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A12 WORLD NEWS
Monday 7 october 2019

Protests choke communities in Haiti as aid, supplies dwindle

By DÁNICA COTO a gas station would open
Associated Press that day and there was a
LEOGANE, Haiti (AP) — Ga- limited supply.
briel Duvalesse squatted The line already began
slightly as he prepared to forming as the sun came
push 50 gallons (190 liters) up.
of cooking oil in an old Théodore Rathgens, a
wheelbarrow to an out- 53-year-old social worker
doors market an hour away and construction engineer,
so he could earn $1. said that while protests and
It was his first job in seven blockades had caused
days as deadly protests problems in Jacmel, he
paralyze Haiti's economy didn't blame Moïse for the
and shutter businesses and problems.
schools. Opposition leaders "It's the political clans," he
and thousands of support- said.
ers are demanding the res- Rathgens said Haiti's justice
ignation of President Jove- department should also
nel Moïse amid anger over take it upon itself and not
government corruption, wait for instructions from
ballooning inflation and Moïse to investigate former
scarcity of fuel and other top government officials
basic goods. Residents pump drinking water from a well in the village of Barriere Jeudi, outside Leogane, Haiti, accused of mismanaging
Seventeen people have Saturday, Oct. 5, 2019. millions of dollars in funds
been reported killed and from a Venezuela-subsi-
nearly 200 injured in the was forced to suspend all Rice, coconuts, milk and di- the health department dized oil plan slated in part
protests. food deliveries to schools apers are among the doz- passing by without stop- for social programs.
The political turmoil is hitting as demonstrations started. ens of goods that people in ping. Haitian economist Kesner
cities and towns outside the Meanwhile, cash transfers this coastal community of The protests and barri- Pharel noted that Haiti is a
capital of Port-au-Prince to some 37,000 people in more than 200,000 inhab- cades are increasingly iso- country of nearly 11 million
especially hard, forcing need were postponed. itants say are hard to find lating already struggling people where 60% make
non-government organiza- U.N. officials also said that since the protests began in communities across Haiti, less than $2 a day and 25%
tions to suspend aid as bar- private transporters are re- mid-September. including those like Barriere make less than $1 a day.
ricades of large rocks and luctant to deliver goods On Saturday, a grocery Jeudi, where amateur bull He said the problem is wors-
burning tires cut off the flow given the security situation, store near the town's cen- fights on weekends provide ening now that food is not
of goods between the city a problem that Leogane ter opened briefly to sell some distraction from peo- going to Haiti's capital nor
and the countryside. The business owner Vangly Ger- rice, said 40-year-old IT en- ple's financial problems. manufactured goods to
crisis is deepening poverty meille knows well. gineer Sony Raymond. Bruinel Jean-Louis, who rural areas, causing a stop-
in places such as Leogane, He owns a wholesale com- "In less than three hours it repairs refrigerators and page to the economy.
the epicenter of Haiti's dev- pany that sells items includ- was gone," he said. "Leo- stoves, said he hasn't been The situation angers
astating 2010 earthquake. ing rice, soap, cooking oil gane is basically para- able to find much work be- 62-year-old Carolle Bercy,
"We are starving," said and cereal to small mar- lyzed." cause he can't travel to who moved back to Haiti
28-year-old Duvalesse, who kets. But his warehouse is Security concerns grew find the parts he needs. last year after working in
has been unable to work. nearly empty and he strug- on Sunday after onlookers "It takes a very long time, financial services for 30
"I had to make $2 last one gles to find truck drivers will- said they saw two men fa- and that also makes me years in Connecticut, both
week." ing to go to markets to de- tally shoot a third to steal his suffer," he said as several in Stanford and Bridgeport.
The United Nations said that liver the goods because of bike in Leogane. bulls brayed behind him. She said she has seen peo-
before the protests even thieves and barricades. The crowd then went after To make up for the finan- ple fighting over fuel on the
began, some 2.6 million "It's an enormous econom- the two men with machet- cial shortfall, he sells halters rare instances that a gas
people across Haiti were ic loss," said Germeille, a fa- es, dragging one of them for horses. station opens, and she wor-
vulnerable to food shortag- ther of two who is thinking through the street while wit- In a small mountain village ries about the future of Hai-
es, adding that roadblocks of moving to the Domini- nesses said the other com- near the coastal city of tians.
have severely impacted can Republic if things don't mitted suicide. All three Jacmel, some phones be- "It's unbelievable," she said.
some humanitarian pro- improve soon. "If there's no bodies still lay on the street gan ringing at 5 a.m. on "No country on earth should
grams. On Sept. 16, the way to make a living here, I hours after it happened, Sunday as friends and fam- go what Haitian people are
World Food Programme can't stay." with one ambulance from ily let each other know that going through."