This is a new illustration of the security chaos in which Haiti is plunged, mired in a deep crisis six months after the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse. Two Haitian journalists were murdered Thursday, January 7, by a gang on the outskirts of the capital Port-au-Prince. Wilguens Louissaint and Amady John Wesley were killed in a shooting in an area under the control of armed gangs, told AFP the employer of the second, an online media based in Montreal, where a large Haitian community lives.
A third journalist who accompanied them during their report, covering “the safe climate of the area”, was able to escape, according to the same source. “We condemn with the utmost rigor this criminal and barbaric act”, reacted Francky Attis, general manager of Radio Ecoute FM, who also denounces “serious damage” to rights “journalists to exercise their profession freely in the country”. The online media asked Thursday evening, in a statement to the Haitian authorities, to “take responsibility for creating security conditions favorable to all”.
Haiti has been under the control of gangs for months, the influence of which has extended widely beyond the disadvantaged neighborhoods of Port-au-Prince. The area of Laboule 12, where the three journalists went on Thursday, is the subject of intense fighting between several armed bands who want to ensure control. The path that crosses it is the only alternative land route to reach the southern half of the country, for lack of being able to take the national road totally controlled, since June, by one of the most powerful gangs in Haiti.
The endemic political crisis in this poor Caribbean country, further exacerbated by the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse six months ago, has only worsened the security situation. At least 950 kidnappings were recorded in Haiti in 2021, according to the Center for Analysis and Research in Human Rights, an organization based in Port-au-Prince.
Under-equipped in the face of criminal groups with a war arsenal, the Haitian police have not organized large-scale operations against gangs since March 2021. On March 12, the police attempted to intervene in a district of the capital known to be used by a gang as a place of kidnapping. Four police officers were then killed, and their bodies and equipment could never be recovered.