When despair sets in, the only thing that we have left is our ability to hope. Usually, it is easier to give up during moment of hardship than it is to imagine a better tomorrow. The price we pay for our freedom to imagine could often lead to our death, which is especially true in the case of Haiti.
People know the symptoms of the disease that is set to eradicate the hope of our nation. The fear of dying has reduced many of our compatriots to talkers instead of doers. In this time of great desperation, Haiti no longer needs talkers. We have to pay the price of hope at any cost necessary.
We are losing a wave of generations to idleness and isolation. Our children have no other vision than obtaining a visa to foreign land, primarily the United States. The brains of the country are leaving in record number with no thought of returning. We must take a stand against this inaction or irresponsibility that is corrupting the spirit of our intellectual community. The belief that Haiti’s problem is not or should not be their primary concern is contrary to any logical intelligence. We must pay the price of hope.
Recently, I have been listening and reading the views of many friends living outside of Haiti. For the most part, many of them firmly believe that the Haitian diaspora is really the last best hope for the country’s development. As much as I agree that the diaspora has an integral and necessary role to play in Haiti’s path to success, I am a little doubtful that real change is impossible without the diaspora controlling the country.
We have many people in the diaspora community, who strongly believe that the current Haitian constitution is a detriment to the country’s own good. Many of them focused solely on the fact that our constitution does not recognized dual citizenship. Others pointed out some useless descriptions in the constitution such as, a child’s right to be loved by their parents. In my view, Haiti does not suffer from a lack of laws, but rather from a lack of people willing to follow the laws.
As a people, we often tend to contradict ourselves. Among the same group, who are calling for an amendment or annulations of the current constitution, you would find many who would be quick to point out the reasons they want to go back to Haiti is because they would not have to worry about paying taxes on their properties. Most Haitians are only concerned about the injustice that directly affects them, and this is the main reasons we can not come together to bring change in our country. Our hopes are so fragmented that it is impossible to unite. We must start to hope for the same end goal, and must be willing the pay the price for that hope.
It is a great injustice to only think that our only way of helping Haiti is to take control of it. There is no doubt that our past and present governments have left little for us to be proud of, but the reflection of a few should not obscure the judgment of many. The future of Haiti remains the main responsibility of those who have never left Haiti. I believe there are many of them who are capable of leading the country, but we have a responsibility coming from the outside to find them and take them under our wings. Those people have no alternative, but to live in Haiti; hence they have more to lose if Haiti keeps sliding on the slope of hopelessness.
We must empower the people of Haiti, and not have them rely on us. We must share our wisdom with them, and not think for them. We have to advice them, and not dictate them. We must consider them as our family, and not as strangers. We have a responsibility to help them because it is our duty; therefore we should never feel as if we are doing them a favor. This is the kind of hope I have for us, as a people. This is the kind of hope that we must transcend into reality. It is definitely the kind of hope that is worth the price.
As it was pronounced by a great American President, the only thing we have to fear is fear itself; we have to find a way to obliterate the fear of our own brothers and sisters in our psyche. We ought to stop believing that our life is more worthy than those who have nothing. The creed that each human life is as valuable as another human life must be the guide of our conscience. Hoping is believing; and through a belief every impossibility becomes possible.
Let us never live without hope, for the moment we stop hoping is the time we stop breathing. As long as we are alive, we shall survive, and survival is founded on the premise of hope. Together, let us hope for a better tomorrow. Let’s join hands in unison, and chant the song of hope, even if it would cost us our lives, we shall never cease to hope. The price of hope is freedom of the soul. Free at last, free at last, let us hope to be truly free at last.