Several thousand people demonstrated peacefully on Tuesday in the Haitian capital against the resurgence of heinous kidnappings and against the Prime Minister, seen by the protesters as incompetent to ensure the safety of the population against gangs.
“We are tired of taking bullets, of being kidnapped: we are asking Mr. Ariel Henry, as he has proven that he was incapable, to leave power”, asserts Robens Dorvil, participating in the citizen’s march in Port- au-Prince, who demanded the resignation of the Prime Minister.
“Many people in the Haitian community are victims of the irresponsibility of the state,” laments the protester.
Along the route through the capital, guarded by a large police force, a colorful crowd chanted for more than three hours slogans hostile to the government in place and to the police, accused of being passive in the face of armed gangs.
In Les Cayes, the third largest city in Haiti, a group of protesters against insecurity invaded the runway of the airport on Tuesday noon, whose attendance has increased sharply since June, when gangs took control of the only road connecting the southern half of Haiti, where Les Cayes is located, to the capital Port-au-Prince.
A small American missionary plane parked there was stormed, moved outside the airport and then set on fire.
“Our team on the ground is safe. We are preparing to bring them back to the United States safely,” Florida-based Agape Flights said in a statement posted on its website. his flights for the week were cancelled.
According to local media, one person was killed and several people were injured by bullets during the police intervention against the group which had taken possession of the device.
At the end of the afternoon, the Haitian Prime Minister deplored these acts of vandalism without mentioning the deceased.
“I strongly condemn the violence of demonstrators which resulted in the burning of a plane at Les Cayes airport,” said Ariel Henry on Twitter. “I have instructed the public authorities to put public action in motion against the perpetrators of these subversive acts so that they are severely punished,” added the head of government, strongly contested across the country.
– “Five to ten kidnappings a day” –
Haiti has been, for months, under the regulated control of gangs whose influence has largely extended beyond the disadvantaged neighborhoods of Port-au-Prince.
“According to the alerts we receive, we say that between five and ten people are abducted every day, with peaks sometimes going up to 20 a day”, indicates Marie-Rosy Auguste Ducéna, activist of the National Network for the Defense of Rights humans.
“The West department (where the capital is located) has become a maze of crime,” laments the lawyer.
Demanding ransoms of several thousand or even several hundred thousand US dollars from the relatives of their victims, even the poorest, the armed gangs have imposed a climate of terror in the main city of Haiti where the streets are deserted as soon as night falls. of the night.
“We do not lead a normal life in Port-au-Prince. It is a totally paralyzed people: it is the reign of fear”, testifies Jean-Robert Argant, the coordinator of the collective 4 December, one of the organizations having called for demonstrations.
Citizens feel left to fend for themselves as kidnappings are committed by people wearing Haitian National Police uniforms.
“Imagine the anguish that this creates”, challenges Jean-Robert Argant. “When the healthy side of the police wants, for example, to carry out searches or checks, the citizen tends to flee or distance himself from this checkpoint because he does not know if he is dealing with a real policeman or to kidnappers disguised as policemen”, he testifies.