Great HSG News Round-up

Haiti Support Group News Round Up

21 March 2013

LEGAL/IMPUNITY/HUMAN RIGHTS

The 'Baby Doc' Duvalier case continues to be heard, albeit in his absence as he continues to claim ill health for a good roundup with background, read this piece in Other Worlds. the most significant feature is that victims are being heard in court for the first time, a huge step forward in bringing the ex-dictator to trial for crimes against humanity. The UN's independent expert on Human Rights in Haiti also added his voice to the call for the trial to go ahead, although Truth-Out points out that for justice to really be served, Duvalier should not be alone in the dock.

The UN, however, does not have much of a moral high ground to stand on after its disgraceful refusal to afford justice to the victims of the cholera epidemic it has inflicted on Haiti, as pointed out by former Prime Minister of Jamaica, PJ Patterson, whose comments are in stark contrast to the deafening wall of silence on the issue from the Haitian administration.
While the UN has kicked the issue of dealing with cholera into the long grass with an unfunded 10-year $2.2billion project, the epidemic is taking off again and a scandalous lack of resources for treatment means many more unnecessary deaths, as explained in this MSF report and this excellent piece in The Nation.

Illegal, often violent, forced evictions of IDP camp dwellers continue, with a new twist that those who dare to speak up are now facing arrest for their temerity.

Meanwhile, the continued delays in forming a constitutionally valid electoral council allow the Haitian government carry on with unelected agents of the President in charge of local authorities and causing a crisis of democracy, which, along with deteriorating rule of law, is even drawing condemnation from the UN security council, which has hitherto been supportive of the Martelly/Lamothe administration. The US embassy, meanwhile, has not been able to resist the temptation of yet again throwing its weight around in the electoral affairs of a sovereign nation.

OTHER

In more depressing news, the UNDP 2012 Human Development Index report shows that Haiti dropped three places in the index compared to the previous year, from 158th to 161 (out of 186). Even the UK's Daily Mail has been moved to publish a lengthy article drawing attention to the lack of discernible improvements, which may be in part explained by the workings of aid policies, which once again fall under the spotlight, in particular those of Canada and the USA. 

Forbes magazine carried an interesting piece on a potential alternative sustainable development project for Haiti, so it is all the more of a shame that the 'international community' and donors continue to focus on the assembly/sweatshop model, the prime example being the 'Caracol Free Trade Zone', the impact of which is analysed by the excellent Grassroots Watch/Ayiti Kale Je.

The news is not all depressing, as Haitian grassroots peasant's associations continue to resist, seeing themselves as part of a broader movement across Latin America and the developing world, drawing not a little inspiration from the late Hugo Chavez, whose death has wide-ranging implications for Haiti, not least because the PetroCaribe deal represented a major source of funds for the Haitian government.

In another piece of all too rare good news, the tireless work of organisations such as KOFAVIV and the Bureau des Avocats Internationaux (BAI) has led to a tightening of the laws on sexual violence, although much hard work still needs to be done to translate this into practice.

poverty problem

It's Saturday morning, and here are five calls we've received so far today:

• A community organizer that lives - or lived - in a displacement camp. Last night, in the middle of the night, the landowner sent guys in to light the camp on fire and forcibly evict all of the families living there. There was shooting (though no-one was injured) and violence. They don't know where to go or what to do.
• A young photographer friend who recently published photos of a couple gang murders in his (rough) neighborhood. Since then, the gang has been after him. Last month they tried to grab him and ended up shooting him in the hip. Yesterday, they kidnapped his little brother. 
• My friend whose daughter has undiagnosable mental issues and other teenage daughter just had a baby. The friend's blood pressure is so high that she has fainted several times in the past few days and hasn't been able to see a doctor.
• Another friend who has been homeless since the earthquake, and is afraid that she is about to lose the space that that she and her family have been renting for their tarp shelter. 
• The man who sells toilet paper, candles and crackers across the street needs to borrow money because his business is floundering and he has to pay his kids' school fees.

In Haiti tragedy after tragedy occurs as a lack of infrastructure, security and the basic services (like: affordable healthcare and education, housing, a functional JUSTice system...) that every single human being deserves.

The longer we live here, the more frequently we are called upon in times of crisis. Each and every time, we feel helpless. We can connect friends to human rights organizations or to journalists. Sometimes we can provide transportation or some money or help to fill out an online form. Sometimes all we can do is care. It never feels like enough.

Today is one of those (many) days that I am angry. Unreasonably angry that I - with my lack of resources and practical skills - am called upon again and again to meet needs that I cannot meet.

This is not just a Haiti problem. It is a poverty problem. It is the problem with an unjust economic system wherein so much wealth is concentrated among so few, while the majority on this planet face a life of grinding poverty and hardship. It is a problem of humanitarian organizations spending thousands of dollars on landscaping when people can't see a doctor or pay school fees. It's a global problem. And, like it or not, we're all a part of it somehow.

"Under Tents" - International Campaign Launch for Housing in Haiti

"The quantity of people who are homeless in Port-au-Prince today is not acceptable. We need the support of other governments, like the US, to demand that the Haitian Government create a social housing plan. We are looking for allies to help our advocacy. We are asking simply for quality homes where people can live." - Jackson Doliscar of the grassroots group Force for Reflection and Action on Housing (FRAKKA).
                                       
Haitian grassroots organizations and international allies are launching an urgent housing rights campaign this week calling for permanent housing solutions for the nearly 400,000 people who are still living in displacement camps more than two years after the earthquake.
                                       
As part of the Under Tents campaign, Haiti’s homeless are demanding that the government immediately halt all forced evictions until public or affordable housing is made available. They request that the Government of Haiti, with the support of its allies and donor governments in the U.S., Canada, and Europe move quickly to: (1) designate land for housing; (2) create one centralized government housing institution to coordinate and implement a social housing plan; and (3) solicit and allocate funding to realize this plan. 

The campaign will press for US Congressional and European Parliamentary action, raise international awareness about the crisis through news media, mobilize international grassroots pressure through a petition, and build an international support movement especially with US and international housing rights organizations.
                                       
Under Tents is a joint initiative of dozens of Haitian grassroots groups and international allies who are committed to a solution for earthquake victims. The hundreds of thousands still living under shredded plastic tarps and tattered tents face high rates of gender-based and other violence, lack access to clean water and toilets, and combat a surge in the cholera epidemic. One in five is also at risk of imminent forced eviction.
                                       
To add your name to the petition, click here.


For updates, check out the campaign's website, Facebook page, and follow us on Twitter at @UnderTentsHaiti.

Get the Counter!

Scroll down and look at the sidebar of the blog, you'll notice something new: a "cholera counter."

Friends at Just Foreign Policy have created the counter to raise awareness about the cholera epidemic, and to apply pressure on the United Nations to do the right thing - accept responsibility for introducing cholera to Haiti and step up efforts to address it.

You can get the counter for your own blog or website here.

Ben learned this week from someone at Doctors Without Borders (who are currently managing the bulk of the country's cholera treatment centers) that all but one of their centers is maxed out. Today's update from the Center for Economic and Policy Research rounds up the very sobering statistics. 

Just Foreign Policy says:

"We created this counter in order to educate the public about the ongoing cholera crisis in Haiti.

Prior to October 2010, there had not been a reported incident of cholera in Haiti in over a century. Since then, over 500,000 cases have been reported, including 7,000 deaths. Scientific evidence strongly suggests that UN troops from Nepal, which was suffering from an outbreak of the disease at the time, carried cholera with them to their assignment in Haiti. Then the UN's faulty sanitation system contaminated a tributary of the Artibonite River, the longest and most important river in Haiti. Even a UN panel has conceded this point. Bill Clinton, who serves as UN Special Envoy to Haiti, has admitted that UN troops were the "proximate cause" of the epidemic, and US Ambassador to the UN Susan Rice has acknowledged that the UN played a role. Yet, the UN refuses to accept formal responsibility and it has done little to help treat, prevent, and control the disease.

A number of initiatives are underway to pressure the UN to do more in addressing Haiti's cholera crisis. The Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti has filed a lawsuit on behalf of 5,000 cholera victims. A Congressional letter to Ambassador Rice urges UN authorities to play a central role in addressing the epidemic. Recently, a New York Times editorial made a strong statement in support of this goal. And we have set up a petition that presses the UN to take formal responsibility.

But in order to make the pressure effective, we need to raise awareness. That's where this counter—and you—come in."

Get the counter here. And while you're at it, sign the petition.

Grace Village (Post removed temporarily)

Friends,

Yesterday I shared information about rights abuses in Grace Village camp in Carrefour, along with an action alert from Amnesty International. 

I stand by everything that I wrote, knowing that my information comes from credible first-hand sources (the camp residents themselves, along with the community activists and human rights lawyers - who are also trusted friends - that are working on their behalf).

However, the post has already generated vehement responses from individuals and organizations that are supporting Grace International, which I feel a responsibility to address thoughtfully. In the meantime, I will temporarily take down this post. To those of you that did send comments in defense of Grace International and the situation at Grace Village: I would love to have a conversation about this with you. Please email me directly through the profile on this blog.

Meanwhile, to contact Haitian authorities and demand an end to the human rights abuses that are most certainly occurring in Grace Village, you can download Amnesty's Action Alert here in English, French and Spanish.

With love,
Alexis

Fighting Fire

Camp Lycèe Toussaint after an arson attack. Photo from Mark Synder. 

By Alexis Erkert, Other Worlds
March 28, 2012

When police and the landowner commanded Michelène Pierre to vacate her tent on a Sunday afternoon so that they could light it on fire, she responded: “If you want to light me on fire along with this entire camp, go ahead. I’m not leaving.” The police bypassed her tent, but continued to threaten other residents of Camp Kozbami, setting flame to six tents.

Camp Kozbami is the fifth camp to be arsoned in two months. As landowners and the government push to close camps inhabited by those displaced by the earthquake that rocked Haiti 26 months ago, a reported 94,632 individuals are facing forced eviction.

Residents of the 660 displacement camps scattered throughout the Port-au-Prince area are experiencing increasing levels of threats and violence. Repeated acts of arson have both killed six people and displaced hundreds. Though cramped living conditions and a lack of available water during Haiti’s dry season have made camps vulnerable to accidental fires, camp organizers believe that all the recent fires have been deliberate.

Until her own tent was burned down, Arlette Célissaint lived in Camp Lycèe Toussaint. At a press conference on Friday, March 23, Célissaint and four other camp residents described the horror of waking up at 2:00 in the morning to a camp engulfed in flames. “Fire took over... We were all in our tents, all asleep and suddenly it was, ‘Run!’ and everyone started to get up and run. There were people burned on the spot and six went to the hospital…”

That morning, 96 of approximately 120 shelters were burned and five people, including a mother and her three children, were killed. Families lost everything they had managed to salvage from the earthquake and the little they have saved since, including money and legal documents. To date, none of the relevant government authorities have launched an investigation into the crimes. Neither the government nor aid agencies have stepped up to provide these doubly-displaced—and doubly-traumatized—communities with adequate disaster assistance.

“Look out for us.” Looking directly into a TV journalist’s video camera, Marie Charles, another former Camp Lycèe Toussaint resident said quietly, “We ask the government to look out for us. We’re people, not animals, but the conditions that we’re living in are not fit for people.”

Camp residents like Célissaint and Charles are raising the volume of their denunciations about the fires and about evictions in general with protests, press conferences and letters to the government. Others, like the families in Camp Maïs Gate, are physically refusing to move. Though paid thugs have been harassing them for weeks, families refuse to leave until they are provided with an adequate alternative.

No such alternative yet exists. Though the government is touting a plan called ‘16/6’ as a solution to Haiti’s housing crisis, it does not address the underlying structural challenges to relocation by making land available to camp dwellers for permanent resettlement or building houses. Instead, ‘16/6’ targets six camps, or approximately 5% of the displaced population, providing families $500 apiece to relocate into 16 communities. Critics say implementation of the plan has been rife with corruption and that it has accelerated rates of violent forced evictions in other camps. Though the ‘16/6’ model is being replicated by aid groups in a handful of additional camps, there is still a glaring absence of any comprehensive housing plan.

Human rights advocates and camp residents point to the eviction of a camp called Place Jeremie in late December as a prime example of the corruption and disregard for displaced peoples endemic in the relocation process. Though families were supposed to receive $500 apiece to relocate, police came to the camp in the middle of the night, armed with machetes and batons, destroyed tents and violently evicted the families living there. The Force for Reflection and Action on Housing (FRAKKA) reports that the majority of residents received $25 in compensation.

Regardless of whether families receive $25 or $500, there is no evidence that they do indeed wind up in safer, more dignifying circumstances once they’ve relocated. Housing in Haiti is expensive and the numbers make it clear that there is not enough undamaged housing available in Port-au-Prince to absorb displaced people, 80 percent of whom were renters before the earthquake. According to data from the International Organization for Migration, current shortages will leave more than 300,000 without housing.

With the displaced population down to 490,545 from 1.2 million just after the earthquake, Antonal Mortimé of the Platform of Haitian Human Rights Organizations (POHDH) wonders where people who have left the camps have gone. “Have they moved to the countryside? Back into their houses? Are enough new houses being built? Are new camps springing up? Or are people returning to fissured and unsound homes? No-one knows.”

Thus, an assembly of local human rights groups called the Right to Housing Collective is supporting camp dwellers in a call for a comprehensive national housing plan that includes public housing for the displaced. In the short-term, they are calling for an end to the violence plaguing camps and for a moratorium on evictions.

“We are struggling alongside the people whose rights are being trampled, to create a movement that forces the government into taking responsibility for its citizens…” said Jackson Doliscar. Doliscar is a community organizer with FRAKKA, a coalition of 26 camp committees and grassroots organizations and a key member of the Right to Housing Collective. “People are unaware of their specific rights, especially as displaced people. They don’t think that they have the right to ask anything of their government… That’s beginning to change… Many camps are ready to join hands.” And indeed, the arson attacks have renewed camp dwellers and rights advocates’ sense of urgency.

During Friday’s press conference, Mortimé reminded his government that the UN Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement require that they make every effort to guarantee the right to life and security of all earthquake victims.

Mortimé adds, “We aren’t just denouncing, we are pronouncing. We are proposing and advocating for solutions that come from displaced people themselves and we will not give up on pressuring the government to take responsibility for meeting these demands.”  

To read more about the ways that the Haitian housing movement is creating and promoting solutions to the housing crisis, read Home: From displacement camps to community in Haiti.  

Alexis Erkert is the Another Haiti is Possible Coordinator for Other Worlds. She has worked in advocacy and with Haitian social movements since 2008. You can access all of Other Worlds’ past articles regarding post-earthquake Haiti here.  

Copyleft Other Worlds. You may reprint this article in whole or in part. Please credit any text or original research you use to Alexis Erkert and Other Worlds.

"When it rains we will grow again": International Women's Day

Originally published over at Other Worlds
March 14, 2012
Text by Alexis Erkert, Photos by Ben Depp (scroll over slideshow to view captions)

 

“As activists, we commemorate this as a day of struggle, a day to make our voices heard until someone pays attention and helps provide solutions to our problems." Facing the Haitian parliament with a throng of banner-waving and singing women at her back, Rachelle Fondechaine of Women Fighting for the Development of Haiti continued, "Today is March 8th! It's a day when women workers in New York first took to the streets in to demand their rights in 1857. This day is marked in our memories, and as women in Haiti, we have no support, we are left in the street, our children don't have access to school...”

Hours earlier, hundreds of women converged in front of the Ministry for the Status and Condition of Women and, dancing to the rhythm of an all-women street band, wove their way through the streets of downtown Port-au-Prince to the Haitian parliament. Supported by more than a dozen local human rights organizations and activist groups, protesters' demands ranged widely from prosecution of former dictator Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier, to better conditions in factories, to UN accountability for cholera and sexual violence.

Women head nearly half of Haitian households and account for most of the country’s subsistence farmers. As traditional caretakers of children, the elderly and the sick, the burden on women has increased since the January 2010 earthquake. In displacement camps, where nearly 500,000 still live, women continue to face alarming rates of rape and gender-based violence. A recent report from Gender Action reveals that post-earthquake investments in Haiti have largely neglected issues of gender equality.

But over the years, Haitian women's groups have made important gains including legal equality for women within marriage and the criminalization of rape. Significant legislation is currently being drafted to provide increased protection from gender-based violence. And this year, on Women's Day, protesters reminded onlookers of their power, singing, "Women, we are reeds. You can cut off our heads, you can burn our roots, but when it rains, we will grow again."

Copyleft Other Worlds. You may reprint this article in whole or in part. Please credit any text you use to Alexis Erkert, Other Worlds and the slideshow to Ben Depp.

Still in Camps

Even though it's been more than two years since the earthquake, there are still a half a million people here living in displacement camps. This Washington Post article describes the situation better than I can. With Other Worlds, Alexis is working alongside Haitian organizations that are trying to push for much-needed public housing as one solution. I just take the pictures. The last one of these ran on the front page of the Post on Monday:

 

Two Years after the Earthquake in Haiti, “Housing Is Our Battle”

On the second anniversary of the Haiti earthquake, a protestor's sign reads, "If there is land for factories, there should be land for housing." [Photo by Ben]

By Alexis Erkert

January 19, 2012

Remember, you are marching today for those who couldn’t be here,
To say to them, “We haven’t forgotten. We’ll never forget.”
And to say to those that are still here,
We will take a stand for the rebuilding of Haiti.
                - Right to Housing Collective, January 12, 2012

On the morning of January 12, 2012, a group of women, children and men wound their way through the city wearing white, the Haitian color for mourning. Part memorial, they deposited wreaths of flowers on sites that had become mass graves during the 2010 earthquake, and part protest, they carried a banner that read “Two years later: Enough is enough.” They alternated between singing a funeral dirge and chanting, “We need houses to live in!”

Haitian social movements have reclaimed douze janvye, January 12, as a symbol of moving forward. Two years later, 520,000[i] continue to live in appalling conditions in displacement camps. And so, on January 11 and 12, thousands of Haitians – peasant farmers, activists, and displacement camp residents – took to the streets to denounce the situation in tent camps and the forced evictions of residents, and to call on the Haitian government to undertake land reform, provide public housing, and protect women's rights.

Although political and social divisions have long fissured Haitian movements, organizations from across historic divides are demanding many of the same things. One clear, common emphasis is the immediate need for land and housing for the displaced.

Excerpts from declarations and speeches on or around January 12, all with a focus on the right to housing, follow.

From a joint press conference of the International Lawyers’ Office (BAI) and residents of Camp Mariani, denouncing the threat of illegal forced eviction by the landowner in complicity with the local government:

We raise our voices to denounce with all of our might, before the national and international community, the threat of forced eviction, and arbitrary and illegal acts of violence being carried out against us by the major. We can’t take the pressure anymore. We ask all the institutions involved (the president, the government, the mayor, NGOs assisting displaced people, human rights organizations, etc.) to press, press our case, to take this issue into consideration so that the government and mayor sign a moratorium to block the aggression against people living in this camp, to plan what should be done with regards to displaced people, to respect the rights that we have as people. As Article 22 of this country’s constitution and Article 25 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights declare, “All people have the right to housing.”

From a speech given by Marie Frantz Joachim of Haitian Women’s Solidarity (SOFA), on behalf of the National Coordination of Women’s Organizations (KONAP), composed of a wide variety of feminist organizations, during the January 12, 2012 memorial march:

Out of respect for the battle our ancestors carried out, we too undertake the struggle to force our leaders to take responsibility for… the people living under tents. The housing problem is a structural problem and demands a structural response. Displaced Haitians cannot continue to live in the chicken cages that are being constructed for them. Haitians should be living in dignity…  And so we say, “This is our battle: the right for people to live in adequate housing.” And we ask that everyone in the social movement, all organizations, come together so that we can clearly, collectively, respond.

From the Eye-to-Eye Platform (Platfòm Je nan Je), a 12-member grouping that includes four of Haiti’s largest peasant associations, in a declaration to the Haitian Parliament following a march attended by thousands of protestors: 

The Eye-to-Eye Platform supports people from all four corners of the country by submitting the following demands and recommendations to the government:

• Remove people from under tents as quickly as possible; but that doesn’t mean to send them back to pre-existing slums or to the shantytowns created after the earthquake;
• The government must implement a disaster risk management plan to identify safe construction sites, with land for farming set apart from land for housing;
• The government must create and implement a housing policy, with urban planning and zoning; In this plan we must clearly see what needs to be done in both urban and rural areas; This plan needs to designate responsibility for land and housing to state institutions;
• Guarantee the security of displaced people, especially in the places to which they are being relocated…

From the report by the National Human Rights Defense Network (RNDDH), one of Haiti's most prominent human rights organizations: Advocacy for the Situation of January 10, 2010 Earthquake Victims:

Recommendations of RNDDH to the relevant institutions:

• Plan an effective re-location strategy with the participation of displaced people;
• Develop a public housing policy with the involvement of the Haitian government's own Public Enterprise for the Promotion of Social Housing (EPPLS);
• Strengthen state institutions necessary to effectively control the situation in camps and relocation sites;
• Insist that all actors involved in rebuilding the country adopt a human rights-based approach to everything that they do.

From a speech by Colette Lespinasse and Reyneld Sanon of the Right-to-Housing Collective, made up of 30-some Haitian organizations, grassroots groups and displacement camp associations.

We, organizations of survivors living in internally displaced persons [IDP] camps, as well as social and grassroots organizations, state:

• The government must define a land use policy for the country;
• The Parliament must draft and vote on a law to guarantee the right to housing;
• The government must look for and acquire land though expropriation [eminent domain] so that there is sufficient space to respond to the housing needs of the population;
• Women, children and the disabled, and the population in general must participate in decision-making regarding housing;
• All neighborhoods should be places where people can live in dignity and security

We resolve to remain mobilized in the struggle to change our society and our government. We resolve to regain the sovereignty of our country to construct a society in which we can enjoy guaranteed access to housing and all our fundamental rights.

From a presentation on housing in Camp Carradeux on January 12, 2012 by Olrich Jean Pierre of Noise Travels, News Spreads (Bri Kouri Nouvèl Gaye), an alternative media group doing advocacy and public education:

When we struggle for housing, we’re not just asking for houses. There are other services that should accompany housing. A house in an area where potable water isn’t available does not respect the right to housing. People need access to healthcare.  The battle for housing is not simply a battle for 4 square meters to live in. It’s a battle for public schools to educate our children so that they don’t have to go work in factories. It’s a battle to have access to healthcare when we’re sick.

We’re not just mobilizing to denounce the situation. No, the struggle before us is the struggle to pressure the government, to ask them, “Where are the houses that you’ve prepared for us?” And then to ask if there are toilets inside of them. Because we are a people with dignity. And with rights that need to be respected.

---

[i] HAITI Emergency Shelter and Camp Coordination Camp Management Cluster, Displacement Tracking Matrix V2.0 Update, November 30, 2011.

See Other Worlds’ recent article, Home: From Displacement Camps to Community in Haiti, for more detail on the right-to-housing movement in Haiti and how Haitian organizations are responding with advocacy and alternatives.

Copyleft Other Worlds. You may reprint this article in whole or in part.  Please credit any text or original research you use to Alexis Erkert and Other Worlds.

Home: From Displacement Camps to Community in Haiti

Displaced Haitians are actively claiming the right to housing through

advocacy and alternative housing models. Photo by Ben Depp.

By Alexis Erkert and Beverly Bell
January 4, 2012

As 2012 begins, a growing movement of displaced people and their allies in Haiti is actively claiming the right to housing, which is recognized by both the Haitian constitution and international treaties to which Haiti is signatory.

Haitians displaced by the earthquake two years ago face many crises, but perhaps none worse than ongoing homelessness. One of the 520,000 people still living in displacement camps, [i] Dieula Croissey describes conditions where she lives in Cité Soleil: “We’re living in insecurity, our lives are threatened, our daughters are used.” In addition to insecurity and violence, especially against women, people living in camps face deteriorating shelter materials – shredding plastic tarps and tattered tents – hunger, and lack of adequate water or toilets. Despite Haiti’s declining rates of cholera infection,[ii] the dearth of sanitation options leaves real risk for contracting the disease.

Meanwhile, reconstruction projects, especially permanent housing projects, have been slow in materializing. According to figures furnished by UN-HABITAT, only 13,000 houses have been repaired and 4,670 permanent homes built for the more than half a million people originally displaced. Though current numbers are hard to come by, approximately 100,000 temporary shelters have also been built.[iii] Tiny (less than 100 square feet for an entire family), with few windows, and usually made of untreated plywood or heavy plastic sheeting, these do not provide a long-term solution for people in need of housing.

The first step toward a real solution, according to the housing movement, must be development of a comprehensive national housing policy by the government, with broad input by displaced people themselves. Currently, no such policy exists; instead, homeless people’s fates are in the hands of piecemeal efforts from groups ranging from respectful community churches to profit-motivated businesses. One component of a national policy is that the government begin invoking eminent domain, exercising its right (guaranteed by a Decree on the Recognition of Public Interest in 1921) to claim private property for public use.

The second urgent need, activists say, is for the government to create public housing on the claimed land. The governmental Public Office for Public Housing Promotion (EPPLS by its French acronym) exists for this purpose, but currently has no budget or authorization to move forward. Housing activists stress that the residences built must be safe; have access to roads; provide water, electricity, and sewage; offer community and recreational spaces; be accessible to people with disabilities; and provide women with equal access.

The housing rights movement is also calling on the government to:

• Pass a law guaranteeing the right to housing. While Article 22 of the Haitian Constitution recognizes the right to decent housing, it does not guarantee it;
• Enforce existing rent control legislation. Renters report prices rising up to 17 times higher than pre-earthquake; 
• Take proactive measures to sort out land tenure and create a registry of ownership, as a first step toward an urban and rural land redistribution program; 
• Define a land use policy that prevents housing speculation and facilitates decentralization from Port-au-Prince by encouraging rebuilding outside the capital; 
• Give small grants and credit to help people repair or build their own houses, where the government doesn’t provide public housing. The movement is calling on foreign organizations to do the same; 
• Tackle gender bias in housing and land ownership, so that women’s names are consistently included in titling and their legally protected right to own and inherit land is enforced; and
• Ratify the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. This covenant, recognized by 160 countries, has been signed by the Haitian government but not yet passed into law. Doing so would hold the government responsible for providing housing, education and other human rights accountable to international standards and monitoring. 

While urging systemic and legislative solutions, Haiti’s right-to-housing movement is also constructing transformative paradigms of housing and community. This is especially important because what little housing has been created since the earthquake has largely missed the mark in terms of need. Colette Lespinasse, director of the Support Group for Repatriates and Refugees (GARR by its French acronym) says, “What we were seeing in terms of housing plans has come largely from foreigners, with proposals for pre-fabricated houses that responded more to the interests and needs of businessmen. In general, the proposals don’t correspond to Haitian culture or our climate, and also don’t give people a chance to learn techniques themselves that they can use to continue building on their own.”

In public forums and in interviews, women in camps make a distinction between housing and homes. They point out that while lodging can provide a roof over their heads, what they want is a nurturing space that is free of violence, where the common good is prioritized, and where power dynamics between men and women can shift. In the absence of initiative by the government, some Haitian non-profit and human rights organizations have stepped out of their normal missions to provide different kinds of housing. They have teamed up with local communities to create do-it-yourself solutions. They hope to inspire others, including their government, to envision and to dare to create viable community spaces with local participation.

Colette says, “You can’t just denounce what you don’t want. We’re meeting with others, as well as drawing inspiration from housing movements, networks and cooperatives in other countries. We want to propose alternatives that our country’s leaders could use as models.”

In one of these alternatives, the peasant support group Institute of Technology and Animation (ITECA) in Gressier, 90 minutes or so west of Port-au-Prince, is building 1,700 permanent homes for residents who lost theirs, in an approximately ten square kilometer area. With funding from Caritas Switzerland, the houses offer water and electricity, almost unheard of in the countryside, and moreover in environmentally low-impact ways - through a rainwater collection system and solar panel on each roof. Each is equipped with an outdoor latrine. They are earthquake and hurricane-resistant and use local building materials, like stones, to the degree possible. Another rare feature is that the home-owners themselves do all of the work that doesn’t require specialized skills. ITECA is also working with the mayor to ensure that each owner will receive proper land and housing titles.

Chenet Jean-Baptiste, director of ITECA, explains, “We aren’t building houses to meet a need for housing, but rather as a work of community process. For us, housing is an entry point for re-organizing concepts of land ownership and social and economic relationships. Our fundamental mission is to accompany communities and encourage them to become principal agents of change. After all, what’s the point of giving someone a house only for them to die of hunger inside it?”

A second initiative is GARR’s dream to create land and housing cooperatives. The vision springs from a 40-year-old experiment in Uruguay, where 25,000 members of housing cooperatives manage their housing and land communally. It is also reminiscent of land reform communities in Brazil and elsewhere. In this model, according to Colette, “the very poor pool their money together and pull their internal resources to resolve their own problems, to find land and care for the land together. Everyone is responsible for the community.” GARR has started two model cooperatives, made up of 42 families on the Haitian-Dominican border. One is a landowners’ cooperative where families with small properties merge their properties to manage together. The second is cooperative housing, on land donated by the government. With assistance from Christian Aid, GARR has constructed 15 out of 40 projected houses on this land. The visionaries hope that the cooperatives will continue to grow and that “villages of life” will evolve, thriving communities with on-site or nearby clinics and schools, and job opportunities in agriculture or small business.

In Cap-Rouge, in South-eastern Haiti, the Haitian Platform to Advocate Alternative Development (PAPDA) is working together with an organization called Hope for the Development of Cap-Rouge (VEDEK), to repair 500 destroyed homes using local building materials. According to Franck St. Jean, coordinator of PAPDA’s Food Sovereignty Advocacy Program, core principals of the project include strengthening local wisdom, culture, and economy; conserving biodiversity; and empowering community. Though currently funded by European non-profits, PAPDA and VEDEK are ultimately trying to create a model that doesn’t depend on external funding or knowledge.

Similarly, the Support Group for Rural Development (GADRU) is repairing homes around the towns of Carrefour and Kenscoff in Haiti’s western province. Their objective? To promote community development wherein konbits, or volunteer, collective labor teams, of 10 families each build one another’s homes. GADRU, too, is working with local construction techniques and materials – wood, stone and earth – and designing the homes to withstand natural disasters.

As with every other element of reconstruction from the earthquake, displaced people and grassroots organizations are insisting that they must have input in developing solutions. Calling on the Haitian government to provide a comprehensive solution to the housing crisis, they are also paving the way with participative models of what that solution could look like. Reyneld Sanon of the Force for Reflection and Action on Housing (FRAKKA) says that people have to be part of planning the reconstruction of “their neighborhoods, of their cities, of their country, and of their dignity.”

“People have needs and they have ideas, they have visions for the way that houses can be built,” he said. “Go into a camp, and ask any child to make a drawing that shows what kind of house they want to live in. And you’ll see. You’ll see. Even children have ideas and ideals.”


[i] This is the most recent figure available. (HAITI Emergency Shelter and Camp Coordination Camp Management Cluster, Displacement Tracking Matrix V2.0 Update, November 30, 2011).

[ii] When rainy season ended, the number of new cholera cases declined from an average of 500 a day to 300. As of November 18, 2011, 521,195 people have contracted cholera and of those, almost 7,000 have died. (UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), Humanitarian Bulletin (19 November -19 December 2011), December 19, 2011; Republique d’Haiti Ministère de la Santé Publique et de la Population, Rapports journaliers du MSPP sur l'évolution du choléra en Haiti, January 3, 2012, http://www.mspp.gouv.ht/site/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=117&Itemid=1).

[iii] In August 2011, the Haiti Shelter Cluster reported that 9,4879 temporary shelters had been constructed. (Haiti Shelter Cluster, Shelter Report by Municipality, August 31, 2011).  

Alexis Erkert is the Another Haiti is Possible Coordinator for Other Worlds. She has worked in advocacy and with Haitian social movements since 2008.You can access all of Other Worlds’ past articles regarding post-earthquake Haiti here. 

Beverly Bell has worked with Haitian social movements for over 30 years. She is author of the book Walking on Fire: Haitian Women's Stories of Survival and Resistance and is working on the forthcoming book, Fault Lines: Views across Haiti’s New Divide. She coordinates Other Worlds, which promotes social and economic alternatives. She is also associate fellow of the Institute for Policy Studies.  

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Ben, Sean and Oprah

Last week Ben was featured, along with Sean Penn and Oprah Winfrey, on the cover of Haiti's progressive newspaper, Haiti Liberté.

Okay, so Ben might be just a little bit harder to pick out... but he's there (right above the microphone). This picture is from the protest in Saint Marc on Human Rights Day and the headline reads, "MINUSTAH: Victims Demand Justice and Reparations." See here for news and updates related to the IJDH/BAI cholera lawsuit against the UN.

Oprah was here last weekend, as were Kim Kardashian, Louis Farrakhan, Ben Stiller, and Maria Bello. Sean is usually around here somewhere, too. Happy Holidays, Haiti.

“Haitian Peasant Women as Poto Mitan, Central Pillar”: An interview with Iderle Brénus Gerbier

Interview by Alexis Erkert, Other Worlds
December 20, 2011

"Haitian women are the poto mitan, or central pillar, of economic activities," says Iderle Brenus. Photo: Ben Depp

Iderle Brénus Gerbier has worked with many peasant organizations in support of women's rights and food sovereignty. She is a member of the Haitian National Network for Food Security and Sovereignty (RENHASSA), campaign coordinator for Food Sovereignty in Haiti, advisor of the National Confederation of Peasant Women (KONAFAP), and organizer for the Haitian Social Forum for Food Sovereignty.

In Haiti, peasant women play a special role in the home and in agriculture. We consider peasant women as the poto mitan, central pillar, of economic activities.

When neoliberal structural adjustment programs are imposed on the Haitian government, like they have been for 20 years, they affect our peasant women. They require that the state implement fundamentally anti-peasant programs that threaten to destroy the whole peasant sector. They mean the Haitian government doesn’t adequately fund our agriculture and has left the small farmers unable to compete [with cheaper imported goods] in the local market. Many farmers are forced to abandon agriculture to go work in factories or other activities, in the cities or in the Dominican Republic. And when a man leaves the rural community, the whole responsibility falls on the back of his wife.

The Haitian society is essentially macho, and the Haitian politicians and international interests oppress Haiti’s own children. Farmers become victims again and again and women are always held back. But these women continue to support their country.

Our goal is to achieve respect for the rights of Haitian women. Despite their position as poto mitan, as the main carriers of the national economy, rural Haitian women always suffer in our society. Most of these women have no direct access to agricultural lands and income is strictly controlled by men, despite their role in agriculture.

Many rural residents are forced to give away the children they love because they don’t have the financial capacity to keep their children at home and send them to school. The majority of these children become the slaves of women living in Port-au-Prince and in other cities. If women farmers could earn income from their hard work, they’d be able to keep their children at home.

The majority of the women working in the informal economy in the city come from the countryside. Many rural residents lost their lives because they were at the heart of the earthquake looking for employment in Port-au-Prince, working for pennies at a factory or selling bottled water in the streets. The earthquake increased the responsibilities that were already too heavy for these poor women.

I’ll repeat over and over that these women who lost their lives, their children, their husbands, and other loved ones in Port-au-Prince, lost them mainly because of lack of infrastructure resulting from the neoliberal policies in the country. But they’ll never be discouraged. They’ll always be involved in all kinds of constructive activities and keep supporting their country. After the earthquake, they went to Port-au-Prince searching for their children and ended up offering help to others who were in need. In the cities and in the countryside, these women work without rest.

We need to advance the struggle of women by redefining the concept of feminism in Haiti. To do this we have to reshuffle the cards and reduce the differences between our urban and peasant women. Right now there are two kinds of women: women with a capital W and women with a small w. Even within the women’s struggle, there are a lot of contemptible practices that have yet to be overcome. Most of the urban well-off women look down upon the poor countryside women, calling them tèt mare, wrapped head, because of the kerchiefs rural women often wear on their heads. The rich and educated town women forget that the poor peasant women make up the core of the rural communities that constitute the greatest part of the country. It’s not fair that a small minority have the privilege of monopolizing almost all of the society’s resources and wealth.

Peasant women are always present in all activities to win human rights, respect for life, and food sovereignty. October 15 was declared “Day of the Haitian Peasant Woman,” but unfortunately this day has never been commemorated. We have to recognize and appreciate women farmers for their significant socio-economic worth. We have to give them the compensation they deserve and support their efforts. We need to increase their visibility in efforts to build food sovereignty in the country. Rural women and those struggling with them, here in Haiti or overseas, need to shore up their strength. We must advocate for the rights of women.

Many thanks to Joseph Pierre for translating.

Alexis Erkert is the Another Haiti is Possible Co-Coordinator for Other Worlds. She has worked in advocacy and with the Haitian social movement since 2008. You can access all of Other Worlds’ past articles regarding post-earthquake Haiti here.

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Human Rights Day

Today, folks all over the world are celebrating the 63rd anniversary of the UN Declaration of Human Rights.

This week also heralds the 20th anniversary of several Haitian human rights organizations, including the 7-member Platform of Haitian Human Rights Organizations (POHDH) and the Action Group for Repatriates and Refugees (GARR). The timing is no coincidence. A military coup d'etat took out democratically-elected president Jean Bertrand Aristide in September 1991 and the period following the coup marked a time of mass popular resistance against the civil and political repression of an illegimitate military regime backed by the United States.

 POHDH: 20 years of struggle for the respect of Human Rights

Yesterday I attended a commemorative event at POHDH. Although members of POHDH's executive committee talked about the pressing human rights needs in Haiti today, lack of government accountability and the structural and ideological barriers to economic & social rights, they also emphasized that huge gains have been made in the last twenty years.

Human rights discourse has seeped into politics, entertainment and even general conversation in a big way as Haitians are in general more aware of their rights. Many more media outlets exist, demonstrating increased liberty of expression, and popular organizing is commonplace in all sectors (small farmers, factory workers, displaced people, women, youth...).

And, as evidenced yesterday, more protests are taking place. In St. Marc, cholera victims demonstrated in front of the MINUSTAH (the UN peacekeeping mission) base, asking that their claims for reparations be acknowledged and responded to by the UN. The event was organized by the Bureau des Avocats Internationaux (BAI). BAI and their stateside partner, the Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti (IJDH) have recently filed a landmark case against the UN on behalf of over 5,000 cholera victims.

Yesterday, too, the Commission of Women Victims for Victims (KOFAVIV) a women's rights group supporting victims of rape and gender-based violence, hosted a sit-in in front of the Haitian Parliament during which they delivered an open letter on women's protection to the President of the Senate. Meanwhile, GARR hosted a packed-out day of remembrance for renowned Haitian-Dominican activist Sonia Pierre who passed away last week. 

Towards the end of the event yesterday, Antonal Mortimé, POHDH's Executive Secretary, pointed out that increased awareness, free media and popular protests are quantitative versus qualitative in terms of impacting people's access to very necessary social and economic rights like education, food, water, healthcare and liveable housing. Still, he said, they are important steps towards a society in which human rights and dignity are respected.

Here's to twenty years of struggle towards that vision.

"Looks like it's cholera!"

Kids in Desarmes, in the Artibonite valley, have made up a song that they sing to the tune of Shakira's "Waka Waka":

Diri ak sos pwa, // Rice with bean sauce,
mayi moulen ak pwa, // cornmeal with beans,
yon sache dlo, de ji dola // one bag of water, two ice pops,
landan legliz la. // in church.*
Ou fin manje, // You finish eating,
ou kouche, // you lay down,
gen diyare // have diarrhea,
ou leve. // you get up.
Vwazen mwen, sa w gen la? // My neighbor, what you do have?
Vwazen mwen, sa w gen la? // My neighbor, what you do have?
Vwazen mwen, sa w gen la-a-a? // My neighbor, what you do ha-a-ave?
Genlè se kolera! // Looks like it's cholera!

*It's unclear why they are eating the rice, cornmeal and ice pops in church.

Yesterday marked the one year anniversary of the introduction of cholera into Haiti. As of the beginning of October, 465,293 cases have been reported and 6,559 deaths. Ben - who has spent a fair bit of time photographing cholera in the countryside - thinks that in reality there have probably been four times that many deaths.

Although it was tapering off, cholera has spiked again with heavy rains that began in August. Doctors without Borders (MSF) reported that in Port au Prince in the last month, cases in their clinics have increased from less than 300 admissions a week to more than 850, while "resources for adequately preventing the disease remain rudimentary and at the mercy of the uncertainties of life in the country." Resources remain "rudimentary" in part because many NGOs withdrew from the cholera response shortly before the rainy season. [See this excellent August report from the Center for Economic Policy Research explaining why Haiti's cholera epidemic is the worst in the world despite the outrageous number of NGOs working here.]

Haitian and international human rights groups are calling on the United Nations to acknowledge that the epidemic was brought to Haiti by peacekeeping troops, a fact that has been corroborated by multiple experts and researchers, and asking that the UN pay restitution to Haiti. As one Haitian social activist put it, "The irony is not lost on us that a Chapter VII peacekeeping mission [which are often deployed in response to crimes against humanity], is refusing to acknowledge their complicity in the deaths of so many people. Cholera is a crime against humanity in Haiti."

In protest, some of the organizations that we collaborate with marched yesterday from Fort National to the National Cemetery. We met up with them at the cemetery, arriving just in time to join the protestors as they rushed into the graveyard with exuberant ra ra instruments, a spray-painted goat [a popular nickname for UN soldiers here is "volè kabrit," or goat thieves, after a soldier stole a goat a couple years back], and a miniature wooden casket to symbolize the peacekeeping mission.

The casket is painted with the words, "Down with MINUSTAH: goat thieves, fags." (Even among activists, homophobia is so strong in Haiti that is more of an insult to call soldiers "fags" than it is to call them rapists. This, of course, is in reference to the incident in Port Salut in September.)

After speeches, someone threw spray paint cans into the casket, poured kerosene in and lit it on fire. Amid much cheering, the casket exploded. And as the crowd disbursed I heard someone yell, "MINUSTAH is finished!"

On the contrary, the mission's mandate has just been extended for another year. It doesn't seem like the UN will be taking responsibility for Haiti's cholera epidemic anytime soon. [In fact, last week when Ben was in Mirebalais taking pictures outside of the UN base that was the point of origin, he was detained and, as he puts it, "diplomatically threatened" not to publish the pictures in any stories related to cholera].

"We are Tired of Living under Tents"

Originally published at Daily Kos, October 6, 2011
By Alexis Erkert, Another Haiti is Possible Co-Coordinator, Other Worlds


On Monday morning, October 3, ten women stood across the street from the Ministry of Social Affairs, waving their arms, wailing and chanting. They were calling on Osany, of the pantheon of vodou lwa, or spirits, for assistance. The lyrics of their chant, repeated over and again, were patently simple:

Stop stealing this country’s money
This country’s money belongs to the poor.

The Creole word for “poor,” malerè, also means miserable. And the litany of the women’s sources of misery is overwhelming: aging tents, shredding tarps, heat, rain, wind, high blood pressure, colds, body aches, cholera, rats, cockroaches, raw sewage, no potable water, no privacy, no security. One is a single mom with a 2-month old. And they are all facing eviction from Vilaj Fratènite, Brotherhood Village, the displacement camp where they have lived since the earthquake.

Monday was World Habitat Day, established by the UN in 1986. The month of October is annually one in which movements and organizations around the world mobilize for housing rights and in opposition to evictions.

According to the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, 595,000 Haitians are still living in camps – half of the total number displaced by the earthquake 21 months ago. And, despite last year's ruling by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights that the Haitian government impose a moratorium on all evictions, the government has not stepped in to keep private landowners and local government officials from forcing displaced people off both public and private land. IOM reported that the number of camps under threat of eviction increased by 400% per cent between July 2010 and July 2011.

Although conditions in the camps are abominable, residents that remain in the camps - facing the challenges that the women from Brotherhood Village enumerated above - do so simply because they have no better options. Summed up one member of the group, “That’s how we live now. But where will we go when we are evicted? We have nowhere to go.”

Homeless people and their allies have begun to vocally insist on their democratic right to participate in planning the reconstruction of their homes, communities, and nations. It is acknowledged in the UN Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement that displaced people should be able to participate in the “in the planning and management of their return or resettlement.” Yet the government has consistently excluded the vast majority, including those directly impacted. Although various housing plans are being drafted by the government and international agencies, human rights lawyer Patrice Florvilus says, “If it’s decided without us, it won’t help us.”

President Michel Martelly’s housing plan, referred to as “sixteen-six,” includes provisions for the relocation of six larger, more visible camps to sixteen rehabilitated neighborhoods. As for how those ten women calling out to Osany might benefit, there may as well be no plan. The same goes for residents of the 184 other displacement camps that are not addressed by Martelly’s program.

Patrice went on to point out that the housing repair projects being led by many international agencies throughout earthquake-damaged areas benefit those who were homeowners before the earthquake. While this is helpful, it does not address the needs of the renters and homeless, who are the most vulnerable. “What housing projects are targeting the people that need housing the most?” he asked.

In response, the Force for Reflection and Action on Housing (FRAKKA), a collective of 30-some committees and associations from displacement camps, formed to advocate for secure and dignifying housing for all, as well as to combat forced evictions. More recently, a group called the Housing Rights Collective, which includes FRAKKA and other organizations, have been attempting to create possibilities for camp residents to organize, collectively determine their needs and priorities, and form strategies to achieve them.


Nou bouke viv anba tant, We are tired of living under tents, was the slogan for three days of events, from October 1-3, planned by the Housing Rights Collective to mark World Habitat Day. Events included a forum, skits and cultural activities in Camp Corail-Cesselesse, and a rally in front of the Ministry of Social Affairs. Allies from the International Alliance of Inhabitants, the Zero Evictions Movement, COOPHABITAT in the Dominican Republic, and housing cooperative movements in Puerto Rico and Cuba came to Haiti to lend support, reminding displaced Haitians that they are not isolated in their struggle. They also shared strategies from their own successes in winning housing.

Forum participants included approximately 120 camp residents and members of camp committees or associations. An emphasis in the discussion was on evictions. Testimonies from camp residents who have already experienced forcible and often violent evictions resonated deeply with others in attendance. With no clear housing strategy in place, most expressed fear that they will eventually be forced to leave the camps without being provided alternative places to live.

“We have rights! Just like everyone else, we have the right to see our children live like other children. We have the right to sleep like other people, without rats crawling over us or rain dripping on us,” Marie-Helene Moïse, 32 years old and with two children, who has been living in Camp Kid since the earthquake, stood up and said. “When you say you live in a camp, people look at you like you’re inferior. We suffer and our people are not standing up for us. Morning, noon, night… it’s not possible to live well in the camps. The Haitian government needs to remove us from these conditions because we can’t keep going. My friends, this is why World Habitat Day should be so significant to those of us living in tents. Today, we’re reflecting, but there will be action to come.”

During the rally, some of that action was visible in front of the Ministry. Spirited protestors, mostly women, including the group from Brotherhood Village, waved hand-written signs:

“We are not made to live under the rain.”

“There is no liberty without well-being. There is no well-being without adequate housing for all. Housing without discrimination.”

“January 12 took most of what we own. We won’t let rain and hurricanes wash us away with the little that is left.”

“We are people. We want homes.”

“Ministry of Social Affairs, fulfill your responsibility.”

As for solutions? A letter drafted by camp committees and other grassroots groups and delivered during the protests requested that the Ministry: help to apply the Inter-American Human Rights Commission ruling to stop forced evictions; take leadership in creating a national housing plan, complete with zoning regulations; begin public housing projects for earthquake survivors; ensure that a housing fund be part of the national budget; and, finally, give the Public Office for Public Housing Promotion (EPPLS by its French acronym) the means and the power to execute a public housing plan.

More advocacy initiatives are being planned, including meetings with the parliament and chamber of deputies to discuss budgeting for public housing initiatives, and meetings with local magistrates to request their assistance in curbing forced evictions. FRAKKA and the newly formed pro-bono legal office started by Patrice Florvilus, Defenders of the Oppressed (DOP), are joining forces to provide legal training to camp residents. The International Lawyers Office (BAI) is carrying out similar work, conducting advocacy for housing rights and fighting forced evictions.

Today the Haitian popular movement (the succession of grassroots groups and progressive non-profit organizations that have led movements for alternative social, economic and political systems) is small and faces numerous challenges. The movement still bears the scars of past political divisions and for many, the risk of being outspoken is great. Despite relative civil liberty in Haiti today, ongoing beatings and arrests of activists at anti-eviction demonstrations have been a reminder of that risk. Progress is also often obstructed by lack of resources.

Given the size and desperation of Haiti’s displaced population, right to housing and anti-evictions work is necessarily one of the main foci of the popular movement. As time passes without adequate solutions from the government and international agencies, camp residents are growing increasingly exasperated.

In her introduction to Saturday’s forum, Lisane André of GARR reminded participants of the proverb, Se kolòn ki bat, It is a column that wins. She explained: “When we are faced with a struggle and we separate, each working individually, it will take a long time to achieve results, if they’re achieved at all. Instead, if we all come together, if we create a chain, if we stick together, if we form a column… We can achieve victory despite the odds.”

“We are a collective,” she cried, her voice ringing out, “And we invite everyone to join us in the movement for housing.”

Click here to participate in calling for an end to forced evictions.

For a more in-depth look at the current housing situation, see the Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti’s new report, “Haiti’s Housing Crisis.”

Alexis Erkert is the Another Haiti is Possible Co-Coordinator for Other Worlds. She has worked in advocacy and with the Haitian social movement for the past three years. You can access all of Other Worlds’ past articles regarding post-earthquake Haiti here.

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