Ask President Obama to Intervene in Haiti Now!

Dear Mr. President:

I am writing to ask that the United States take immediate action regarding the situation in Haiti. We have a responsibility not only as a good neighbor to address the happenings there, but also because US policy has contributed to the state that the Haitian people are now in.

As a Black man, I'm sure you can understand the frustration of African peoples as they struggle to be heard within a global system which consistently drowns out their voices. The United Nations mission is not helping Haitians, it is occupying Haiti and murdering unarmed people.

The UN has repeatedly denied political participation to thousands of Haitians, who have called for the Lavalas party to be allowed access to the November 28th elections. It has infected the population with cholera, its' Sri Lankan peacekeepers have been sent back to their country for raping children, and its' Brazilian contingent has consistently violated Haitians' human rights. Brazilian MINUSTAH--which lead the UN mission in Haiti--have repeatedly arrested and imprisoned young Black men without affording them due process, have beaten and shelled unarmed civilians and several months ago they murdered a well-known human rights activist in Cite Soleil. Now, they are picking off protesting Haitians in the streets with assault rifles.

The people of Haiti are rioting because they feel helpless. No one will isten to their very just concerns, because they are written off as angry Black people who are never satisfied. I'm sure you realize that during our own Civil Rights era--which I know you hold in very high esteem--Black people were viewed in much the same light. Why is it wrong for Haitians to demand that they stop being occupied, imprisoned and beaten? Martin Luther King Jr., were he still alive, would most assuredly have stood in solidarity with the people there. I am asking you to immediately do the same.

Here is what you can do:

1. Allow your conscience, faith and experiences as a Black man in America and as a community organzier to guide your decision making processes with regard to Haiti.

2. Make an immediate speech via the mainstream media and on social media sites calling for calm in Haiti and for a respecting of Haitiians' human rights. Call on the UN to cease their killing of Haitian civilians at once.

3. Find a way to insure that Lavalas--the people's clear choice of a representative party--be allowed to participate in the upcoming elections. Deploy U.S. Marines and Navy, who I personally witnessed doing great work in Haiti following the eartquake there, to restore order. Put them in charge of guarding the ballot boxes and the voters who are brave enough to cast their votes.

4. Take it upon yourself personally to make sure that Haiti receives the humanitarian and logistical support it needs to begin the rebuilding process. Call for an immediate release of all U.S. funds promised to Haiti.

5. Engage Afrocentric-minded scholars and diplomats in the Haitian electoral and rebuilding processes. Haiti's values are more clearly aligned with such thought, and it is only through doing so that true peace and prosperity in Haiti can ever be achieved.

Please help the people of Haiti right now, Mr. President. If you don't, the country will continue on in a downward spiral, and the ancestors will haunt your conscience for the rest of your life for the blind eye that you have turned to the Haitian people in their most desperate time of need.

In Good Faith,

The Undersigned