Haiti’s powerful gangs want to overthrow the interim government. Because of the violence, the head of government cannot return from a trip abroad. Now, according to the media, the National Palace has been attacked.
Criminal gangs have been controlling Haiti’s capital Port-au-Prince for days. Now, according to media reports, they have also attacked buildings in the city’s government district – including the National Palace, the Interior Ministry and a regional police headquarters.
The EFE news agency reported shots fired in the area of the National Palace, and there were also reports on social media.
Thousands of prisoners escaped from prisons
The violence in Port-au-Prince has been escalating for a week. Police stations were attacked and shots were fired at the airport – all flights were canceled. According to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, the health system is on the verge of collapse. According to him, more than 4,500 prisoners escaped in attacks on two prisons last Saturday.
According to further media reports, the notoriously understaffed police can hardly stand up to the gangs and are hardly present on the streets.
Gangs band together
The humanitarian situation in Haiti was already very critical. According to the UN, almost half of the Caribbean country’s eleven million residents suffer from acute hunger, and various brutal gangs control a total of around 80 percent of Port-au-Prince.
Now the two main armed groups joined forces. Its leader, Jimmy “Barbecue” Chérizier, threatened civil war if interim Prime Minister Ariel Henry, who was scheduled to leave office in early February, did not resign. Instead, at the end of February, Henry agreed with the opposition to govern together until new elections “within twelve months.”
Interim head of government still abroad
Gangs used Henry’s trip abroad to further plunge the country into violence. Apparently Henry still hasn’t been able to return from the trip. Since it was not possible to fly to Port-au-Prince airport, Henry had to land in the Caribbean state of Puerto Rico a few days ago, as the authorities there confirmed. He was expected to travel on to the Dominican Republic to get to Haiti. A state of emergency and a curfew have been in effect in the capital for almost a week.
There have been no elections in Haiti since 2016. The post of president has been vacant since the assassination of Jovenel Moïse in 2021.