HLLN – 2/1/08 Blan Mannan by Feliks Moriso Lewa | What’s in a name? Some names,(the name Jean Jacques Dessalines!) horrify enslavers, tyrants and despots,everywhere | Jan. 1, 1804 – Jan. 1, 2008 Recalling Dessalines’ Law…

Recommended HLLN Link:
January 1, 2008 – Another Independence day Under Occupation
www.margueritelaurent.com/pressclips/Jan1_08.html#08

Three ideals of Dessalines
www.margueritelaurent.com/pressclips/dessalines.html#3

In this post

What’s in a name?
www.margueritelaurent.com/pressclips/dessalines.html#horrify

Blan Mannan by Feliks Moriso Lewa | Translated to English by members of HLLN
www.margueritelaurent.com/pressclips/dessalines.html#mannanEnglish
-Kreyol Original: Blan mannan Travay Feliks Moriso Lewa
www.margueritelaurent.com/pressclips/dessalines.html#mannan

Dessalines’ Law for Haiti
www.margueritelaurent.com/pressclips/dessalines.html#Law

What’s in a name?
www.margueritelaurent.com/pressclips/dessalines.html#horrify

Some names horrify enslavers, tyrants and despots, everywhere…..
Triumphant and proud, free and sovereign. Not humbled by the enslavers lash nor
beaten by the greatest armies of his time. He left this legacy to us. He said:

“Recall everything I have sacrificed to fly to your defense – relatives, children, wealth, so that now the only riches I possess is your freedom. Recall that my name horrifies all those who are enslavers, and that tyrants and despots everywhere only bring themselves to utter it when they curse the day I was born. Remember, if you should ever discard or forget the law that the God who watches over your well being has dictated to me for your happiness, you will deserve the fate that inures to ungrateful peoples. “

Jean Jacques Dessalines, Haitian Act of Independence, January 1, 1804

(Translation by Ezili Dantò for HLLN’s FreeHaitiMovement – Dessalines is Rising, Oct. 17th commemorations
www.margueritelaurent.com/law/events.html )

*

Quote:
“..rappelle-toi que j’ai tout sacrifié pour voler à ta défense, parents, enfants, fortune, et que maintenant je ne suis riche que de ta liberté; que mon nom est devenu en horreur à tous les peuples qui veulent l’esclavage, et que les despotes et les tyrans ne le prononcent qu’en maudissant le jour qui m’a vu naître ; et si jamais tu refusais ou recevais en murmurant les lois que le génie qui veille à tes destinées me dictera pour ton bonheur, tu mériteras le sort des peuples ingrats. “
www.margueritelaurent.com/pressclips/dessalines.html#libete

Blan Mannan by Feliks Moriso Lewa
Translated to English by members of HLLN

Blan mannan – Lowly Pariah white

Don’t put words in my mouth
i say there are good whites and there are bad whites
the worst of the whites are the lowly pariah whites

Don’t make me say what I’ve never said
i say there are good blacks and there are bad blacks
the worst of the blacks are the rich blacks

I’m told French whites now do whatever they want
in Jean-Jacques Dessalines’ country
tell them I’m damn well coming to kick them out

I’m told the French are kicking
Dessalines’ children in the ass
tell them to prepare for my wrath
I’m planning another November 1803 especially for them

Tell them that when they hear me coming
they better pack up and leave
no matter how bleak the night
a new dawn inevitably will come

There are good blacks and there are bad blacks
there are good whites and there are bad whites
Dessalines did not kill the Polish whites
the worst of the whites are the lowly pariah whites

Dessalines who is my history teacher
tells me the only good white
is the white that shoots the bad whites
Please, don’t make me say what I won’t say

****

English Translation by Frantz Jerome in collaboration with other members of the Haitian Lawyers Leadership Network, for the FreeHaitiMovement – Dessalines Is Rising, October 17th events
www.margueritelaurent.com/pressclips/dessalines.html

Ezili Dantò
HLLN
Oct. 5, 2006

PS.
Ezili Dantò’s Note: Different English equivalents for the pejorative term“Blan mannan” were put forward by the Haitians at HLLN including: “red neck,” “white trash,” “poor white,” “average farmer,” “pariah white.” And even “creole white” was put forward because, at one epoch in Haiti, the term “Creole” was also used to refer to all Europeans who were born or grew up in a colony. Another explanation offered was that when it’s used in common language in Haiti “blan mannan” usually means “yon blan ki pa kenbe kòl; ki sankoutcha; k ap mache sal oswa chifonnen nan lari.”

Any defects or limitation in the final translation and chosen English equivalents of this Moriso Lewa unofficial translation is the sole responsibility of Ezili Dantò as head of HLLN.

Dessalines’ Law
www.margueritelaurent.com/pressclips/dessalines.html#Law

Jean Jacques Dessalines’ Law for Haiti
Sèl blan ki bon blan se blan k met fizi sou move blan yo

On January 1, 2008, the 2004 anniversary of Haitii’s initial independence, as HLLN continues to promote and encourage dialogue and writings to celebrate the life, triumphs and ideals of Jean Jacques Dessalines, today we ask again, “what was Desalin’s law?” For he said:

Quote:

…”Recall everything I have sacrificed to fly to your defense – relatives, children, wealth, so that now the only riches I possess is your freedom. Recall that my name horrifies all those who are enslavers, and that tyrants and despots everywhere only bring themselves to utter it when they curse the day I was born. Remember, if you should ever discard or forget the law that the God who watches over your well being has dictated to me for your happiness, you will deserve the fate that inures to ungrateful peoples. “ Jean Jacques Dessalines, Haitian Act of Independence, January 1, 1804

Desalin’s Law is in Desalin’s 1805 constitution; it’s certainly in the Haitian Act of Independence. (See, Proclamation Pour Abjuration De La Nation Française– Liberte Ou La Mort! Du Général en chef du Peuple de Hayti
www.margueritelaurent.com/pressclips/dessalines.html#libete )

Desalin’s Law is most recognized by Haitians as follows:

“…Never again shall colonist or European set foot on this soil as master or landowner. This shall henceforward be the foundation of our constitution.”

“…No whiteman of whatever nation he may be, shall put his foot on this territory with the title of master or proprietor, neither shall he in future acquire any property therein…”

Dessalines’ ideals established Haiti as a Black nation. Dessalines’ Law dealt with the question of land ownership; the question of equitable wealth distribution in Haiti; how to keep Haitian sovereignty and uphold the well-being of the Black masses whose fathers were in Africa. (See, Three Ideals of Dessalines, www.margueritelaurent.com/pressclips/dessalines.html#3

After Haiti’s independence in 1804, when the mulattoes in Haiti sought to replace their defeated French fathers as masters, through the claiming of the hated enslavers plantation properties. Dessalines spoke up for the disinherited, nationalized the plantations, declaring all land the property of the state. Like today, the economic elites weren’t having it. In general, the few rich affranchis and still fewer powerful blacks claimed the plantations as their rightful inheritance and this battle split the nation in two with the defeated foreigners/colonists encouraging the Haitian dissension and fratricide as much as possible. Dessalines, is said to have responded, “How does it come to pass that since we have chased away the colonists, their children are claiming their property? The Blacks whose fathers are in Africa will then have nothing? Be careful of yourselves, Negroes and Mulattoes … the property we have conquered in spilling our blood belongs to all of us; I insist that it be shared with equity.”

Eventually, land was divvied up in Haiti, not according to blood, inheritance or economic class, but primarily because of merit and brave actions that had assisted the coming of independence and common good, and then also for political reasons of maintaining power. In general, land, in Haiti, was parceled out to the people. Thus, as compared to the economic elites elsewhere in Latin America, in Haiti, the economic elites’ wealth would, for the vast majority, (with some exceptions) initially NOT be based on the land the African warriors had liberated.

But alas, the Haitian Constitution was unilaterally amended by the US, in 1918, during their first occupation of Haiti to allow foreigners to own property in Dessalines’ land. The 1987 Constitution reasserted some of Dessalines’ Law. The 1991 and 2004 US-sponsored and orchestrated coup d’etats, very much like the Dessalines’ assassination and the first Haitian coup d’etat in 1806, have, similar aims: the reversals of Dessalines’ law in Haiti.

This epic struggle, of the US/Euro tribes’ goliath determination to dominate the materially poor Black masses in Haiti, continues….

Everyone knows at Ezili Dantò’s HLLN, “se Desalin ki pwofesè istwa nou” and thus, we share today how, through poetry (Blan Mannan) one of our greatest Haitian thinker/poets, Feliks Moriso Lewa, taught and extended Desalin’s Law and ideals for the empowerment of this generation of Haitian freedom fighters:

Blan mannan

Pinga fè m di sa m pa di
M di gen bon blan gen move blan
Pi move blan se blan mannan

Pa fè m di sa m pa janm di
M di gen bon nèg gen move nèg
Pi move nèg se gran nèg yo

Yo di m blan franse fè sa yo vle
Nan peyi Jan Jak Desalin lan
Di yo m ap vin fout yo deyò

Yo di m s ak kout pye blan franse
Ap trete pitit pitit Desalin yo
Di yo tann soukous mwen
M ap pare yon novanm 1803 pou yo

di yo lò yo tande m ap vini
Yo mèt mare pakèt yo pou y ale
Menm si l fè nwè kou lank
Wè pa wè fòk jou louvri

gen bon nèg gen move nèg
gen bon blan gen move blan
Desalin pat touye blan polonè
Pi move blan se blan mannan

Desalin ki pwofesè istwa m
Di m sèl blan ki bon blan
Se blan k met fizi sou move blan yo
Pa fè m di sa m pa vle di non.

Forwarded by Ezili’s Haitian Lawyers Leadership Network

January 1, 2008 – Another Independence day Under Occupation
www.margueritelaurent.com/pressclips/Jan1_08.html#08