Haiti's tragic history just keeps repeating itself

In Haiti, history repeats itself repeatedly.

- Clarence Page

And for what remains of Haiti’s troubled government, history seems to keep getting worse.

Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry and Kenyan President William Ruto signed an agreement in early March to fast-track a long-delayed deployment of Kenyan police officers to confront spiraling violence in the island nation.

But a day later, the Kenyan government put the brakes on the deployment. The feckless Prime Minister Henry, long propped up by Washington, resigned overnight.

Kenya would have to pause the deployment, they announced and would reevaluate once a new Haitian government is in place.

If only it were that easy. As tough as it may be to install a new Haitian government, it too often--has been harder still to keep one in place.

The news reminded me of my last trip to Haiti. With a group from the Committee to Protect Journalists, on whose board I was a member, I met in early 2004 with then-President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, a charismatic priest from the slums who first was elected in 1990 with about two-thirds of the vote.