Haiti cannot wait another year for the U.S. and Canada to help

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Haiti was not at the very top of the agenda when Joe Biden visited Ottawa a year ago this month. But it was close, as the U.S. President asked Canada to lead a multinational force to restore order in Haiti where, Mr. Biden said, “gangs have essentially taken the place of the government.”

Mr. Biden did not get the answer he wanted from Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who had already dismissed the idea of an “outside intervention” to stabilize Haiti. Instead, Mr. Trudeau touted his government’s plan to contribute $100-million to strengthen the capacity of the Haitian National Police as a better solution.

A year later, the situation in Haiti has gotten much worse. Whatever control the national police once had over the capital, Port-au-Prince, has crumbled. Thousands of officers have either quit or been fired for abandoning their posts. Scores have been killed in armed confrontations with gangs. Lawlessness, violence, rape and hunger are now rampant.

In short, a year of U.S. and Canadian procrastination has led to nothing but more suffering and bloodshed in Haiti.

It is hard to see how Haitians stand a fighting chance at order, much less democracy, without another United Nations-sanctioned peacekeeping force first restoring security to its streets. Previous UN missions have left bitter memories, not to mention cholera, among the Haitian population. But the United States nevertheless has an obligation to help fix what it broke, often with Canada’s help, over more than a century of military and political intervention.

More: The world needs to let Haiti write its own story

Haiti’s chronic failure to emerge from its vicious cycle of dictatorship and corruption can be directly traced to two decades of U.S. occupation starting in 1915. Washington later backed ruthless dictators François Duvalier and son Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier between 1957 and 1986, mainly because they were anti-communists.

The U.S. intervened in 1994 to restore the democratically elected Haitian president Jean-Bertrand Aristide to office after he was ousted in a coup. But Mr. Aristide also proved to be rather undemocratic, and was forced from power in 2004.

The U.S. pattern of backing the wrong horse in Haiti repeated itself after the 2021 assassination of president Jovenel Moïse. Washington, along with Ottawa, stood behind the unelected prime minister Ariel Henry, even though he took power under murky conditions and lacked legitimacy among Haitians themselves.

Mr. Biden and Mr. Trudeau both seemed content to go along with Mr. Henry’s plan to bring in 1,000 police officers from Kenya, and 2,000 soldiers from Benin, to sideline the gangs. Or at least, they did until Mr. Henry was prevented from returning to Haiti from a trip this month to Kenya as gangs shut down the country’s airports and ports.

Mr. Henry’s Monday announcement that he will step down once a transitional council is put in place and names an interim prime minister was hailed as progress by Washington and Ottawa. But it will delay the arrival of any UN peacekeeping forces in Haiti, and may ultimately lead to a stalemate that enables Mr. Henry to cling to office.

“We need to recognize that this has been a very, very challenging few years, not just for the Haitian people, but for the entire political class in Haiti, and I really commend them for continuing to come together,” Mr. Trudeau said on Monday after participating remotely in a meeting of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) that was held in Jamaica, but before Mr. Henry announced his intention to step down. Mr. Trudeau’s comments belied the reality on the ground in Haiti and the deep divisions and obstacles that stand in the way of the transitional council’s success.

It remains to be seen whether Haiti’s various political factions can agree on the council’s composition, much less on a timeline for elections. Under the agreement reached in Jamaica, anyone who has been convicted, charged or indicted in any jurisdiction, or who is the subject of UN sanctions, is to be prohibited from becoming a member of the transitional council. But that rule will be hard to enforce.

Haiti’s elites have long conspired to rule the country in their own interests, while most of their 11 million compatriots live in poverty. The country ranks 158th out of 193 on the most recent UN Human Development Index. Corruption and drug smuggling are endemic, and there is no political faction that does not have ties to criminal activity.

Indeed, many of the gangs that have turned Haiti into a no-go zone, which include the G9 gang led by Jimmy “Barbecue” Chérizier that is at the centre of the current crisis, emerged from the private security forces that various political parties created or called on for their own protection.

On Monday, Mr. Trudeau said he favoured a “Haitian-led solution” to the crisis. But that’s what he said last year, too.