PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti—Violent gangs have taken hold of Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince, overpowering the nation’s police and plummeting the city into chaos.
More than 360,000 Haitians have already fled the city seeking refuge in traditionally safer, southern regions, according to a new report by the U.N.’s International Organization for Migration. Meanwhile gunmen have open fired at government buildings, barricaded streets, torched businesses and police stations, took over the ports, looted and pillaged residential neighborhoods, seized the international airport, and stormed the country’s two largest prisons releasing more than 4,000 prisoners.
Thousands of lives have been lost in the surge of violence with an estimated 15,000 left without homes. The U.N. estimated that more than 1,190 lives have been lost since the beginning of 2024 alone.
To make matters worse, when many of these displaced Haitians left their homes fleeing rampant gang violence, they were met with another problem when they arrived at their new destinations: cholera.
According to the ION more than 6,800 suspected new cases of the waterborne disease were reported across the country in November 2022, around the time gang violence began to stifle city operations. There have been a reported 2,279 new cases of cholera as of January 2024.
Following weeks of violence and havoc Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry announced his resignation last month on March 11.
Reuters reported that the Prime Minister traveled to Kenya in late February on an international security mission seeking assistance to fight his country’s powerfully armed gangs but the politically motivated militias took advantage of his absence to escalate their carnage further resulting in Henry being stranded on the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico. Henry has been unable to return to his country since its ensuing violence closed off international airports.
Henry took power following the assassination of former Haitian President Jovenal Moise in 2021. Since then, widespread protests have erupted across the Caribbean country calling for his resignation. These protests escalated into gangs, forcing the country into a state of emergency.
Haiti disbanded its military back in 1995 following a series of military coups and political interference. Law enforcement officers working in the capital city of Port-au-Prince are severely understaffed, under-equipped in comparison to the gangs, and lack incentive to interfere with many of them not being able to cash their checks for months since gangs halted operations at the state bank. The average salary of a Haitian police officer to begin with is about $200 a month.
Just last month representatives of Haiti’s government, opposition groups, private sector, civil society, and religious groups met with leaders at the U.S. and Caribbean Community (CARICOM) to form a consensus on how to bring stability back to the island, Reuters reported.
Part of this consensus is to adopt what’s called a Transition Council to fill the leadership vacancy Henry left with his resignation. The council consists of two observers, and seven voting members intended to represent a vast array of Haitian society perspectives, CARICOM Chair Irfaan Ali said.
The nine members of the Transition Council were sworn in on Thursday, April 25. Mr. Henry’s finance minister, Michel Patrick Boisvert, will serve as the interim prime minister. The council will try to restore law and order and is backed by Caribbean nations and the Biden Administration.
Members are expected to represent a center-left political party led by the country’s first democratically elected president, Jean Bertrand Aristide who was ousted in 2004, as well as the political party Pitit Dessalines, led by former Senator Jean-Charles Moise, and a representative of the political party Committed to Development, of which former Prime Minister Claude Joseph was a member – who has been accused of carrying out the assignation against Jovenel Moise.
The result of former Prime Minister Henry’s national security efforts in Kenya, which involve a U.N.-backed Kenyan police force deployment, have been halted until the Transition Council has been fully established.
The country of Haiti enforced a nighttime curfew for now to try and mitigate the effects of violence aimed at civilians.
Haiti has a long history with political corruption dating back at least the last 20 years but devastating earthquakes in 2010 and 2021, respectively, exacerbated the already difficult lives of its residents. The 2010 earthquake alone killed about a quarter of a million people and leveled much of the country’s weak infrastructure, leaving many cities in shambles.
While Henry has not been the most popular political leader among many of Haiti’s residents, upheaval began in February when he made the announcement that he agreed to hold a general election but not until 2025. Henry was supposed to step down from his role in February but declined to do so. That’s when politically motivated gangs took matters into their own hands to demonstrate their frustrations.
Haiti currently has no elected officials and has not had a parliamentary or general election since November of 2016.
The leader of the federation of gangs attempting revolution, called the G9 Family and Allies, is Jimmy “Barbeque” Cherizier, a former police officer turned revolutionary gangster.
There are an estimated 200 gangs that make up the G9 Family and Allies with at least 23 of them headquartered in the capitol city of Port-au-Prince. These gangs have controlled about 60% of the city since 2022, the U.N. said, but that has skyrocketed to about 80% since February.
As Haiti’s economy, infrastructure, and political core has dwindled these gangs have only been growing more financially independent and powerfully armed through arms smuggling and paid ransoms from kidnappings.
“Present-day gangs enjoy a much higher degree of military capacity than those a decade ago,” said the Global Initiative Against Transnational Crime. “This has largely been driven by the gangs’ ability to acquire high-caliber weapons.”
CBS News reported last month that intercepted arms destined for Haitian ports involved .50 caliber sniper rifles, .308 rifles, and even belt-fed machine guns.
Author: Kienan Briscoe
