Word: papas
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Their aim was to rid the country of the flag that Francois ("Papa Doc") Duvalier introduced in 1965 and that has since come to symbolize the dictatorial rule of the Duvaliers. Last week, six days after Papa Doc's son and successor, President-for-Life Jean-Claude ("Baby Doc") Duvalier, had fled to France with his family to avoid a bloody popular uprising, the hated standard was pulled down for the last time. Beginning this week, on the orders of Haiti's new five-man ruling government council, the palace guard will hoist the red-and-blue Haitian flag that...
...jubilantly, "He flew away; he flew away!" Others proclaimed, "Vive America!" and waved the Stars and Stripes, as well as banners of red and blue, the colors of Haiti's flag before it was replaced in 1964 by Jean-Claude's father and predecessor as President-for-Life, Francois ("Papa Doc") Duvalier...
Mobs of Haitians singled out monuments to the memory of Papa Doc for destruction. At the Leogane traffic circle south of Port-au-Prince, hundreds of people brought a commemorative ironwork structure crashing down. At the national cemetery in the capital, a mob tore apart the late dictator's marble- and-granite mausoleum. Although bodies in nearby crypts were disinterred, Papa Doc's remains were said to have been removed to safety. The tin-roofed house & on 22nd September Street, where the elder Duvalier had once lived, was stoned and set alight. Rampaging groups attacked properties owned by Michele Duvalier...
...enforce his rule, Duvalier created the thuggish Tonton Macoutes, Creole for bogeymen. Swaggering through the streets, they terrorized the population, extorted money and tortured and killed untold numbers. In January 1971, Papa Doc decreed that his tubby son Jean-Claude, 19, would succeed him in the presidency. Haitians were called to the polls to ratify the succession of the ) moon-faced playboy, whose interests seemed to revolve around women and fast cars. According to government figures, Baby Doc won the plebiscite handily...
...first it appeared that Jean-Claude might be a more enlightened despot. He promised an end to repression and an economic revolution. But he actually made few real improvements. True, political opponents were no longer executed as often as they had been under Papa Doc, but the son imitated the father in using the army and the secret police, the dreaded Tonton Macoute (a term for bogeyman in Haiti's Creole dialect) to brutalize the population...