BTI 2022 Country Report: Haiti
Date of Publication
2022 12:00 AM
Security Theme
State Stability and Infrastructure
Keywords
Political Stability, Political transformation, rule of law, stability of democratic institutions, political and social integration, stability
Description
Haiti has fallen into a spiral of political, economic and social chaos not seen since the overthrow of the Duvalier government in 1986. All state institutions such as parliament, the judicial system and the public administration have collapsed. Many factors have caused this unprecedented crisis. First, Jovenel Moïse, who became president in 2017, was never accepted by the population as a legitimate leader. Second, he failed to hold scheduled parliamentary and municipal elections in 2019. Third, since he assumed the presidency, he has unilaterally replaced all officials that contested his decision in the judicial branch and failed to renew the terms of the judges and prosecutors who refused to accept his arbitrary decisions. Parliament has been shut down since January 2019, and local elected officials were forced to leave their posts. Since 2019, there have been only 11 elected officials in the country. Moïse has introduced decrees that curb people’s civil and political rights, created agencies and promoted policies that should have required the approval of parliament. Since 2018, the country has experienced a wave of kidnappings, summary killings and massacres in the capital’s most heavily populated slums. Although human rights, civic and international groups have called on the government to rein in the armed gangs that are terrorizing the population, the government has ignored them and let these groups continue to wreak havoc everywhere. These incidents have exacerbated the political crisis in the country and fueled renewed calls for his resignation.
BTI 2022 Country Report: Haiti
Haiti has fallen into a spiral of political, economic and social chaos not seen since the overthrow of the Duvalier government in 1986. All state institutions such as parliament, the judicial system and the public administration have collapsed. Many factors have caused this unprecedented crisis. First, Jovenel Moïse, who became president in 2017, was never accepted by the population as a legitimate leader. Second, he failed to hold scheduled parliamentary and municipal elections in 2019. Third, since he assumed the presidency, he has unilaterally replaced all officials that contested his decision in the judicial branch and failed to renew the terms of the judges and prosecutors who refused to accept his arbitrary decisions. Parliament has been shut down since January 2019, and local elected officials were forced to leave their posts. Since 2019, there have been only 11 elected officials in the country. Moïse has introduced decrees that curb people’s civil and political rights, created agencies and promoted policies that should have required the approval of parliament. Since 2018, the country has experienced a wave of kidnappings, summary killings and massacres in the capital’s most heavily populated slums. Although human rights, civic and international groups have called on the government to rein in the armed gangs that are terrorizing the population, the government has ignored them and let these groups continue to wreak havoc everywhere. These incidents have exacerbated the political crisis in the country and fueled renewed calls for his resignation.
