1980, November – December: (Carter Repudiated, the Duvaliers Celebrate, Forty Journalists Jailed to Miami, $40 Million in Foreign Reserves Vanished, $20 Mill…

1980, November – December: (Carter Repudiated, the Duvaliers Celebrate, Forty Journalists Jailed to Miami, $40 Million in Foreign Reserves Vanished, $20 Million for Michèle’s Shopping Sprees, the Gourde Slides, Berrouet Rings His Hand-Bell to Silence a Human Rights Speech, and $170 Million in Aid for 1981): In November, American voters overwhelmingly repudiated Jimmy Carter and his governessy brand of foreign policy. The Duvaliers threw a lavish gala to celebrate the incumbent’s defeat and moved aggressively to, as Time put it, jail the news — all told some forty newsmen including such hardy veterans as Radio Métropole’s Marc Garcia were rusticated to Miami, there to contemplate their sins; repentant, they would gradually be issued the entry visas that would allow them to come home, but those remaining in Port-au-Prince tempered their words. Despite government admonitions, the news refused to stay jailed for long: by the end of 1980, confidence was shaken by the revelation that foreign exchange reserves had dwindled by some $40 million over the previous year — rumor had it that a good portion of the deficit had been caused by the president’s withdrawal of $20 million to fund the shopping sprees abroad of his new wife. The gourde, for many years interchangeable with the U.S. dollar at a rate of five to one, began to trade at six and even seven to one. Buoyed by the U.S. election results, the government took an aggressive stance toward the foreign donor community even as it held out its hand: meeting with officials from all the principal donor countries, Minister Berrouet drowned the speech of a lame-duck Carter administration official who sought to mention human rights abuses — ringing a hand-bell, Berrouet intoned that human rights statements were not acceptable and ordered the official to pass to the technical part of your speech. Cowed, all present made no further disagreeable allusions, indeed agreeing to a twenty-percent increase — to $170 million for 1981 — of Haiti’s dole from the international community.