Wyclef Jean Good Deeds RSS/NewsFeed by PartnerwithaStar

Wyclef Jean Brings Help, Hope To Haiti

info@partnerwithastar.com — Wed, 20 Dec 2006 16:49:54 +0200

Christian Science Monitor) This article was written by Amy Bracken.

When residents in the slums of Haiti's capital want to express rage or joy, they often throw a street party. Musical bands march through town, gathering crowds that almost overflow into the trash-filled canals that line the streets.

That was the scene when Grammy Award-winning Haitian-American hip-hop star Wyclef Jean — one of the founders of the hit group The Fugees — showed up in the Cité Soleil slum earlier this month.

One man standing on a truck yelling "Vive Wyclef!" said he thinks Jean will help him get a job. Others said they love Jean for the work he's doing for the Haitian people.

Jean's Yéle Haiti organization — launched last year to find and fund groups working in education, health care, and the environment — is already making a difference in the neediest communities. It is an increasingly visible — and audible — force for change across the country.

Jean's early success, observers say, lies in his star power and his reluctance to get involved in politics. This uniquely positions him to be a unifier in a stratified country, bringing together rich and poor, black and mulatto, and members of opposing political camps.

His willingness to appear with both rebel leaders who helped drive former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide from power and pro-Aristide gangsters has irked some Haitians. But even critics who question the long-term impact of Jean's humanitarian efforts don't deny the sense of hope he is bringing to people in the Western Hemisphere's poorest nation.

"Wyclef is one of the few people who is really able to bridge a divide in Haiti, reaching out to gang leaders, business leaders, donors ... this is very exciting," says Caroline Anstey, the World Bank's country director for Haiti and 15 other Caribbean countries. Anstey says Jean has enabled development projects to continue in dangerous areas in part by providing hope to the residents. "His focus on music and sports and young people is a very, very hopeful approach because it's really focusing on the next generation and bringing hope to people who up to now have had very little hope."

A 'Movement,' Not A Charity

Jean describes his motivation for starting Yéle Haiti in broad terms. "I think what happens is you're born and you die, but there's this little space in the middle — and from that little space emerge some of the greatest people with the greatest responsibilities. How did I get to that space? I don't know. My dad was a minister, so he was always talking to us about giving. ... I came to my country to help."

Jean sees Yéle as an expanding movement. "I always say that Yéle Haiti is not a charity. It's a movement," he says. "We don't really need your charity, we need your movement. So, physically, do something."

Yéle partnered recently with the Haitian cell phone company ComCEL to provide scholarships and other support for youths attending L'Athletique d'Haiti, a sports and tutoring program, and to rebuild schools and provide scholarships for children in Gonaives, a town devastated by floods in 2004.

Robert Duval, a former local soccer star now revered for his creation of L'Athletique d'Haiti, says his group gets a boost not just from the funds Yéle provides. "We've been here eight years, and we've been doing a relatively good job," he says, "but now Wyclef puts so much electricity into the job that we get to be known more, — and people get excited, and then the best comes out."

Bringing Hope

Through Yéle, 20 schools have been rebuilt, more than 2,000 people who weren't regularly receiving basic food now are, 1,700 previously unemployed men and women of all ages are working to clean the streets, and 3,754 students are receiving scholarships. With ongoing support from ComCEL, Yéle has pledged to almost double the number of scholarships in 2006, and is rolling out program expansions in higher education, environmental awareness, sports, food distribution, and HIV prevention.

And Yéle, from the Creole word for "cry" or "yell," is growing louder, with more initiatives being done through music.

Jean recently emceed a hip-hop contest in the Bel Air slum as part of the USAID-funded Clean Streets project. From 50 contestants in three different slums, Haitian rap star "Jimmy O" Alexandre and Jean selected four from each neighborhood to perform in Bel Air.

The crowd and Jean himself were stunned by the show. "I held my tears back because I'm a tough guy, but it was very emotional," Jean said later. "I mean, there was hope in their eyes. They're superstars in their own country. The world just doesn't know who they are yet, but they're going to know."

Jean, who said he learned to speak English by rhyming, says hip hop is universal and the best way for youths to communicate. He says he wants these Haitians to see themselves on television and to be discovered by the world. That's why he purchased Haitian TV station Telemax. One station feature will be the live finale of the hip hop competition.

ComCEL executive director Bernard Fils-Aime said the movement also involves broadening the horizons of the wealthy elite by connecting them with the poor majority. ComCEL and Yéle plan to do this by organizing soccer competitions between different kinds of neighborhoods, as well as through school trips to plant trees.

Jean says he hopes to produce all kinds of Haitian musicians through his label, Sak Pasé (What's Up) Records. "I think the Haitian people are just the coolest in the universe, you know? And I want to always let them know, y'all are jazzy, y'all are sexy, and don't let anybody twist that," he says.

Wyclef Jean starts scholarship program in Haiti

info@partnerwithastar.com — Tue, 19 Dec 2006 16:53:26 +0200

PORT-AU-PRINCE - Artist Wyclef Jean visited his native Haiti and inaugurated a scholarship program that strives to help kids stay in school. Dozens of Haitian youths mobbed the hip-hop star as he visited a slum Tuesday to inaugurate a program to support education in his impoverished native country.

The kids watched the former Fugees rapper perform an impromptu rendition of his new song, Gonaives, atop a truck in a soccer field in Cite Soleil, a seaside slum outside the capital of Port-au-Prince. They ran after him as he hopped on a small bicycle and rode around the field.

Jean, whose 1997 solo hit We Trying to Stay Alive was about Haitian slums, was visiting the L'Athletique d'Haiti Sports Academy, an after-school program in Cite Soleil that provides tutoring and sports training for 650 youths. He inaugurated an initiative to provide scholarships to help new participants stay in school, a requirement for the after-school program.

Free schools are rare in Haiti, and many families cannot afford tuition. Among the those mobbing Jean were 25 kids who have already received ''Wyclef scholarships'' with a grant of $23,800.

At least 100 more scholarships will be awarded in the first initiative by Yele Haiti, Jean's new foundation.

''What Sammy Sosa has done for the Dominican Republic, that's what I think I can do for Haiti,'' Jean said, referring to the Dominican-born baseball star who founded a charity for health in education in his country.

Yele Haiti is also planning a program to provide scholarships for 4,000 children in the northern city of Gonaives where floods killed more than 2,000 people in September. It also will rebuild 20 damaged schools.

ComCel, Haiti's largest mobile-phone provider, is funding the projects, pledging $500,000 for the first year, said Bernard Fils-Aime, the company's secretary-general.

Child Soldier Rehabilitation

info@partnerwithastar.com — Sun, 3 Dec 2006 00:05:38 +0200

Providing education, vocational training and counseling for imprisoned child gang members to prevent them from becoming hardened criminals when released.

NEED: Behind the high blue and white stone walls of the Delmas 33 prison complex in Port-au-Prince reside 101 boys who were born in the poorest Haitian slums and are now labeled as criminals and therefore rejected by society. The children, ranging from 10 to 17 years old, were recruited by armed gangs as “soldiers.” They can begin as messengers or lookouts, lured with money and food, following which they are drawn into escalating acts of violence or risk beatings or worse.

RESPONSE: Yéle Haiti is collaborating with Foundation PRODEV to introduce basic education to the boys and girls in jails and create a rehabilitation center or halfway house for them to go to when they are discharged. These children are victims, not criminals, and need to be given education and protection in order to escape the violence and prevent them from becoming hardened criminals when they are released

Once forgotten and without hope, these boys now have a chance at life through the Child Soldier Rehabilitation program which is managed by Foundation PRODEV and partly sponsored by Yéle Haiti. The initial contribution of Yéle Haiti has allowed PRODEV to get the program on its feet, and it has developed into what it is today through the collaboration of the Haitian government; namely the offices of the Prime Minister and the Minister of Social Affairs.

Together, they are providing solutions to improve the child prisoner situation in Haiti by turning the prison into a rehabilitation center. The children are still detained, but are being provided with an education and rehabilitation will give them the tools to become productive members of society rather than contributing to future insecurity in Haiti.

Yéle Haiti is also working with Rodney Montreuil, a teacher and community activist from Arizona, to train the imprisoned children in new technologies through a Digital Storytelling Project. The objective of this project is to help the children express themselves creatively and tell their own stories through photography, audio and video recording and written narratives. The best stories will be made into a collection which will be sold to raise funds to support the educational rehabilitation of these children.
CELEBRITIES CAN BE HEROES SO CAN YOU!
Search volunteer opportunities important to your favorite celebrity by visiting :
http://www.partnerwithastar.com

WFP and Wyclef Jean's "Yele Haiti" distribute food

info@partnerwithastar.com — Thu, 23 Nov 2006 20:45:02 +0200

Cite Soleil , 14 November 2005 - The launch of a new joint food distribution programme in two of the Haitian capital’s most violent and vulnerable neighborhoods was announced today by WFP and Yéle Haiti, founded by the Haitian singer/songwriter, Wyclef Jean, after the devastation of Tropical Storm Jeanne in 2004.

“Children fear not the storm, because after the storm, it gets calm, and that’s when the sun comes out. Yéle Haiti,” says Wyclef Jean.

Large scale food distributions had been significantly decreased or even stopped altogether last year in Cité Soleil and Bel Air because of the prevailing level of danger and violence.

Hip hop distributions

However, in June this year, Yéle Haiti organized local hip hop musicians to distribute rice, beans and vegetable oil right into the homes of some of the world’s poorest people. WFP has agreed to provide food for continued distributions in these two areas.

Burdened by unprecedented levels of poverty and a lack of services and infrastructure, Cité Soleil and Bel Air are the poorest slums in Haiti, which is itself the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.

Overall unemployment in Haiti is 80 percent, and even higher in these districts where there is little hope of getting a job. Open sewers run through the slum shacks, which are often built on mounds of garbage.

Mud pies

The deplorable food conditions in these two districts include residents baking mud pies, using toxic clay, containing a small amount of nutrients, which they gather from the polluted earth.

The mixture is formed into clay patties, and laid in the sun to bake. This has been a way of life in Cité Soleil and Bel Air for decades.

Yéle Haiti and WFP carry out food distributions twice a month, feeding approximately 2,700 people per day; that number is planned to increase soon.

Beneficiaries, from among the most vulnerable inhabitants, are chosen by local community centers. The hip hop musicians distribute the food mainly to women, the traditional heads of families in Haiti.

Reach out

“Working with Yéle Haiti has allowed us to reach out to some of the most vulnerable people in Haiti, namely the women and children of Cite Soleil and Bel Air. We are therefore very happy about this new cooperation,” says WFP Haiti Country Director, Mamadou Mbaye.

As one of the most disadvantaged countries in the developing world, Haiti ranks 153 out of 177 countries on the UNDP Human Development Index (2005).

Chronic malnutrition

Chronic malnutrition is widespread among the most vulnerable, with severe or moderate stunting affecting 42 percent of children under five. Easily preventable, maladies like malnutrition and diarrhoea kill 28 percent and 20 percent of children under five years old, respectively.

Food supply covers only 55 percent of the population and daily food insecurity affects 40 percent of Haitian homes.

Haiti ranks along with Afghanistan and Somalia as one of the three countries of the world with the worst daily caloric deficit per inhabitant (460 kcal/day). Some 2.4 million Haitians cannot afford the minimum 2,240 daily calories recommended by the World Health Organization.

Falla Boucan

info@partnerwithastar.com — Mon, 13 Nov 2006 22:51:08 +0200

Young Canadian and Haitian artists and youth leaders creating and learning together

NEED: The future of Haiti is going to depend to a great degree on the capacity of young people to find new ways to engage in development. The visual, literary and performing arts represent a strong and vibrant force in Haiti, but they have not been used to enlist youth in shaping the future of the country. The arts and culture are a significant resource that must be brought into the mainstream of development in this struggling nation.

RESPONSE: Yéle Haiti has formed a partnership with TOHU, a Montreal-based NGO that is on the cutting edge of enlisting the arts and culture to develop new models of sustainable development. The first result of that partnership was a joint initiative that brought together 22 young Canadians and Haitians – a combination of young artists and youth leaders – for a week-long forum in Jacmel, Haiti, from November 24 to December 1, 2006.

This cultural exchange had three outcomes. It was an opportunity for young artists to discuss the potential of artistic initiatives in the service of development. Second, there was a soul-searching dialogue between the two cultures that helped the participating young people discover more about their own self-worth. The final result was that together they designed and built a giant but fleeting sculpture that was burned in a ceremony as part of a concert by Wyclef Jean for an estimated 40,000 people on the beach in Jacmel on December 1 – marking the official end of both YéleFest and the Film Festival Jakmèl 2006.

Known as a “falla,” this sculpture was built on a platform suspended above the ocean at the end of a specially constructed pier. The young Haitians and Canadians had painstakingly built this short-lived artwork so that it would easily ignite after being completed, using recycled material and featuring paper mache masks that are a local Jacmel tradition for Carnaval (they are traditionally burnt at the end of Carnaval to ward off evil spirits).

It took a week to design and build, and the final assembly of the sculpture took place during the day on December 1. The “falla boucan,” as it came to be known, adding the Creole word for grilling over an open fire to the title, was completed just hours before the concert began. At the midpoint of his performance, Wyclef invited the 22 young artists to the stage and in a short ceremony the falla boucan was set ablaze. Fireworks set around the base were the first to ignite, followed by the spectacular blaze that enveloped the artwork.

ANNOUNCEMENT: Yéle Haiti is proud to announce that the Right Honorable Michaëlle Jean, Governor General of Canada, has become patron of the ongoing cultural co-operation between Yéle Haiti and TOHU.

Partners:
TOHU, la Cité des arts du cirque
Film Festival Jakmèl
Fondation Sant D’A Jakmèl (FOSAJ)
Fondation Tarazat

CELEBRITIES CAN BE HEROES SO CAN YOU!
Search volunteer opportunities important to your favorite celebrity by visiting :
http://www.partnerwithastar.com

Concours Pwojè Lari Pwòp

info@partnerwithastar.com — Mon, 2 Oct 2006 07:57:45 +0200

A contest where youth from the slums wrote rap songs on themes of cleaning up the environment; the final competition was televised in June, 2006.

NEED: There is no regular garbage collection by municipal authorities in the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince, and trash is usually dumped on the streets. The result is that the city is overrun with garbage, contributing to a major health hazard that no one takes responsibility for changing.

RESPONSE: Part of Yéle Haiti’s role with Pwojè Lari Pwòp (Project Clean Streets) is to encourage Haitians to stop littering and dumping their garbage on the street. Wyclef Jean launched a competition for youth from the slums to write original rap songs on theme of cleaning up the environment. Twelve finalists were chosen and sent to a studio to record their songs, which were then played on the radio for two months and listeners could phone in their votes. The final national televised competition was on June 3, 2006, and there were four onsite judges – with the public’s votes counting as the fifth judge. The three winners received a cash prize along with help in launching their music careers.

Partner:
Pan American Development Foundation (PADF)