The Sydney Morning Herald from Sydney, New South Wales, Australia • Page 33

Extra Island in the grip of voodoo and violence Violence and insurrection are nothing new to Haiti, the Caribbean island threatened by US invasion. Hi "AITI in the 1960s provided a perfect setting for The Comedians, Graham Greene's novel about the uprooted and uncommitted being forced to take a stand when the world around them was plunged into barbarism. This was the Haiti of President "Papa Doc" Duvalier TYRANT: Papa Doc Duval ier. VOODOO POWER: Haitian revenge. and his hideous henchmen, the brutal Tontons Macoutes the secret police named after "Uncle a giant bogeyman Haitians grow up to believe carries away naughty children in his macoute (knapsack).

The Tontons or the Volunteers for National Security as they were ludicrously known were a private militia founded in 1958 by dictator Papa Doc. They wore sunglasses and blue uniforms with red sashes and their methods were brutal and simple: when they encountered anyone they thought didn't support Papa Doc, they beat them up or murdered them. For more than 20 years, they were led by a fearsome woman, Madame Max Adolphe, a close friend and rock-solid supporter of Papa Doc. She is said to have supervised the torture of children and the elderly and kept video recordings of the horrors. A former mayor of the capital Port-au-Prince, she liked to arm herself with an Uzi machine-gun.

The Tontons, who numbered about 15,000, were locally based and operated independently. In each community they used their absolute power based entirely on the fact that they were well armed to extort, pillage, rape, terrorise and murder. Nobody in Haiti could expect to escape the appalling poverty without either belonging to the Tontons or paying them off. Their favourite trick was to drive past an individual or a group and aim short bursts of machine-gun fire. If they could lind a large crowd to cut down with gunfire, it was even better.

They liked to shoot people through the eyes. They employed hundreds of spies who were paid a pittance to pass on information and gossip about possible dissidents. In 1986, when a popular uprising ousted Baby Doc and a military junta took over, many of the Tontons surrendered to the army, although many others died at the hands of revenge mobs. Many of the Tontons were voodoo priests: a trademark was to threaten to turn people into zombies. Eighty per cent of iiaaiiiMittiiifcuiidii MADAME ADOLPHE pteodtefii Ufa Is fascinating crossroads ft 'ft' ll I oftheOrien, ff nfUTkrA ft JJ' pU Ai uTjajsi vl -Tli, This is it.

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Recently members of the rightist paramilitary force Revolutionary Armed Front for the Haitian People threatened to use magic power and other voodoo charms against foreign invaders. Voodoo priests, according to a combination of lore and some historical accounts, cast spells that caused yellow fever, typhoid and other tropical diseases to break out among US Marines who occupied Haiti from 1915 to 1934. Haiti's war of independence from the French began with a giant voodoo ceremony. Today, Haiti's de facto president, Emile Jonassaint, warns that he will use all forces including voodoo against the US. Two of Haiti's key military leaders are reportedly voodoo worshippers and have consulted voodoo priests, or houngans, for counselling on ways to resist US threats to use force.

In much of the Western world, voodoo is widely stereotyped as a backward practice associated with animal sacrifices, dolls with pins stuck in them and zombies terrorising the living. But for Haitians voodoo is a source of strength, a refuge from daily struggles. They seek out voodoo priests when they are sick, need a bountiful harvest or wish someone to fall in love with them. Even exiled president Jean-Bertrand Aristide, a Catholic priest who was ousted by a military coup in 1991, used to have voodoo gods sewn into his religious vestments to show his solidarity with the masses. Haitian history and voodoo are intertwined.

Voodoo was brought over from Africa by slaves who mixed in Catholic beliefs. The slaves hid their African beliefs behind Catholic practices to get around French laws prohibiting voodoo worship. As a result, many voodoo gods, or loos, have Catholic saints as their counterparts. Voodoo priests are masters in the use of herbs, plants and animals for medicinal purposes. And in a country severely lacking in doctors, the voodoo priest is often the only provider of medical services.

Claudette Munro, administrator of a decrepit children's hospital in the northern seaside city of Gonaives, said voodoo priests had concocted a potent weapon should US troops invade AIDS powder. Voodoo priests have been ransacking the graves of people who died of AIDS and stealing their bones to turn into AIDS powder, said Munro, who is an ardent foe of Aristide. The priests are the only ones ho have the antidote, she said. "This may sound ludicrous but if you know anything about Haitian culture you will realise this is not a joke," Munro said. "Voodoo has always been a powerful weapon in our history, a tool by which to defend ourselves.

It has always been a part of our struggle." in jo 102 'Ki man iwt 02 sut ntT iisiDf. cciwODiTo K(i witnoui rtiwn Mounts wi utouioDtriM siitim to huisiosch mm 34 SUN-HCRALD. Septginber 18, 1994.