The President of Haiti, Jovenel Moïse (53), was attacked and shot dead by unknown attackers on his private estate in Port-au-Prince. The interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph announced. Moïse’s wife Martine was injured and hospitalized. Joseph condemned the act as “a hateful, inhumane and barbaric act”. He stressed that Haiti’s security forces would take all measures “to guarantee the continued existence of the state and to protect the nation”.
The attack takes place in the midst of increasing poverty, food shortages and a wave of political violence that sweeps over the eleven million Caribbean country. In the capital, Port-au-Prince, gangs are fighting for supremacy on the streets and against the police. According to the AP news agency, 60 percent of the population earns less than two dollars a day. Added to this are the consequences of a devastating earthquake in 2010 and the hurricane Matthewthat the country has not yet overcome.
There have been fierce protests against President Moïse since he took office in 2017. The opposition accused him of trying to build a dictatorship in Haiti and to rule in an authoritarian manner, which Moïse denied to the end. Under his rule, the country became increasingly unstable. For the past two years, Moïse had only ruled by decree after elections had failed. The opposition demanded his resignation as his legal term ended in February 2021. Elections are scheduled for the end of this year.