My mother died in Haiti, after nearly twenty-four hours of unsuccessfully calling an ambulance to avoid the worst. She will not be rushed to hospital following a stroke. No, she’ll spend a whole night moaning, hurting, moaning, dying, as my little sister described to me there.
And, the next morning, still no ambulance because the country is paralyzed after the assassination, by gangs, of police officers who were rightly demonstrating. Because, at the same time and like every day, armed gangs rule the streets and everyone is afraid. Even paramedics. Meanwhile, my mother continues to agonize, then she dies on January 26th. But the drama does not end there, as if the death of my mother, which could have been avoided, was not enough.
In this climate of permanent fear, the undertakers are also delayed in the exercise of their functions. My mother’s husband – my stepfather – whose presence was essential for the organization of the funeral, was in another town in the country.
He decides to return to Port-au-Prince, capital of Haiti, to carry out the administrative procedures and participate in the funeral. Her nephew, whom my stepfather raised, accompanies her due to insecurity but also to participate in the farewell ceremony in honor of my mother.
The kidnappers released my father-in-law, kept his nephew, and demanded a ransom of $300,000 from a family that has no way of raising such a sum. He was eventually released for ransom. In my life-and-death story, the family went into deep debt to pay off the criminals. This is the daily life of Haitians, this is what we do not talk about.
The “mafiocracy” has taken control. Haiti, pioneer land of liberation, land of freedom, land of modernity, land of the future, succumbs! And there is no future for Haiti without restoring the rule of law. Today, traffickers are decimating the country and depriving it of its future in the indifference and denial of international and European institutions.
No state seems ready to come out of denial of reality and fight against its own mafias profiting from the chaos. The general public is not well informed about the situation. Otherwise, every man, every woman would say to their government, “You weren’t elected for this, to allow another people to be oppressed and destroyed.” »
What the Haitian people are going through today is only the dress rehearsal of what threatens every people in the future. Just look at what is happening in the world to understand. Can we really continue to feed the filthy beast that threatens our human rights?
The Haitian problem is first of all a political problem: this series of corrupt and illegitimate powers tolerated and maintained by international institutions and Western countries. Haiti demands the departure of the ruling clique for the holding of honest elections. Because this clique cannot fight against the insecurity it has helped to create.
The Haitian people are held hostage between hunger, war, interference, their suffocation by the powerful – “We can’t breathe” – by the gangs. He can expect nothing from his leaders, themselves compromised. Corruption, kidnappings, racketeering, rapes, murders, massacres: these are the daily bread of terror.
These crimes against humanity must be punished and the rule of law must be restored so that the Haitian people can find a possible future. It must be understood that it is also the future of man that is at stake, because to say stop to “mafiocracy” is to say stop to the rise of economic injustices which lead us all towards our own decline. Martin Luther King said, “Our life begins to stand still the day we remain silent about serious things. »
My voice and so many others are rising to denounce the interferences of the Core Group. The examples are numerous: former President Michel Martelly, who had never held an election in five years and who is involved in numerous scandals of corruption and misogyny, was supported by this group.
Jovenel Moïse, who had never organized an election either in almost five years, was also supported by this same group. Even by becoming dictator, accused by several reports from Haitian institutions – and one from the United Nations – of having ordered a dozen massacres of civilian populations – notably in La Saline, a popular district of Port-au-Prince where a hundred people were killed – he had the support of the Core Group.
In September 2021, in his resignation letter, the US special envoy for Haiti Daniel Foote declared that Haitians must have the freedom to decide for themselves, without international influence and without certain candidates in power or not being favored. According to Mr. Foote, it was the Core Group that chose the current Prime Minister and interim President Ariel Henry, two weeks after having initially supported Claude Joseph who succeeded President Jovenel Moïse.
Thus, we ask the Canadian, American, French, German, Spanish and Brazilian peoples to call on their governments to change their policies, to stop supporting the de facto power and to support the wish of the Haitians to put in place a government of transition in which the people can place their trust.
We call on the International Court of Human Rights to take up the matter before there are more corpses than alive in the streets of Port-au-Prince and in the rest of the country. Together, let’s react now and act while there is still time. Don’t just erect memorials, save the living!
* Sadrac Charles is the director of the Parisian festival Haïti Monde, the second edition of which will be held from June 2 to 4 in the Goutte-d’Or district, in the 18th arrondissement of Paris.