Port-au-Prince, May 7, 2023 --- Najella survived a gang rape at the height of the violence in Cité Soleil, the largest slum in Port-au-Prince, in July 2022. Her husband who accompanied her was intercepted by bandits. She hasn't heard from him since.

“I was able to relocate thanks to the support of a feminist organization Kay Fanm supported by UNFPA, the United Nations Fund for Reproductive Health,” she confides. “This area is quieter. However, my living conditions are a little less so. My children almost lost the school year. I can’t pay for their schooling,” she adds.

Najella has not yet resumed her previous activity. She sold retail at Croix-des-Bossales, the largest public market in Port-au-Prince, the capital of Haiti. The neighborhood surrounding this market has become increasingly insecure.

Najella and her husband were returning from the market when they experienced their mishap in Cité Soleil. They were unaware of the increasing violence there.

Najella was among three hundred women survivors of violence whom the feminist organization had helped to relocate. The head of the organization would like to continue this relocation program, given the persistence of violence perpetrated by gangs, particularly targeting women and girls.

The Special Representative of the UN Secretary General in Haiti observed, before the Security Council, on April 26, 2023, that “it will be difficult to move forward within the framework of a political dialogue without "effectively address endemic insecurity, with gang violence growing at an unprecedented rate in areas previously considered relatively safe, in Port-au-Prince and outside the capital."

Mari Isabel Salvador, reported “1,647 criminal incidents – homicides, rapes, kidnappings and lynchings – recorded by the PNH and BINUH during the first quarter of 2023, more than double the total of last year at the same time. period ".

According to a human rights organization – “Fondasyon Je Klere” – over the last 21 months, “non-exhaustive figures amount to more than 2,000 violent deaths, more than a thousand cases of kidnapping, cases of rape, theft, fire, destruction of other people's property, plantations, massive internal population displacements, disruption of school, economic, commercial, social and cultural activities, summary executions and dangerous roads nationals abandoned to armed gangs.

Text and photos: Vario Sérant

Note: Najella is a borrowed first name