely as a result of the reign of terror imposed by the macoutes. Commerce and industry suffered from endless demands for contributions to austerity funds, national bonds or government lotteries.39
None of the electoral promises to campaign against hunger, poverty, illiteracy and injustice were fulfilled. Unemployment was increasing, while illiteracy was higher than before. With 65 per cent of all funds devoted to state security, most public services were neglected. Abandoned cars lay rusting in the streets. Once-beautiful parks were overgrown with brush and weeds. Deaths from starvation were reported from Cayes and Jeremie, two areas in the southern peninsula where the harvest was usually abundant.40
Despite a climate of fear and insecurity, however, the death toll was relatively low. As in North Korea, roughly 7 to 8 per cent of the population were able to vote with their feet. Poor people illegally crossed the border into the Dominican Republic or sailed across the Windward Passage to Cuba. Those who were better off fled to the Bahamas, hoping to enter the United States. By the middle of the 1960s four out of five of the country’s best lawyers, doctors, engineers, teachers and other professionals lived in exile. Those who remained in Haiti were crushed into apathy.41
Duvalier himself lived like a recluse, rarely seen, occasionally heard, a prisoner in his own palace. He alone made all the decisions. Like Mussolini he occupied himself with every detail of government. He decided not only who was to be killed and who was to be spared, but also what kind of material should be used for a new road, who should be granted a university degree and which spelling should be used in Creole.42
But enthusiasm, even enforced at the barrel of a gun, was waning. The country was peaceful but prostrate. For the first time in many years the celebrations to mark 22 June, a date which replaced 22 May as the high point in the dictator’s calendar, were toned down.43
In November 1965 Duvalier showed himself in broad daylight, visiting several shops in the capital. It was apparently a reaction to hostile broadcasts from New York, taunting him for being too afraid to leave the palace. His bullet-proof Mercedes-Benz was followed by half a dozen sedans packed with bodyguards to ensure his safety. A few days later the president visited several orphanages. His appearance, according to the official release published in the newspapers, provoked ‘delirious enthusiasm’.44
On 2 January 1966 Duvalier struck a new tone in his New Year speech to the nation. It was time, he announced, to put an end to the explosive phase of the Duvalierist Revolution. Having swept away the ‘political, social and economic superstructure of the former regime’, the moment had come to begin rebuilding the economy. The curfew was ended. Roadblocks were removed, the streets cleaned up. The presidential palace received a fresh coat of paint. The macoutes were reined in.45
Duvalier refurbished his image, projecting himself as a benign and elderly statesman, the spiritual leader of the black world. In April the President for Life welcomed the King of Kings, Haile Selassie, Emperor of Ethiopia. Before he landed the airport was hastily renamed Aéroport François Duvalier. Its new access road was christened Avenue Haile Selassie. Coverage from the local press, radio and television was lavish and adulatory. Duvalier was unusually open with the international press that was invited to Haiti by the regime’s new public-relations firm. In a series of interviews, he appeared cordial and self-assured, candidly admitting that there was indeed censorship in the media, which he deemed necessary to protect the people from false reporting. One correspondent described him as ‘charming, cooperative and thoroughly relaxed’.46
More public appearances followed. In June he attended a football tournament with his son Jean-Claude. A few days later he took his daughter Marie-Denise to the opening ceremony of the annual congress of the Caribbean Travel Association. For the first time since 1963 he showed himself at a diplomatic function, toasting the British ambassador at a reception organised to mark the birthday of Queen Elizabeth II.47
Duvalier, his people were told, was a great statesman acclaimed by international figures. A local newspaper published a statement attributed to Haile Selassie. ‘You must remain president, so that this people may continue to benefit from your goodness. I have understood, from visiting you, from having seen, why this people and this nation love you so much.’ The quotation was a fabrication concocted by one of the president’s ghost writers.48
Duvalier created the impression that he was a leader of international stature, a statesman with direct access to Washington and the Vatican. In June he gave a CBS interview to Martin Agronsky. Seated in his gold and blue throne at the National Palace, he intimated that he was in ‘close touch’ with President Johnson to discuss the renewal of American aid. But his contacts with the White House were ‘privileged matter not to be discussed publicly’. Later that year the Vatican restored links with Haiti and granted Duvalier the right to appoint his own bishops. The President for Life appeared on radio and television to make the agreement appear the result of close collaboration between him and Pope Paul VI.49
Duvalier also worked on his image as a great writer, historian, ethnologist, poet and philosopher. Most of all, Duvalier was the father of Duvalierism, which found expression in the publication of his Essential Works. As he put it, ‘when one is a leader one must have a doctrine. Without a doctrine you cannot direct a people.’ The two first volumes appeared in May 1966, to much acclaim, greeted with glowing newspaper reviews, as well as endless laudatory letters written by prominent members of the community. Excerpts were read on radio in a five-hour programme, subsequently retransmitted by all stations in the capital. Duvalier, listeners were told, was a giant in the same category as Kipling, Valéry, Plato, St Augustine and de Gaulle. ‘He is the greatest doctrine-giver of the century.’50
Gift sets were presented to schools and other educational institutions. The two hefty tomes were also awarded to outstanding students, who, apparently on command, wrote more adulatory letters, all published in the newspapers.51
A high point came in September as the legislative chamber passed a decree awarding Duvalier the title of Grand Master of Haitian Thought. They designated his birthday as Day of National Culture, and demanded that everyone should learn at least three-quarters of the Essential Works by heart, even though 90 per cent of the population were illiterate.52
Duvalier’s sixtieth birthday was celebrated over four days, in a style befitting a dictator fully in control of his country. Mardi Gras, the Haitian carnival, was brought forward to heighten the festive mood. Beauty queens were flown in from Miami and the Dominican Republic. Poetry readings were held, with pride of place given to the works of François Duvalier. Leading politicians, soldiers, scholars, businessmen and civil servants presented tributes. A delegation of 2,000 uniformed schoolchildren paraded in front of the palace. The macoutes paraded, the soldiers paraded.53
The festivities were spoilt, however, after a bomb exploded inside an ice-cream cart, killing two and injuring forty. Suspecting a military coup, Duvalier reshuffled the leadership and had nineteen officers of the palace guard thrown into Fort Dimanche, a dungeon on the outskirts of the capital. For good measure two ministers were also placed under arrest. On 8 June Duvalier arrived at Fort Dimanche in full military uniform and army helmet, personally presiding over the execution of the nineteen suspects, tied to stakes on a rifle range.54
Two weeks later, on 22 June, as the country marked the third anniversary of Duvalier’s election as President for Life, a captive audience of thousands was assembled in front of the palace. In a great show of force, Duvalier solemnly took a roll call of the nineteen officers, pausing theatrically after each name. ‘All of them have been shot,’ he announced in the end, sending shock waves through the crowd. ‘I am an arm of steel, hitting inexorably,’ he exclaimed. Then he described himself as the embodiment of the nation, on a par with other great leaders like Atatürk, Lenin, Nkrumah and Mao.55
The cult of personality was further cranked up over the following months, culminating in the tenth anniversary of the revolution. Gold coins in four denominations were minted, carrying the president’s effigy. A compilation of his Essential Works was published as Breviary of a Revolution. Like the Little Red Book, which had just appeared, it came in a small format, easily tucked inside a pocket. The newspapers were filled with adulatory reports, ‘sickeningly transparent and endlessly repeated’ according to the American Embassy. A few days before the main event, Duvalier spoke to the nation, referring to himself as ‘the God you have created’. Mass parades were held over the following two days. A François Duvalier Bridge, a François Duvalier Library, a François Duvalier Swimming Pool (Olympic size) and a François Duvalier International Air Terminal were opened.56
On 22 September the president spoke again, referring to himself in the third person. He listed his many achievements, and then concluded: ‘We are superior blacks, because no other blacks in the world have accomplished an historical epic. This is why, without indulging in any narcissism and without any sense of superiority, we believe ourselves, we blacks of Haiti, superior to all other blacks in the world. This is why, my dear friends, I want to tell you today that your Chief is considered a Living Sun by blacks throughout the world. It is said that he has lighted the revolutionary conscience of the blacks of the American continent and of the universe.’57
Duvalier was a manipulator of men, not the masses. He may have been a champion of the poor, but he showed little interest in mobilising them, even for the greater glory of his own person. He rarely left the palace, and never travelled the country. The macoutes ensured that thousands turned up on the lawns of his palace to dutifully acclaim him several times a year, but otherwise the vast majority of people were left alone. There was no official ideology, no all-encompassing party, no attempt to institute thought control, even though dissent was prohibited. The radio occasionally broadcast his speeches, but until 1968 stations in the north of the country were too weak for reception. Newspapers carried his pronouncements, but were rarely seen in the impoverished countryside, where few could read.58
Duvalier was a dictator’s dictator, a man who wielded naked power without the pretence of ideology, despite all the talk about revolution. He ruled alone, from his mahogany desk, an automatic pistol within reach, a few palace guards behind the nearest door. There was no junta, no faction, no clique, no true party except in name, only underlings vying for his attention, hoping to supplant each other by demonstrations of absolute loyalty. Duvalier, suspicious of everyone, was single-minded in exploiting their foibles, manipulating their emotions, testing their loyalty. It helped that he occasionally miscalculated, crushing friends and foes alike.59
His network of willing accomplices extended all the way to the countryside. Even in the most remote part of the country, the president was popular. No public official ever claimed a good decision as his own. Deputies filled meetings with accolades to their leader. Every positive development, including a successful rainy season, was held to radiate from Duvalier.60
It was a comparatively small network of loyalties, but it was enough to sustain his regime. The remaining four million mattered very little to him. They were accustomed to predatory governments. They lived in fear at worst, apathy and subservience at best.
Nonetheless, a small commando of professional soldiers, properly equipped and trained, could easily have toppled the regime. It never happened, largely thanks to the United States. After the disaster of April 1961, when a group of Cuban refugees trained by the CIA tried to land in the Bay of Pigs to overthrow Castro, there was no realistic chance of the United States trying to intervene in Haiti. And even if Washington viewed Duvalier with revulsion, he, unlike Castro, was an ally in the midst of the Cold War. Duvalier exploited the relationship to the fullest. He could be stubborn, unpredictable, irascible, but he never truly severed all the links. He knew how to insult the Americans even as he took advantage of their economic aid.61
Duvalier’s best propaganda vehicle in Washington was communism. For a decade Duvalier played up the threat from the left, labelling his real and imagined enemies as underground agents of Cuba and Moscow.
In December 1968 two rival parties combined to form the United Party of Haitian Communists. They were committed to overthrowing Duvalier. In March 1969 they picked the only village in Haiti without a houngan and took down the regime’s flag. Duvalier responded with a huge witch-hunt as dozens of people were shot or hanged in public, many more forced to flee into the mountains. Every book even vaguely related to communism became taboo, its mere possession a crime punishable by death. When Nelson Rockefeller, the governor of New York, visited Port-au-Prince three months later, Duvalier was able to assure him that the communist threat had been eliminated. It was the start of yet another rapprochement with the United States.62
However, the press photograph released for the occasion showed an ailing Duvalier leaning on Rockefeller for support. Papa Doc was frail, in declining health, looking much older than his sixty-two years. He began eliminating all opposition to his son being designated as his heir. In January 1971 Jean-Claude was named as his successor. A referendum was dutifully held, although among the 2,391,916 votes one was apparently negative. François Duvalier died of a heart attack three months later, on 21 April 1971. His reign was a few months short of that of Henri Christophe (1806–20). His son was installed in the first hour of 22 April, as ever a lucky date for the Duvalier family.63
Thousands of Haitians filed by their late ruler’s body as he lay in state at the National Palace. Duvalier was dressed in his favourite black frock coat, resting in a glass-topped, silk-lined coffin. Losing a dictator can be as traumatic as having to live under one, but despite widespread apprehension that chaos would follow his disappearance, complete calm prevailed. His body was buried first in the National Cemetery, but later transferred to a grandiose mausoleum erected by his son. When Baby Doc himself fell from power in 1986 an angry crowd demolished Papa Doc’s final resting place.