Haitian politicians started Wednesday creating alliances to lead the country crumbling under gang attacks that have shuttered the main airport and prevented embattled Prime Minister Ariel Henry from returning home.
Politicians pursued new coalitions as Haiti remained largely paralyzed, with schools and businesses still closed amid heavy gunfire blamed on gangs that control an estimated 80 per cent of the capital, Port-au-Prince, where several bodies lay strewn on empty streets.
The country’s two biggest prisons were also raided, with more than 4,000 inmates released over the weekend. Several police officers were killed in violence that erupted last week.
Frantz André, a spokesperson and co-ordinator for Action Committee for People Without Status, says he’s received several calls from members of the Haitian diaspora in Montreal asking for help. Many are wondering how to get their families to Canada. A 72-hour state of emergency was declared on Sunday night after inmates escaped from two prisons in Haiti.
One new political alliance involves former rebel leader Guy Philippe and ex-presidential candidate and senator Moïse Jean Charles, who told Radio Caraïbes on Wednesday that they signed a deal to form a three-person council to lead Haiti. Philippe, a key figure in the 2004 rebellion that ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, was repatriated to Haiti in November and has been calling for Henry’s resignation.
The prime minister has not made any public comments ever since gangs began attacking critical infrastructure late last week while he was in Kenya pushing for a UN-backed deployment of a police force from the East African country to help fight a surge in violence in the troubled Caribbean nation. Before flying to Kenya, Henry was in the South American country of Guyana for a summit held by a regional trade bloc known as Caricom, where Haiti was high on the agenda.
Henry was appointed prime minister with the backing of the international community shortly after the July 2021 assassination of President Jovenel Moïse. Several men have been charged in connection with that killing.
Henry landed in Puerto Rico late Tuesday afternoon after he was not allowed to land in the Dominican Republic, where officials closed the airspace to and from Haiti. Héctor Porcella, director of the Dominican Institute of Civil Aviation, told reporters the plane did not have a required flight plan.
It was not clear if he was still in Puerto Rico as of Wednesday morning.
Dickon Mitchell, prime minister of the eastern Caribbean island of Grenada, told the AP on Wednesday that regional leaders spoke with Henry late Tuesday.
“He is the prime minister. He has not indicated anything otherwise than that he is trying to get back into Haiti,” Mitchell said without providing further details.
Gang leader threatens Henry
On Wednesday, heavy gunfire echoed throughout the capital of Port-au-Prince, with Haitians fearing additional attacks led by powerful gang leaders. It remains unknown when the country’s international airport will reopen.
“If Ariel Henry doesn’t step down, if the international community continues to support Ariel Henry, they will lead us directly into a civil war that will end in genocide,” gang leader Jimmy Cherizier, known as Barbeque, said at a new conference on Tuesday.
Cherizier said there were “strategic places” that a broad alliance of gangs known as Viv Ansanm (Living Together) were fighting to annex and which would allow them to “win the battle for the ousting of Ariel Henry as quickly as possible.”
The U.S. administration has refused to commit troops to any multinational force for Haiti to keep the peace, while offering money and logistical support.
Canada has sanctioned a number of economic and political actors it believes have enabled gang violence and corruption in Haiti, but balked at leading an armed international stabilizing force. Canada has been a part of such Haiti missions before 2004.
Last week, Ottawa announced it would provide $80 million to support the multinational force to be led by Kenya, including police personal protective equipment and vehicles, as well as communications equipment for the police.
