Haiti’s underbelly seethes after earthquake

Port-au-PRINCE - To comprehend the deathly power of a machete you only need to see it raised in the air, attached to an arm, and then in fierce, rapid movements designed to kill, watch as it unflinchingly comes down on a human body.

In Centreville, one of the poorest areas in Port-au-Prince where the earthquake has left little standing, a group of people suddenly started fanning out in panic as men armed with knives and machetes launched a vicious attack in a small, tight circle. You didn’t have to witness the bloody end to feel the rage as the machetes chopped down repeatedly, as if automated.

It was late Monday morning and the area was enveloped in a suffocating layer of acrid smoke from burning garbage. For a snapshot of Centreville, picture this: Mounds of rubble with rafters and beams sticking out like broken limbs; damaged buildings threatening to fall; low-hanging power lines; swirling pools of grey water that people were collecting; fly-ridden piles of rotting food; the stench of urine, faeces and bodies still to be retrieved; and narrow streets lined with men, women and children who haven’t eaten in days.

The area has witnessed waves of violence in the aftermath of the earthquake. But even as people tried to flee from the machetes, those standing across the road looked on quite nonplussed. In between, rows of cars tried to navigate away before tensions escalated.

As our car crawled past this scene, the only assurance of safety we had was the presence of Wawa, a 38-year-old former gang member who wields tremendous power in Port-au-Prince’s dangerous underbelly. His domain is the downtown slums of Aviacion, which was the epicentre of violence in 2004 but is calm today. He also commands respect in the seething, volatile, densely-populated areas of Bel Air, La Saline and Cite Soleil - places that many who have lived in Port-au-Prince all their lives haven’t ventured into.

Dressed in all black with dusty dreadlocks, he stared blankly at the unravelling scene - it might have been him a few years back. He’s seen the worst of Haiti, and has often been a part of it.

Wawa said he understood, but didn’t accept, the looting and violence that have followed the earthquake, like aftershocks. The 7-magnitude temblor that flattened this impoverished country has killed possibly 200,000 people, injured tens of thousands more and left an untold number homeless - who are starving on the streets as food and water have been slow in reaching them.

“The situation is so bad, people have nothing to eat, so they’re driven to looting,” Wawa told us. “But they don’t do it with malice. They just need it.”

Abandoned by their own government when it was most needed, Haitians are depending on the international community to feed, protect and heal them. “The government has said nothing, has distributed no help. We have heard that the foreigners have brought a lot of help, but the people have seen none of that so far,” he said.

For the looting to stop, the aid must be given to local communities for distribution and shouldn’t be done by the international humanitarian agencies “because some people will get nothing”, he said. He emphasised that the government should not be in charge of distributing supplies “because they will keep most of it for themselves and the Haitians will get very little”.

Haiti’s blood-soaked headlines have only described a country spiralling out of control, without providing reasons or context. But as someone who has lived with violence for years, Wawa gave an insider’s view into what was going so terribly wrong here at a time when Haitians have to come together to determine their future.

A key contribution to the blood-letting was the hundreds of inmates who managed to escape when the main prison collapsed in the earthquake, and who have returned to slums they once controlled in Bel Air, Wawa said.

“The gangsters are back and want their top posts back,” he said, adding that they were willing to kill the people who replaced them while they were behind bars. “If they don’t find them, they are willing to kill their families.”

“These are vendettas, not random attacks,” Wawa said. Before getting locked up, many of the gangsters had hidden their guns and were now recovering them. Vigilantes were in turn attacking the criminals as they didn’t want them back in the community.

Wawa was confident that the aggression and attacks wouldn’t increase. “The situation won’t worsen because people won’t tolerate it. Haitians are cooperating with the police and MINUSTAH (United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti) so that they (gangsters) are recaptured.”

The deployment of US troops this week has been the only glimmer of hope for the people of Haiti, whose president has had no contact with them and offered neither support nor reassurance.

“The Americans are our only hope. I think they will deactivate the gangs,” Wawa said.