Hip-hop star brings help - and hope - to Haiti

Yéle partnered recently with the Haitian cellphone 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."

Today, 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 later said. "I mean, there was hope in their eyes. They're super stars in their own country, and 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, and 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.

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