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Wyclef Jean Responds to Sean Penn Criticism
The potential front-runner in Haiti's Nov. 28 election is attempting a difficult and potentially dicey transformation: From multimillionaire international recording artist to leader of one of the world's poorest and most dysfunctional countries - and doing so through a pivotal and difficult election.
Among the best-known figures in his native country, Haitian-born, Brooklyn-raised singer Wyclef Jean supports the U.S. and U.N. vision for rebuilding Haiti's economy after its magnitude-7 earthquake - a plan that encourages private investment in factories, agriculture, mining and other areas.
Jean also said he would encourage donors to invest heavily in education.
Wyclef Jean: I'm Qualified to Lead Haiti
Special Report: Haiti - The Road to Recovery
Jean's leap from entertainer to prospective head-of-state is also leading to some interesting transitional moments. After previously listing his age as 37, as a candidate he suddenly jumped to 40 years old.
The worldwide attention that his presidential bid attracts also means scrutiny and criticism - turning the campaign into what Jean called a "combat sport."
The singer fumed when aides told him that actor Sean Penn, who cofounded the J/P Haitian Relief Organization and has been managing an earthquake-survivor camp in the Haitian capital since the spring, had accused Jean of not spending enough time in Haiti after the quake and misappropriating $400,000 of the $9 million his charity, Yele Haiti, raised after the disaster.
Speaking on CNN's "Larry King Live" yesterday, Penn said that while he does not know Jean and credits him with being "an important voice" in rebuilding Haiti, he is "very suspicious" that Jean may be backed by corporate interests and opportunists who want to take advantage of Jean's celebrity.
"What the Haitian people need now is a leader who is genuinely willing to sacrifice," Penn said. "And one of the reasons I don't know very much about Wyclef Jean is I haven't seen or heard anything of him in these last six months that I've been in Haiti."
Calling Jean a virtual "non-presence" in Haiti since the January 20 earthquake, Penn said Jean's donors must be closely examined, "because this is somebody who is going to receive an enormous amount of his support, if he continues his campaign, from the United States.
"I think that Haiti is clearly vulnerable to, in particular, the manufacturing concerns that it so desperately needs and the jobs that it so desperately needs," Penn said, noting that the country has a history of American interests "coming in and underpaying people - this is a culture of one to two dollars a day that they were making."
"I just want Sean Penn to fully understand I am a Haitian, born in Haiti and I've been coming to my country ever since (I was) a child," he said. "He might just want to pick up the phone and meet, so he fully understands the man."
In an interview aired this morning on "The Early Show," Jean told CBS News correspondent and "Morning News" anchor Betty Nguyen, "I have to take what I used to sing about" - poverty, hunger, AIDS - "and turn it into policy."
Jean stepped down from his chairmanship of Yele on Thursday ahead of filing paperwork for his run for office. The organization has been accused of pre-quake financial improprieties that benefited the singer.
Before campaigning can begin, Jean must be cleared to run by Haiti's eight-member provisional electoral council. Among the requirements he must fulfill are proving he has never renounced his Haitian citizenship by holding another (U.S.), and that he has been a resident of Haiti for the last five years, which by most accounts he has not.
The campaign will argue that Jean's status as a Haitian ambassador-at-large - a post he was awarded in 2007 - exempts him from having not spent more time in the country of late.
If approval comes, Haiti's particular brand of Byzantine and often brutal politics will really begin. Jean's charisma and popularity in Port-au-Prince's vast slums could draw comparisons - some favorable, others not - to the popular but divisive former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who was flown into African exile aboard a U.S. plane during a bloody 2004 rebellion.
In an interview with the Associated Press Thursday, Jean also responded directly to a revelation published this week on the U.S.-based website The Smoking Gun. The article stated the hip-hop star owes the Internal Revenue Service more than $2.1 million for taxes from his individual 1040 returns for 2006, 2007 and 2008.
"First of all, owing $2.1 million to the IRS shows you how much money Wyclef Jean makes a year," he said, pledging to publish an accounting of his finances online and to repay the money he owes.
© 2010 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report. Among the best-known figures in his native country, Haitian-born, Brooklyn-raised singer Wyclef Jean supports the U.S. and U.N. vision for rebuilding Haiti's economy after its magnitude-7 earthquake - a plan that encourages private investment in factories, agriculture, mining and other areas.
Jean also said he would encourage donors to invest heavily in education.
Wyclef Jean: I'm Qualified to Lead Haiti
Special Report: Haiti - The Road to Recovery
Jean's leap from entertainer to prospective head-of-state is also leading to some interesting transitional moments. After previously listing his age as 37, as a candidate he suddenly jumped to 40 years old.
The worldwide attention that his presidential bid attracts also means scrutiny and criticism - turning the campaign into what Jean called a "combat sport."
The singer fumed when aides told him that actor Sean Penn, who cofounded the J/P Haitian Relief Organization and has been managing an earthquake-survivor camp in the Haitian capital since the spring, had accused Jean of not spending enough time in Haiti after the quake and misappropriating $400,000 of the $9 million his charity, Yele Haiti, raised after the disaster.
Speaking on CNN's "Larry King Live" yesterday, Penn said that while he does not know Jean and credits him with being "an important voice" in rebuilding Haiti, he is "very suspicious" that Jean may be backed by corporate interests and opportunists who want to take advantage of Jean's celebrity.
"What the Haitian people need now is a leader who is genuinely willing to sacrifice," Penn said. "And one of the reasons I don't know very much about Wyclef Jean is I haven't seen or heard anything of him in these last six months that I've been in Haiti."
Calling Jean a virtual "non-presence" in Haiti since the January 20 earthquake, Penn said Jean's donors must be closely examined, "because this is somebody who is going to receive an enormous amount of his support, if he continues his campaign, from the United States.
"I think that Haiti is clearly vulnerable to, in particular, the manufacturing concerns that it so desperately needs and the jobs that it so desperately needs," Penn said, noting that the country has a history of American interests "coming in and underpaying people - this is a culture of one to two dollars a day that they were making."
"I just want Sean Penn to fully understand I am a Haitian, born in Haiti and I've been coming to my country ever since (I was) a child," he said. "He might just want to pick up the phone and meet, so he fully understands the man."
In an interview aired this morning on "The Early Show," Jean told CBS News correspondent and "Morning News" anchor Betty Nguyen, "I have to take what I used to sing about" - poverty, hunger, AIDS - "and turn it into policy."
Jean stepped down from his chairmanship of Yele on Thursday ahead of filing paperwork for his run for office. The organization has been accused of pre-quake financial improprieties that benefited the singer.
Before campaigning can begin, Jean must be cleared to run by Haiti's eight-member provisional electoral council. Among the requirements he must fulfill are proving he has never renounced his Haitian citizenship by holding another (U.S.), and that he has been a resident of Haiti for the last five years, which by most accounts he has not.
The campaign will argue that Jean's status as a Haitian ambassador-at-large - a post he was awarded in 2007 - exempts him from having not spent more time in the country of late.
If approval comes, Haiti's particular brand of Byzantine and often brutal politics will really begin. Jean's charisma and popularity in Port-au-Prince's vast slums could draw comparisons - some favorable, others not - to the popular but divisive former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who was flown into African exile aboard a U.S. plane during a bloody 2004 rebellion.
In an interview with the Associated Press Thursday, Jean also responded directly to a revelation published this week on the U.S.-based website The Smoking Gun. The article stated the hip-hop star owes the Internal Revenue Service more than $2.1 million for taxes from his individual 1040 returns for 2006, 2007 and 2008.
"First of all, owing $2.1 million to the IRS shows you how much money Wyclef Jean makes a year," he said, pledging to publish an accounting of his finances online and to repay the money he owes.
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The answer - absolutely NONE.
Running a country is not quite the same as deciding what kind of lighting you'll have at your next concert.
Pot - Kettle - Black
Hey Penn, we are very suspicious that you may be backed by Hugo Chavez and Castro interests and such opportunists who what to take advantage of your celebrity.
It is hard to be more embarrass for someone then Sean Penn.
I?ll take trying to keep corporate interest in line rather then trying to keep the interests of Chavez or Castor in line. Both are a challenge but one clearly benefits the economy and pays working people a hell of a lot more.
It grows so incredibly tedious when you play the part of an untrained "diplomat" visiting these countries known for their chronic human rights violations, and returning time and time again with these glowing reports about the wonderful conditions: The clean streets; the great schools; the clean factories with superb working conditions; the fabulous hospitals; AND last by not least -- THE HAPPY PEOPLE (you'll be happy while Sean is here or else!).
Please, PLEASE do your country a favor (yeah, right!) and resign as an unwanted diplomat. You are sorely under-qualified for the position!
BUT,
Sean Penn has been there day in and day out living in tents and working with the sickest and hungriest of the people of Haiti. He hasn't been some fly-in celebrity like Wyclef Jean. It is your right to say ugly things all the time, but why don't you pull your head out of your backside for once and learn the truth.
"Sean Penn has been there day in and day out living in tents and working with the sickest and hungriest of the people of Haiti. He hasn't been some fly-in celebrity like Wyclef Jean."
Seah Penn has his own little agenda going on. He isn't just there out of the goodness of his heart.
And I don't give a rat's ass that he has been there working "day in and day out". I don't know or care about Wyclef Jean, either. The fact is that it ISN'T any of Sean Penn's business. It's the decision of the people of Haiti, no one elses.
"It is your right to say ugly things all the time, but why don't you pull your head out of your backside for once and learn the truth."
I think it is you that needs to pull YOUR head out of YOUR ass. All I said was that Sean Penn needs to mind his own business. How is that ugly? You need to seek help. You seem to have a problem.