Page 12 - aruba-today-20190518

A12 WORLD NEWS
Saturday 18 May 2019

Without Venezuela’s oil, Haiti struggles to keep lights on

By RALPH THOMASSAINT and car dealerships. The
JOSEPH fuel crisis is helping push
Associated Press Haiti’s economy danger-
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) ously close to recession.
— When her daughter was GDP growth in 2018 was
4 years old, Jennifer Jean 1.5% — less than half what
started a small catering the government expected.
business in Bourdon, a low- Economists say this year will
er middle-class district of likely be the same. Annual
the Haitian capital. inflation has also reached
Starting with the occa- an estimated 17%, while a
sional wedding or corpo- gallon of gasoline sells on
rate meeting, she grew the black market for be-
the business into a venture tween $6 and $12.
that earned her as much as Fuel distributors are reim-
$1,000 a month, enough to bursed by the state to the
pay bills and send her now- tune of about 27 cents for
teenage daughter and her every subsidized gallon of
7-year-old son to a good gasoline sold to customers.
private school. That helps keep the price
Then the blackouts started, around $2.50 a gallon. But
making it impossible to do the cash-strapped Haitian
basic activities. Without In this April 16, 2019 photo, Johny Legagneur charges a light bulb for a client at his shop in Petion- state has gone months
refrigeration, she now has Ville, Haiti. without paying subsidies
to buy ice on the street to Associated Press and at one point owed
keep her prepared food were repayable over 25 Caribbean, including Haiti, Nighttime activity has some $71 million, leaving
cool. “Back in the day you years at a 1% interest rate, where the end of cheap oil ground to a halt as armed Haitian businesspeople to
were able to take your car allowing the government has meant a sharp reduc- robbers hold up street mer- call for the end of the com-
out any time of night, 1 to supposedly use the wind- tion in power. chants or break into peo- plicated state-oil purchase
a.m. or 2 a.m.,” said Jean, fall for economic develop- Meanwhile, Haiti’s Bureau ple’s homes in darkness. structure. The path out is
who is thinking of migrating ment. In exchange, Haiti of Monetization of Devel- Gas stations have gone murky at best. When Presi-
to the United States. “Now reliably backed Venezuela opment Aid Programs, or empty for days, making it dent Jovenel Moise tried
all the streets are dark. You against the United States in BMPAD, quickly ran into its nearly impossible for many to eliminate fuel subsidies
just don’t know what you regional forums such as the own difficulties. After start- Haitians to get to work, run on July 6 and raise prices
are going to run into.” Organization of American ing to buy oil on the global errands or take their kids to of various petroleum prod-
Through the Venezuelan States. market, the bureau said school. Hospitals are forced ucts by 38% to 51%, protest-
aid program known as But as President Nicolás this year that it had run out to rely on backup genera- ers took to streets across
Petrocaribe, Haiti once re- Maduro’s government has of operating funds and tors. the country calling for him
ceived roughly 60,000 bar- struggled with plunging pe- stopped regularly deliver- “We can’t find gas for our to step down. The decision
rels of oil a day under favor- troleum production and a ing fuel needed by power vehicles. Our clients can’t was quickly reversed, and
able terms that beat any- cratering economy, Ven- station operators to keep come to us. Sales are down the International Monetary
thing on the open market. ezuela has stopped send- the lights on. in every sector,” said busi- Fund has since offered the
More than half the costs of ing billions in subsidized oil Now, much of Haiti’s popu- nessman Reginald Boulos, hemisphere’s poorest na-
the oil, which came at a to countries throughout lation enjoys electricity for whose investment group tion a $96 million low-inter-
heavily discounted price, Central America and the just three hours a day. runs major supermarkets est loan.q

El Salvador sentences 7 in

‘black widows’ insurance killings

SAN SALVADOR, El Salva- Mara Salvatrucha or MS-13 by telling them it was a re-
dor (AP) — A court in El gang, were found guilty of quirement for processing a
Salvador sentenced seven human trafficking and illicit U.S. spousal visa. Soon after,
gang members to up to association, but absolved the women were forced to
30 years Friday for the no- of fraud and proposition- return to the gang mem-
torious “black widows” kill- ing homicide. The two ring- bers while the men were
ings, in which women were leaders of the group were killed. The women were
forced to marry men who sentenced to 30 years, then made to claim the
were then killed to collect while the rest got 15 or 25 bodies at the morgue, file
on life insurance policies. years. The two women in- the necessary paperwork,
Prosecutors accused the volved testified at the trial collect the insurance pay-
defendants of recruiting and are now under official out and hand it over, ac-
women to perform domes- protection against reprisals. companied at every step
tic work and then having One recounted how she by gang members.
them wed the victims, who was forced to get married Officials learned about the
were tricked into think- in 2014 to Edgar Gutiérrez, deadly scam when one of
ing the women were U.S. who was murdered two the women escaped and
This Dec. 8, 2016 file photo, shows two women who are accused citizens and that marrying months later. After the wed- reported it. Authorities sus-
by police of being part of the Mara Salvatrucha Gang are
presented to the media at police headquarters in San Salvador, them would let them emi- dings, the two men they pect there may have been
El Salvador. grate legally. The “black married were persuaded to more victims, but that was
Associated Press widows,” members of the take out insurance policies never confirmed.q