Trujillo myths
Reprinted from dr1 daily news, 16 February 2005:
Trujillo myths
Economist, historian and businessman Bernardo Vega writes in El Caribe about the "good" that former dictator Rafael Leonidas Trujillo Molina did for the Dominican Republic. For a generation, a massive public relations campaign molded public opinion about the dictator and much of that propaganda still persists in Dominican thought. One by one, Vega disassembles the myths.
The most promoted achievement of Trujillo's era is the fact that he cancelled the foreign debt in 1947. Vega writes that it so happened that Haiti did the same thing at the time because of the same fortuitous trade abundance that resulted from World War II. Both countries had acquired the same type of debt for the same reasons and for similar amounts, but nobody in Haiti considers that the government of Dumarsais Estime did anything special. Moreover, Trujillo could have cancelled the debt in 1934 when the DR bonds were priced at 15? of a dollar in the New York Exchange, but, instead, he ended up paying the debt at US$1.00 without any discount.
Another achievement attributed to Trujillo is the industrialization of the country. However, a closer look will show that the industries that were established in the 40s and 50s were part of the same import substitution program that was happening all over Latin America and the Caribbean at the same time. The only difference in the Dominican Republic was that all of the industries belonged to the dictator.
Trujillo certainly helped the rural farmers when he distributed lands during the 30s, but all of this was voided when the dictator became the owner of a dozen sugar mills, becoming the largest landowner in the country and moving thousands of rural farmers off "his' lands.
While Havana, Port-au-Prince and Montego Bay were full of tourists, nobody came to the DR because of the awful image the country projected at the time. How many investors, both local and foreign, decided not to put their capital in the country because of a lack of confidence?
Vega says that during the "Trujillo Era" the economy was said to have grown a lot. As an economist, Vega points out that GDP figures for that time do not exist, but consumption of re-bar, cement and other building supplies reflect a growth rate far below the average for Latin America.
While it is true that Trujillo created the Central Bank in 1947, it is also true that a lot of Latin American countries were creating their own Central Banks. The technical crew from the United States that assisted the Dominican Republic, did the same thing in Guatemala. Nonetheless, in 1960, Trujillo put up all of the gold in the Central Bank's vaults as a guarantee on an international loan borrowed for his own sugar mills. His failure to repay the loan left the country without hard currency reserves. At the hour of his death, the Central Bank had less than a million dollars on hand.
Ultra-nationalists cite the Trujillo massacre of Haitians in 1937 as an example of how the dictator got rid of Haitians living in the Dominican Republic. However, while that might be true, Haitians continued working in all of the sugar mills. He certainly did not do what the government of Cuba did in 1933 when it deported all of the Haitians and Jamaicans working in the sugar industry and required Cubans of all colors to harvest the sugar cane crop. In fact, Trujillo, as the owner of almost all of the sugar mills, became the largest employer of Haitians.
The former ambassador finishes his piece by reminding readers that in 1930 the country exported sugar, tobacco, coffee and cacao. In 1960, it was exporting the same things plus a little bauxite. So, he says, let's feel nostalgic about something else.