1985, January – August: (The Referendum That Backfired: 30,000 March Shouting Down with Misery and Hunger, Lafontant’s Plebiscite on the Presidency for Life …

1985, January – August: (The Referendum That Backfired: 30,000 March Shouting Down with Misery and Hunger, Lafontant’s Plebiscite on the Presidency for Life Subject to Opposition Parties and a Prime Minister, Only Jesus Christ Is Forever, Radio Soleil Silenced and 200 Priests March in Protest, the Cabinet in Milice Denim at Madame Max’s Party, 99.9% Vote Yes but Nobody Believes It, and Désinor Founds His Own Party While Lafontant Is Bundled to Montreal): The crowd of 30,000 shouted down with misery and hunger — the rising tide of protest had begun to lap against the capital. The ferment the young priest saw was being duplicated throughout urban Haiti. On the fourteenth anniversary of his succession, the president had relaxed Lafontant’s ban on pamphleteering and political parties, but still in the thrall of his dark angel he negated any positive effects by announcing on June 29, 1985, a referendum. Lafontant’s brainchild, the vote would ask Haitians to allow the creation of a new post of Prime Minister and legalize opposition parties — both subject to the electorate’s approval of the Presidency for Life. Clumsily conceived, the vote was greeted with widespread apathy; aside from a few polling stations where free kleren was being passed out, few bothered to vote. The electorate had been encouraged in its passive resistance by the priests of the Ti Legliz movement — only Jesus Christ is forever, thundered one preacher, and Radio Soleil carried the message nationwide. Opting yet again to jail the news, Lafontant ordered the expulsion of three foreign priests associated with the broadcasting operation; in protest, more than two hundred priests and religious workers marched in Port-au-Prince, vowing not to be silenced. At the party held annually every August by Mme Max Adolphe at her Pétionville home to honor the milice, the president and all his cabinet — including the mulâtre finance minister Merceron — appeared in gwo blé, the regulation denim uniform of the milice; the message was unmistakable. The government announced that 99.9% of the electorate had voted yes — the opposition, announced Press Minister Chanoine, must cooperate or retire. But 1985 was not 1961 or 1971, and the plebiscite device no longer worked. The final blow to the regime’s credibility was dealt by one of its own: Clovis Désinor, once faithful minister to Papa Doc, deprived he felt of the presidency that was legitimately his, decried the fact that fifty percent of the nation had never had the privilege of electing a leader, and announced he would found his own political party. The vote intended to settle matters had instead inflamed them, and for this Lafontant was bundled aboard a flight to Montreal — from there, as Canada’s winter set in, he spent most of his time on the phone to Port-au-Prince, plotting in calls that were recorded and delivered to the palace. Coalesced now around the president were all those who felt a stake in Duvalierism’s survival — Merceron, Madame Max and her macoutes, the Bennetts — even Ti Pouche Douyon was again allowed inside the tent.