Maxine Waters: “I am told that they were given assurances that there would be an election and there would be polling places in all of…”

“I am told that they were given assurances that there would be an election and there would be polling places in all of the provinces and that the rumors that we were hearing about the CEP not having the polling places in Cite Soleil and Bellair would not happen. So when they said it I was suspicious, and I thought that perhaps she was saying that to try to appease them at the time. But we know that the Secretary of State has not paid any attention to Haiti. This is not on her radar, and I did not expect that there would be any follow-through to ensure that the people would have access to the ballot. As a matter of fact, they did have the polling places. But people got up in the wee hours of the morning, and they walked for hours, and they stood in line and they demanded that the polling place be open. When they got there, the polling places were supposed to be open. They were not. They demanded they open them. They stayed in line, and they voted in record numbers. They voted in record numbers. And that is why, when the announcement came that somehow his majority had fell below 50 percent, we were all upset, and I fired off a press release that was not too nice at all. The Haitian people have suffered tremendously for decades. Haiti has been ruled by brutal dictators such as Papa Doc and Baby Doc Duvalier. They really were doing the bidding of the elites there.…”