Haiti: A look at a neglected context

The funeral of the former President of Haiti, Jovenel Moïse, is being held today in Cap-Haïtien, near his native region. In the early morning of July 7, the President of the Republic of Haiti was assassinated by an armed commando at his private home in Port-au-Prince, the country's capital. The first lady, Martine Moïse, is back in the country after being hospitalized in a hospital in Miami, where she was treated.

What led to this event? A look at a neglected context.

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Psychological consequences beyond the borders of Haiti

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Born in Quebec, the psychosocial worker Josiane Ménard talks about vicarious trauma: “These are not things that happen to you directly, but you experience them anyway,” she explains. She worries that, without context, people would paint a grim picture of the country. “I had to defend my country. In the midst of a period of mourning, we must also respond to attacks and microaggressions,” she tells us on the day of the assassination.

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Ms. Ménard has not yet had the opportunity to visit her country of origin, and hopes to hug her cousins and their children. “It is one of my dearest dreams. It would be too great a loss to close the door and never go,” she laments. She wants the world's first independent black republic to find stability.

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The journey of a former civil servant

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It is an aspiration to which Jonas* echoes. Around a table at the Place Versailles food fair, he tells us about his journey. Unlike Ms. Ménard, Jonas was born and lived almost all of his life in Haiti. After working for the Haitian federal government for over 15 years, he is afraid to return. Under the presidency of Jovenel Moïse, the official was threatened and assaulted. “I had two choices: either I stay to continue fighting, but by staying too, death was there,” he lamented. Refugee in Quebec since March 2020, the assassination of the Head of State worries him deeply. His wife and two children are still in Haiti. “It's a fragile country, we don't know what will happen tomorrow and the day after tomorrow,” he comments.

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Jonas worked for an opposition party before working in the office of the Minister of Public Health of Haiti. As part of his duties, he met former President Jovenel Moïse several times. He then saw in him his goodwill, but a bad candidate to lead the Republic. “What I noticed was that he was a novice politician. He was someone with good will, but who doesn't really know what he is doing, where to start and what means he should use to achieve his goals,” he recalls. A few years later, Jonas obtained a position at the Office for Occupational Health and Maternity Accident Insurance (OFATMA).

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He closely observes the fraud that took place under the Moïse administration. “I discovered cases of large-scale corruption involving not only the director general of OFATMA, but also the First Lady and many other personalities in the country,” says the former official. In 2018, he noticed the disappearance of all the funds of the OFATMA Hospital in Port-au-Prince. The former director of the establishment, Hans Herbert Boucher, leaves office leaving accounts emptied of 16 million gourdes, or more than 216,000 Canadian dollars.

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“In the interval of two weeks, everything disappeared. Nothing was purchased for the hospital. Nothing was paid in terms of debts, and we did not find documents that indicated that the hospital had debts,” explains Jonas.Jonas, his colleagues tell the director general of OFATMA, Agabus Joseph. They face threats, sanctions, and transfers and revocations. Jonas and his colleagues then decided to make the file public and sent a letter to institutions in a position to conduct investigations, including President Jovenel Moïse. But this letter did not have the desired effect. After a meeting with the president during a parliamentary session, Agabus Joseph transfers Jonas to Port-de-Paix, a town in the north-east of the country located 165 km from the capital. Those around him are adamant: they believe that it is a conspiracy to murder him. The threats materialize during a general meeting held in a hospital.

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“I was attacked and beaten. His men pointed a gun at me,” says Jonas, who points out that the police don't intervene when the official and his colleagues call for help. As a result of this attack, Jonas and his wife, who were pregnant at the time, live in uncertainty. They leave town fearing to be killed. Finally, in 2020, the ex-civil servant left the country. It crosses the continent to land in Montreal. He is waiting to be able to bring his wife and two children there. Jonas considers that a return to Haiti is for him dangerous, if not impossible. The political refugee believes that the assassination of the president was organized by foreign forces, with the collaboration of the entourage of Jovenel Moïse. Following our conversation, he is worried about his family.

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The delicate circumstances of refugees

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Frantz André works with the Action Committee for Persons Without Status (CAPSS) .He accompanies several Haitian refugees on a daily basis. While some of them apply for economic reasons, the community worker believes that the reasons for their exile are more complex. “Economic refugees often leave the country for political reasons,” Mr. André says right away. Nationals include former government officials, police officers, judges and lawyers who, like Jonas, have faced threats from the government. Thus, the economic reasons cited often stem from the fact that these refugees can no longer practice their profession or have a job, in addition to fearing for their safety. “Many of the migration problems are related to these lack of opportunities, caused by politics. We should not separate one from the other,” explains the social worker. He explains that politics is also used to solve personal problems, for example by reporting someone with whom you have some kind of dispute. Applying for political asylum is a painstaking process. “Haiti is not a place where it is easy to justify political reasons.

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People often go on the run, they don't often have time to prepare cases with evidence,” explains the activist. He therefore has the task of collecting evidence to support asylum claims, by doing research. Requests are often based on testimony, which may be discussed during the hearing by the Commissioner in the absence of documented evidence. However, even the authentication of documents from Haiti can be difficult, Mr. André testifies to the difficulties in making the migration authorities understand that they are legitimate. If Frantz André dares to expose himself despite the threats he receives, the assassination of the president plunges Haitian refugees even more into fear. “It is likely that these asylum seekers do not want to talk too much, for fear that their families will be affected,” he said. “In the current case, if there is one intervention that the international community can do, including Canada, it is to secure these people and repatriate their families.” he concludes.

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A controversial presidential mandate

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Frantz Voltaire, historian, political scientist and director of the International Center for Documentation and Information Haitienne, Caribbean and Afro-Canadian (CIDIHCA), describes to us the political, economic and social climate in Haiti in which the assassination of the president occurred. In their new office in Old Montreal, surrounded by books and numerous archives on Haiti, the historian explains that the country has been in bad shape since the 2010 earthquake. He believes that at the time, instead of putting solid bodies in place, the Clinton Foundation, and the intervention of Bill Clinton himself, encouraged the hasty organization of elections that took place in 2011. The term of office of President Michel Martelly, in office between 2011 and 2016, would have worsened the situation. “We facilitated the election of Michel Martelly and afterwards, we facilitated that of Jovenel Moïse under the same conditions, under the same conditions, after the Petrocaribe crisis due to a massive embezzlement of funds from the Martelly administration,” he said. The fruit production company Agritrans, which is owned by Jovenel Moïse, is accused of embezzling substantial funds even before the presidency of its owner.

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“We are talking about 30 million Canadian dollars that were intended to relaunch Haitian agriculture. All this was a scam and there was no follow-up to this project,” explains Mr. Voltaire. These funds came from Petrocaribe, through which Venezuela sold subsidized oil to Haiti. The state had to use the profits to finance social and infrastructure projects, create hospitals and roads. The political scientist says he understands the anger of the Haitian people who are facing loans that they will have to repay, but which have been poorly managed “and in the worst cases diverted to the benefit of a political and economic elite”, he adds. Demonstrations continued to proliferate in the country to demand the departure of Jovenel Moïse, who was accused of being involved in corruption and financing armed gangs.

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Some of these gangs openly proclaimed their support for Jovenel Moïse. These heavily armed gangs that terrorize the population have been a problem that has affected Haiti for some time. The administration of Jovenel Moïse did not know how to stem this violence. “Arms and ammunition could be controlled beforehand,” says Mr. Voltaire, adding that an agreement with American police authorities should be reached in order to limit and control boats that enter Haitian territory and that feed the clandestine canals of the country's ports.

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A presidency that divides

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Apart from his failures in finances and public security, President Jovenel Moïse was also experiencing other major difficulties in his mandate. At the expected end of the presidential term, on 7 February 2021, the elections had still not been held, because the outgoing parliament refused to approve the electoral law, which must be ratified at each election. Without parliament, the former president ruled by decree, i.e. he issued orders to enforce state decisions. Therefore, his decisions could not be called into question. As a result, the country has plunged into economic and political disorder, in addition to being grappling with armed gang violence in working-class neighborhoods. Several decisions were denounced by the opposition and the population, including the decision to organize a referendum to reshape the constitution.

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The vote, scheduled for June 26, was postponed due to the health crisis. By amending the constitution, Jovenel Moïse planned, among other things, to grant the right to vote to the Haitian diaspora, which represents about more than three million people and 40% of the country's GDP. He was opposed to the installation of a transitional government, believing that this would avoid wasting resources, time, money and personnel. Frantz Voltaire believes, however, that this is “cheap rhetoric.” For his part, the former President of the Republic denounced a Haitian oligarchy made up of large companies in the private sector that establish overcharged contracts with the State.

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They benefit from credit notes that allow them to be paid directly by the Bank of the Republic of Haiti in case of delay. The institution is responsible for regulating the Haitian banking system and releases funds from the public treasury. This scheme is valued at around 10 million Canadian dollars each month. “I think that the president, through his arbitrary authoritarian management, had a lot of enemies. When you have all these enemies, it is a bit more difficult to understand who may have an interest in this assassination,” explains Mr. Voltaire.

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On July 12, Marie Dimanche organized a vigil in solidarity with the Haitian people confounded by this assassination, in front of the Consulate General of Haiti in Montreal. While several people present said they feared for their loved ones and apprehended the outbreak of a civil war, another event this week at the Haitian cultural association La Perle Repaid tribute instead to the president whom Jonas and so many other refugees fled, with doves soaring to the sky in his memory. Two perspectives, a reality where uncertainty reigns for the Haitian people and the diaspora. In the meantime, the investigation remains ongoing to elucidate the assassination of the former president, even if many doubt that the truth will come out.

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To go further...

• The Haitian electoral law must be approved at the end of each term by the current government. It creates the Provisional Electoral Council, which is responsible for organizing the presidential elections. According to the constitution amended in 1987, at the end of Duvalier's dictatorial regime, the president alone did not have the authority required to organize elections.
• Since the parliamentary elections did not take place, the Senate was rendered inoperational. The term of the majority of senators who were sitting ended on 13 January 2020. 10 senators, who were elected for longer terms, remain in office. The Senate must have 15 members to have a quorum.
• Jovenel Moïse, as well as his interim successor Ariel Henry, enjoyed the support of the international community through the Core Group. The Core Group was set up in 2004 with the sending of soldiers to forcibly escort the then president, Jean-Bertrand Aristide. It is composed of the ambassadors of Germany, Brazil, Canada, Canada, Spain, Spain, Spain, the United States, the United States, France and the European Union, as well as the Special Representative of the Organization of American States and the Special Representative of the United Nations Secretary General. To date, there is little information on the role and functioning of this entity.
• The Core Group accepted the continuity of the presidential term even after February 7, 2021, the expected end date of its mandate, despite the fact that this extension of the mandate violated the Haitian constitution. Political scientist Frantz Voltaire considers the Core Group to be the body that guides Haitian politics. He hopes that parliamentary, fiscal and judicial reforms will be put in place and especially that a transparent permanent electoral council will be created in the coming months. “I believe that these reforms are necessary if we want to open the country to modernity, if we want to solve a good part of the social inequalities that exist in this country,” he says.