Haitians Need Affordable Homes Now More Than Ever—And Here’s How You Can Really Help
In the span of a month, the news from Haiti has been as shocking as has been sobering. First, in the early-morning hours of July 7th, there was the assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse. In a matter of weeks, the country was then ravaged by a 7.2 magnitude earthquake that, according to Haiti’s civil protection agency, wrought some 2,189 deaths and 12,000 injuries. As if the scene couldn’t get any more grim, heavy rainfall from the recent tropical storm Grace has added to the misery, where earthquake victims have already been sleeping outdoors. These unfathomable events (compounded by the coronavirus, in which just 0.17% of Haitians have received at least one dose of a vaccine) would challenge any nation, let alone the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. Yet, as hospitals care for survivors and as rescuers comb through the ruins, local and international organizations (such as Florida-based Hope For Haiti) have been accepting donations—including New Story, a nonprofit dedicated to building affordable homes for disaster victims around the world. “Imagine spending night after night in a tent with no safety and no stability,” Brett Hagler, cofounder of New Story, told AD in 2017. Some four years later, the country is in need of affordable housing now more than ever.
Since launching in 2015, New Story has completed more 2,000 homes across Haiti (1,050), El Salvador (400), Bolivia (66), and Mexico (650). The homes feature two bedrooms, a communal area, a shower and latrine, and, in some areas, land on which to grow food. Solar panels generate electricity, and—for the newest houses—a water system collects and purifies rain. Amazingly, the cost per home on average comes to just about $6,500. In Haiti, each roughly 500-square-foot residence is designed according to Miami-Dade County earthquake and hurricane codes. It’s because of this fact that, thankfully, the homes built by New Story survived the most recent salvo of natural disasters.
Funded through donations, New Story uses all the money it raises to acquire land and fund construction. “Many people we hire are members of the local communities,” cofounder Alexandria Lafci says. Maintaining those communities, she explains, is ultimately the goal. Rather than putting up one-off houses that might upset social networks, New Story plans clusters of homes and gives families full ownership to ensure roots that will last for generations. New Story has been collaborating with AD since 2017 to fund and build its newest Haitian development, preventing further disruptions to family routines. “If you’re a single mother who relies on a friend to watch your child, you don’t want to lose that when you move,” Lafci says. “We’re not asking families to completely restart their lives.” What they do offer, however, are new beginnings. “It’s amazing to see kids move in,” Hagler says. “They’re so happy and proud to have a house because many of them have never had one.”
According to UNICEF, the latest earthquake has affected some 1.2 million Haitians (almost 11% of the country’s population). The child-welfare organization estimates that 84,000 homes were damaged or destroyed—a dilemma that they say will require at least $15 million to respond to urgent needs. This is all happening in a country ravaged by turf wars, murders, rapes, and kidnappings at the hands of active gangs. With no other alternatives, displaced Haitians are seeking refuge anywhere they can find it; some sleep in public parks and squares while others crowd into churches and gymnasiums. “As Americans, the pandemic has forced us to confront the importance of home more than ever,” says Sarah Lee, Chief Operating Officer at New Story. “Families in Haiti haven’t had the option to stay safe at home because they don’t have a safe home to begin with. Together we can help families rebuild and unlock their safety, security, and opportunities to thrive.”
The wife of Haiti's assassinated president said she used her dead husband's tie as a tourniquet after the attack
- Haiti's president was assassinated next to his wife. She said she was later found by a maid.
- Martine Moïse, who was shot, said she asked the maid for one of her husband's ties to use as a tourniquet.
- She questioned where security staff were, and if someone had ordered them to leave.
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The wife of Haiti's assassinated president said she was found with a gunshot wound by a maid after the attack, and needed to use her dead husband's tie as a tourniquet.
Jovenel Moïse was assassinated in his home on July 7. Martine Moïse was shot in the arm and was left in critical condition.
She told CNN that it was the maid, rather than security staff, that found her in their bedroom after the attack.
She said she asked her maid to bring her one of her husband's ties so she could use it as a tourniquet.
She previously told The New York Times that she had told her children to hide in a bathroom. They survived the attack.
In the CNN interview, Martine Moïse questioned how the attackers were able to reach the couple: "The guards wouldn't leave without an order. Maybe they received an order to leave - this is what I think," she said.
"I've been thinking a lot about how this could have happened."
Haiti has detained several Colombians, Haitians, and Haitian Americans over the attack. But Moïse said authorities need to find who ordered and paid for the attack.
"Someone gave the order, and someone paid the money. Those are the people that we are searching for. I want the United Nations Security Council's help to find those people," she told CNN.
She previously told The Times that she survived the attack because the attackers thought she was dead.
The Haitian president's assassins appeared to identify him by confirming he was 'tall, skinny, and Black' on a phone call before killing him, wife says
- Haiti's president was assassinated in his bedroom on July 7.
- His wife said the killers made a phone call and said he was "tall, skinny and Black" before shooting him.
- She says she survived because the attackers thought she was dead.
- See more stories on Insider's business page.
The wife of Haiti's assassinated president said his killers appeared to identify her husband by confirming that he was "tall, skinny and Black" on a phone call before they shot him.
Jovenel Moïse was assassinated in his home on July 7.
His wife, Martine Moïse, told CNN that the attackers came into their bedroom and appeared to find something they were looking for. She said they then turned to her and her husband on the floor and made a phone call.
"He was alive at the time. They said he was tall, skinny and Black, and maybe the person on the phone confirmed to the shooter that was him. Then they shot him on the floor."
Haiti has detained several Colombians, Haitians, and Haitian Americans over the attack.
Martine Moïse said she believes someone must have ordered and funded the attack, and that person needs to be found.
She told CNN: "Someone gave the order, and someone paid the money. Those are the people that we are searching for. I want the United Nations Security Council's help to find those people."
She was shot in the arm during the attack, and was left in critical condition.
She told The New York Times that she survived the attack because the attackers thought she was dead.
‘They Thought I Was Dead’: Haitian President’s Widow Recounts Assassination
Struck by gunfire, Martine Moïse lay bleeding as the assassins who killed her husband ransacked her room. Now, she says, the F.B.I. must find the mastermind behind the attack.
MIAMI — With her elbow shattered by gunfire and her mouth full of blood, the first lady of Haiti lay on the floor beside her bed, unable to breathe, as the assassins stormed the room.
“The only thing that I saw before they killed him were their boots,” Martine Moïse said of the moment her husband, President Jovenel Moïse of Haiti, was shot dead beside her. “Then I closed my eyes, and I didn’t see anything else.”
She listened as they ransacked the room, searching methodically for something in her husband’s files, she said. “‘That’s not it. That’s not it,’” she recalled them saying in Spanish, over and over. Then finally: “‘That’s it.’”
The killers filed out. One stepped on her feet. Another waved a flashlight in her eyes, apparently to check to see if she was still alive.
“When they left, they thought I was dead,” she said.
In her first interview since the president’s assassination on July 7, Mrs. Moïse, 47, described the searing pain of witnessing her husband, a man with whom she had shared 25 years, being killed in front of her. She did not want to relive the deafening gunfire, the walls and windows trembling, the terrifying certainty that her children would be killed, the horror of seeing her husband’s body, or how she fought to stand up after the killers left. “All that blood,” she said softly.
But she needed to speak, she said, because she did not believe that the investigation into his death had answered the central question tormenting her and countless Haitians: Who ordered and paid for the assassination of her husband?
The Haitian police have detained a wide array of people in connection with the killing, including 18 Colombians and several Haitians and Haitian Americans, and they are still seeking others. The suspects include retired Colombian commandos, a former judge, a security equipment salesman, a mortgage and insurance broker in Florida, and two commanders of the president’s security team. According to the Haitian police, the elaborate plot revolves around a 63-year-old doctor and pastor, Christian Emmanuel Sanon, who officials say conspired to hire the Colombian mercenaries to kill the president and seize political power.
But critics of the government’s explanation say that none of the people named in the investigation had the means to finance the plot on their own. And Mrs. Moïse, like many Haitians, believes there must have been a mastermind behind them, giving the orders and supplying the money.
She wants to know what happened to the 30 to 50 men who were usually posted at her house whenever her husband was at home. None of his guards were killed or even wounded, she said. “I don’t understand how nobody was shot,” she said.
At the time of his death, Mr. Moïse, 53, had been in the throes of a political crisis. Protesters accused him of overstaying his term, of controlling local gangs and of ruling by decree as the nation’s institutions were being hollowed out.
Mr. Moïse was also locked in battle with some of the nation’s wealthy oligarchs, including the family that controlled the nation’s electrical grid. While many people described the president as an autocratic leader, Mrs. Moïse said her fellow citizens should remember him as a man who stood up to the rich and powerful.
And now she wants to know if one of them had him killed.
“Only the oligarchs and the system could kill him,” she said.
Dressed in black, with her arm — now limp and perhaps useless forever, she said — wrapped in a sling and bandages, Mrs. Moïse offered an interview in South Florida on the agreement that The New York Times not reveal her whereabouts. Flanked by her children, security guards, Haitian diplomats and other advisers, she barely spoke above a whisper.
She and her husband had been asleep when the sounds of gunfire jolted them to their feet, she recalled. Mrs. Moïse said she ran to wake her two children, both in their early 20s, and urged them to hide in a bathroom, the only room without windows. They huddled there with their dog.
Her husband grabbed his telephone and called for help. “I asked, ‘Honey, who did you phone?’” she said.
“He said, ‘I found Dimitri Hérard; I found Jean Laguel Civil,’” she said, reciting the names of two top officials in charge of presidential security. “And they told me that they are coming.”
But the assassins entered the house swiftly, seemingly unencumbered, she said. Mr. Moïse told his wife to lie down on the floor so she would not get hurt.
“‘That’s where I think you will be safe,’” she recalled him saying.
It was the last thing he told her.
A burst of gunfire came through the room, she said, hitting her first. Struck in the hand and the elbow, she lay still on the floor, convinced that she, and everyone else in her family, had been killed.
None of the assassins spoke Creole or French, she said. The men spoke only Spanish, and communicated with someone on the phone as they searched the room. They seemed to find what they wanted on a shelf where her husband kept his files.
“They were looking for something in the room, and they found it,” Mrs. Moïse said.
She said she did not know what it was.
“At this moment, I felt that I was suffocating because there was blood in my mouth and I couldn’t breathe,” she said. “In my mind, everybody was dead, because if the president could die, everybody else could have died too.”
The men her husband had called for help, she said — the officials entrusted with his security — are now in Haitian custody.
The Assassination of Haiti’s President
- An assassination strikes a troubled nation: The killing of President Jovenel Moïse on July 7 has rocked Haiti, stoking fear and confusion about the future. While there is much we do know about this event, there’s still much we don’t know.
- A figure at the center of the plot: Questions are swirling over the arrest of Dr. Christian Emmanuel Sanon, 63, a doctor with ties to Florida described as playing a central role in the death of the president.
- More suspects: Two Americans are among at least 20 people who have been detained thus far. Several of the people under investigation met in the months before the killing to discuss rebuilding the country once the president was out of power, Haitian police said.
- Years of instability: The assassination of Mr. Moïse comes after years of instability in the country, which has long suffered lawlessness, violence and natural disasters.
And while she expressed satisfaction that a number of the accused conspirators have been detained, she is by no means satisfied. Mrs. Moïse wants international law enforcement agencies like the F.B.I., which searched homes in Florida this week as part of the investigation, to track the money that financed the killing. The Colombian mercenaries who were arrested, she said, did not come to Haiti to “play hide and seek,” and she wants to know who paid for it all.
In a statement on Friday, the F.B.I. said it “remains committed to working alongside our international partners to administer justice.”
Mrs. Moïse expected the money to trace back to wealthy oligarchs in Haiti, whose livelihoods were disrupted by her husband’s attacks on their lucrative contracts, she said.
Mrs. Moïse cited a powerful Haitian businessman who has wanted to run for president, Reginald Boulos, as someone who had something to gain from her husband’s death, though she stopped short of accusing him of ordering the assassination.
Mr. Boulos and his businesses have been at the center of a barrage of legal cases brought by the Haitian government, which is investigating allegations of a preferential loan obtained from the state pension fund. Mr. Boulos’ bank accounts were frozen before Mr. Moïse’s death, and they were released to him immediately after he died, Mrs. Moïse said.
In an interview, Mr. Boulos said that only his personal accounts, with less than $30,000, had been blocked, and he stressed that a judge had ordered the release of the money this week, after he took the Haitian government to court. He insisted that, far from being involved in the killing, his political career was actually better off with Mr. Moïse alive — because denouncing the president was such a pivotal part of Mr. Boulos’s platform.
“I had absolutely, absolutely, absolutely nothing to do with his murder, even in dreams,” Mr. Boulos said. “I support a strong, independent international investigation to find who came up with the idea, who financed it and who executed it.”
Mrs. Moïse said she wants the killers to know she is not scared of them.
“I would like people who did this to be caught, otherwise they will kill every single president who takes power,” she said. “They did it once. They will do it again.”
She said she is seriously considering a run for the presidency, once she undergoes more surgeries on her wounded arm. She has already had two surgeries, and doctors now plan to implant nerves from her feet in her arm, she said. She may never regain use of her right arm, she said, and can move only two fingers.
“President Jovenel had a vision,” she said, “and we Haitians are not going to let that die.”
Hundreds greet Aristide on return to troubled Haiti
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — Former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide returned to Haiti on Friday after a nearly a month in Cuba, thrilling hundreds of supporters who gathered at the airport at a time of tensions over the recent assassination of the country's leader.
Aristide, a charismatic yet divisive figure in Haiti who was receiving unspecified medical treatment in Cuba, arrives back in a country simmering with tension over the July 7 assassination of President Jovenel Moïse as new details about the investigation emerged.
Colombian Police Chief Gen. Jorge Luis Vargas on Friday accused a former Haitian government official of ordering ex-Colombian soldiers to kill Moïse. He said Joseph Felix Badio told Colombians Duberney Capador and Germán Rivera that “what they have to do is kill the president of Haiti.”
Vargas said Badio gave that order roughly three days before the assassination during a meeting in Haiti with the two Colombians, who had been in the country since May 10.
Capador was killed in a shootout with Haitian police hours after Moïse was slain. Rivera remains detained in Haiti while police are still searching for Badio, who previously worked for Haiti’s Justice Ministry and then the government’s anti-corruption unit until he was fired in May.
More than 20 suspects accused of direct involvement in the slaying have been arrested, the majority of them former Colombian soldiers. At least three other suspects were killed, and police have said they are still looking for at least seven others.
Colombia’s government has said only a small group of Colombian soldiers knew the true nature of the operation and that the others were duped.
Also on Friday, Police Chief Léon Charles said 24 police officers were standing guard when the president's house was attacked. He said they have been interrogated and that a fifth high-ranking police official has been placed in isolated detention with four others, although none have been named as suspects.
Interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph said the government will continue to bring those responsible to justice.
“We will continue to pose questions,” he said.
Tickets for most of the former soldiers, at least, were purchased through a Florida-based company, Worldwide Capital Lending Group, Vargas said Friday.
Officials earlier said they had been bought by another Florida company, CTU Security, which allegedly recruited the men.
Worldwide issued a statement Thursday saying it helped provide a loan to CTU, but said it was meant to help finance infrastructure projects sought by Christian Emmanuel Sanon, a Haitian physician and pastor who has been arrested in the plot.
“At no time during any meeting or conversation with Dr. Sanon or with any of his representatives was there any mention, discussion or suggestion of an assassination plot against President Moïse or the intention to use force to bring about a change of leadership in Haiti,” the company said.
Meanwhile, throngs of Aristide supporters cheered when they saw the former president arrive. They had arrived a couple of hours before the plane landed, holding pictures of the former priest, some saying, “The king is back!”
Aristide was taken home in an ambulance that made its way through the crowd. Some touched the vehicle’s windows before being pushed away by police. Some supporters lingered outside after the ambulance entered Aristide’s home, but the former leader did not come out and speak.
Joel Edouard “Pacha” Vorbe, an executive committee member of Aristide’s Fanmi Lavalas party, told The Associated Press that Aristide “is completely recovered,” although he didn't have details about his condition. Neither Aristide nor the government have described the health issue.
Aristide’s return adds a potentially volatile element to an already tense situation in a country facing a power vacuum. Aristide has long been one of Haiti’s most polarizing politicians and is still popular with many.
Aristide became a global figure of resistance when, as a slum priest known for fiery oratory, he led a movement that ousted the hated dictator Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier in 1986.
He was elected president in 1990, forced out in a military coup a year later and restored to power by the U.S. military in 1994 to serve out the remainder of his term. As a champion of the poor and advocate of leftist “liberation theology,” he was deeply hated by members of the elite.
Reelected in 2000, he was ousted four years later in a rebellion led by opponents with ties to the elite and the old Duvalierist regime. Aristide spent seven years in exile in South Africa before returning in 2011. He has largely kept a low profile, except when campaigning for his party's unsuccessful presidential candidate in 2016.
Joseph is currently governing Haiti with the backing of police and military, although he faces growing challenges to his power.
While Haiti's government has asked for military help, U.S. President Joe Biden said Thursday that sending troops was “not on the agenda." However, he said U.S. Marines would be deployed to boost security at the U.S. Embassy.
Mathias Pierre, Haiti's elections minister, said he believes the door is still open for potential U.S. military assistance, noting that the country is in a “fragile situation” and requires a secure environment to hold elections in upcoming months.
A U.S. citizen is among those arrested for the assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse
- A US citizen of Haitian descent was reportedly among those arrested in connection with the assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse.
- The Haitian-American was identified as James Solages by the Associated Press and The Washington Post.
- Moïse was assassinated by a group of armed assailants who burst into his home at around 1 a.m. Wednesday.
A US citizen of Haitian descent has reportedly been arrested in connection with the assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse.
The Haitian-American, identified as James Solages, is among the six people who have been nabbed for the early Wednesday killing of Moïse at his home, The Washington Post and the Associated Press reported Thursday.
The AP and Washington Post cited Mathias Pierre, Haiti's minister of elections and inter-party relations.
Pierre told The Washington Post that at least one other person who was apprehended is also believed to be a Haitian-American.
Moïse, 53, was assassinated by a group of armed assailants who burst into his home at around 1 a.m. Wednesday.
Haitian first lady Martine Moïse was also critically injured in the attack. She was later flown to Miami, Florida for treatment for her gunshot wounds.
Léon Charles, the director of Haiti's National Police told reporters Thursday that a total of six suspects have been busted in connection to fatal ambush.
Authorities have said that four other suspects believed to be involved in the assassination were killed in a gun battle with police.
Haitian authorities were still looking for more assailants, Charles said Thursday, according to the Associated Press.
"The pursuit of the mercenaries continues," Charles said Wednesday night. "Their fate is fixed: They will fall in the fighting or will be arrested."
Pierre told The Washington Post that the nabbed suspects were being held at a police station in the capital and that an anrgy mob of people had surrounded it.
"The special units are trying to protect the police station, because the population is very mad and is trying to get to them, to burn them," Pierre told the news outlet. "We're trying to avoid that."
The identities of the other suspects were not immediately released.
Haitian Communications Minister Pradel Henriquez has called them "foreigners,"according to The Washington Post.
Official: Haiti President Jovenel Moïse assassinated at home
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — Gunmen assassinated Haitian President Jovenel Moïse and wounded his wife in their home early Wednesday, inflicting more chaos on the unstable Caribbean country that was already enduring an escalation of gang violence, anti-government protests and a recent surge in coronavirus infections.
Claude Joseph, the interim prime minister, confirmed the killing and said the police and military were in control of security in Haiti, where a history of dictatorship and political upheaval have long stymied the consolidation of democratic rule.
While the streets of the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince, were quiet Wednesday morning, some people ransacked businesses in one area. The country appeared to be heading for fresh uncertainty ahead of planned general elections later this year. Moïse, 53, had been ruling by decree for more than a year after the country failed to hold elections and the opposition demanded he step down in recent months.
Former President Michel Martelly, whom Moïse succeeded, said he was praying for first lady Martine Moïse, calling the assassination “a hard blow for our country and for Haitian democracy, which is struggling to find its way.”
Joseph said Martine Moïse, 47, was shot and in a hospital. He condemned the president's killing as a “hateful, inhumane and barbaric act.”
“The country’s security situation is under the control of the National Police of Haiti and the Armed Forces of Haiti," Joseph said in a statement from his office. “Democracy and the republic will win.”
In the statement, Joseph said some of the attackers spoke in Spanish but offered no further explanation. He later said in a radio address that they spoke Spanish or English.
A resident who lives near the president’s home said she heard the attack.
“I thought there was an earthquake, there was so much shooting,” said the woman who spoke on condition of anonymity because she fears for her life. “The president had problems with many people, but this is not how we expected him to die. This is something I wouldn’t wish on any Haitian.”
The U.S. Embassy in Haiti said it was restricting U.S. staff to its compounds and that the embassy would be closed Wednesday because of ‘’an ongoing security situation.''
The White House described the attack as “horrific” and “tragic” and said it was still gathering information on what happened. U.S. President Joe Biden will be briefed later Wednesday by his national security team, spokesperson Jen Psaki said during an interview on MSNBC.
“The message to the people of Haiti is this is a tragic tragedy,” she during a previously scheduled interview on CNN. “And we stand ready and stand by them to provide any assistance that’s needed.”
Haiti's economic, political and social woes have deepened recently, with gang violence spiking heavily in Port-au-Prince, inflation spiraling and food and fuel becoming scarcer at times in a country where 60% of the population makes less than $2 a day. These troubles come as Haiti still tries to recover from the devastating 2010 earthquake and Hurricane Matthew that struck in 2016.
Opposition leaders accused Moïse of seeking to increase his power, including by approving a decree that limited the powers of a court that audits government contracts and another that created an intelligence agency that answers only to the president.
In recent months, opposition leaders demanded the he step down, arguing that his term legally ended in February 2021. Moïse and supporters maintained that his term began when he took office in early 2017, following a chaotic election that forced the appointment of a provisional president to serve during a year-long gap.
___
This story has been updated to correct that Moïse ruled by decree for more than a year, not more than two years.
Haiti imposes curfew, orders mask use for pandemic emergency
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — Haiti’s government imposed a nightly curfew and other restrictions Monday under an eight-day “health emergency" meant to curb the spread of the coronavirus.
All outdoor activity will be banned from 10 p.m. until 5 a.m. under the decree issued by President Jovenel Moise, who was in Ecuador on Monday for the inauguration of that country's new president.
The decree also makes the use of face masks mandatory for anyone out in public, while temperature checks and handwashing stations are required for all public or private buildings such as banks, schools, hospitals and markets. Social distancing in public places is set at 1.5 meters (nearly 5 feet).
The president also ordered public institutions to reduce staff on duty by 50%, while he encouraged that other employees work from home.
Mon, May 24, 2021, 5:39 PM
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — Haiti’s government imposed a nightly curfew and other restrictions Monday under an eight-day “health emergency" meant to curb the spread of the coronavirus.
All outdoor activity will be banned from 10 p.m. until 5 a.m. under the decree issued by President Jovenel Moise, who was in Ecuador on Monday for the inauguration of that country's new president.
The decree also makes the use of face masks mandatory for anyone out in public, while temperature checks and handwashing stations are required for all public or private buildings such as banks, schools, hospitals and markets. Social distancing in public places is set at 1.5 meters (nearly 5 feet).
The president also ordered public institutions to reduce staff on duty by 50%, while he encouraged that other employees work from home.- ADVERTISEMENT -https://s.yimg.com/rq/darla/4-6-0/html/r-sf-flx.html
Residents of Port-au- Prince seemed to take little regard of what was expected of them under these new rules as street markets continued to be crowded as was public transportation. Most people were not wearing masks and social distancing was not followed.
According to official government statistics, Haiti has had 13,906 coronavirus cases since the pandemic began in March 2020 and 288 deaths related to COVID-19. But a recent surge in daily cases of contagion has prompted authorities to declare the state of emergency.
Haiti has not yet begun to vaccinate its population against the coronavirus. The government recently announced its expects to begin giving the shots in June.
Haiti is on its 6th prime minister under the Moïse administration and many are wondering why?
OPINION: To understand the constant turnover of prime minsters, it is paramount to first understand how Haiti’s system of government works
In the midst of the chaos and civil unrest that has plagued Haiti this year— the Haitian people have been dealt yet another blow. Prime Minister Joseph Jouthe resigned from his post under President Jovenel Moïse last month.
Shortly thereafter, Moïse appointed Foreign Minister Claude Joseph as his replacement—making Joseph the sixth prime minister appointed under the Moïse administration. Six prime ministers in the last four years (see below for a complete list of prime ministers under the Moïse administration).
To any outside country or international organization that would explain why Haiti’s government seems to be crumbling underneath the very feet of those in power. To understand why this is occurring, it is paramount to first understand how Haiti’s system of government works.
1. Jack Guy Lafontant. He was the longest serving prime minister under the Moïse administration, serving for a year and a half. He resigned following deadly protests as a result of the government raising gas prices.
2. Jean-Henry Céant. He was ousted while he was out of town on official government business by a vote of no confidence after an accusation of censuring the government largely related to the Petro-Caribe scandal.
3. Jean-Michel Lapin.* The former acting prime minister was appointed by President Moïse but failed to be confirmed by Parliament four times.
4. Fritz William Michel.* Michel was nominated to succeed Lapin but also failed to be confirmed by Parliament.
5. Joseph Jouthe. Jouthe resigned after a year as Haiti’s rates of insecurity, crime and political violence continued to surge. This resignation came on the heels of the recent attacks on an orphanage and the kidnapping of several clergymen and women.
6. Claude Joseph.* Joseph has been appointed as Haiti’s current prime minister. He previously served the Moïse administration as the Minister of Foreign and Religious Affairs.
When a Haitian president is elected, he/she also inherits the power to appoint a prime minister. The National Assembly must ratify this prime minister, and his cabinet. Haiti’s cabinet is led by the prime minister, who is largely considered the head of government. He/she is able to appoint ministers and secretaries of state and is responsible for national defense as well as enforcing the law.
To many, the prime minister may actually be regarded as the most powerful position within the government. Thus the issue lies therein, that the prime minister serves at the pleasure of the president. This, quite frankly, explains why the Moïse administration has gone through six PMs in the last four years.
The theory that President Moïse is insistent on running Haiti via presidential decree starts to seem less and less implausible when understanding the storied history of Haiti’s multiple prime ministers. Typically, when a president appoints a prime minister, the National Assembly must approve of them.
However, as quorum has been breached, the last two prime ministers (Joseph and Jouthe) did not have to go through that government confirmation process. Instead they were simply appointed and approved by Moïse himself—leaving no room for the traditional checks and balances system put in place by the constitution.
Moïse is no fan of the constitution as is—in fact he hopes to single handedly reconstruct it with his June 27 referendum. Although the referendum has not been presented as finished, some of the proposed changes directly address many of the present instabilities.
For example, Moïse’s proposal to eliminate the office of prime minister altogether, instead replacing it with a vice president who is elected alongside the president. Moreover, the president wants to implement the inability to impeach or prosecute a president during his first year in office and also seeks to restrict how often the president can be accused criminally.
Meanwhile much of the country remains skeptical that Haiti will have elections at all. This is because of an issue stemming from the imposition of new voter Identification cards and the notion that it will take anywhere between 10 and 18 months to complete the project of procuring Voter ID cards for all citizens.
These cards are due to be produced by ONI, Office National D’Identification—the office for state archives in Haiti. But as we’ve learned in the United States, with any change in voting requirements there comes the possibility of voter suppression.
Many Haitians have found themselves left with countless questions, with little answers. Will ex-President Michel Martelly run again? What is the timeline for elections in Haiti? Will legislative and presidential elections occur in September? Will municipal and local elections occur in November? Who will replace Ambassador Michele Sison? Yet sadly, most of these questions remain just as ambiguous as President Moïse’s future as president.
POWER LIST
The 2021 MWBE Power 50
The executives and officials boosting government contracting with women and people of color in New York.
Minority- and women-owned business enterprises, or MWBEs, enjoy increasing support in City Hall and Albany. Both Gov. Andrew Cuomo and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio have set ambitious targets for awarding government contracts to MWBEs. Cuomo has prioritized MWBE contracting since his first year in office, while de Blasio has moved the needle recently by demanding that each city agency appoint a chief diversity officer as soon as possible.
While sexism and racism continue to pose formidable hurdles for business owners who are not white men, racial and gender disparities are increasingly under public scrutiny. And while the coronavirus pandemic has disproportionately harmed people of color, policymakers have doubled down on their efforts to diversify the pool of city and state government contractors as one way to rectify historical inequities. City & State’s first MWBE Power 50 – compiled in partnership with journalist Leonard Robinson – recognizes the contractors, public officials, industry leaders and advocates behind rising utilization rates for New York’s businesses owned by women and racial minorities.
1. Julissa Gutierrez
Chief Diversity Officer for the State of New York
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When Julissa Gutierrez was appointed New York’s chief diversity officer last summer, she was tasked with registering more MWBEs and reaching the state’s ambitious 30% MWBE contract utilization goal – which New York nearly did, with the state announcing in December that 29.51% of its contracts had been awarded to firms owned by women or minorities in the 2019-2020 fiscal year. An expert on Latino issues and civic engagement, Gutierrez previously held key roles with the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials Educational Fund.
2. Jonnel Doris & Dynishal Gross
Commissioner; Deputy Commissioner, Division of Economic and Financial Opportunity, New York City Small Business Services
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Jonnel Doris ( NYC Department of Small Business Services )
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Dynishal Gross ( Submitted )
Jonnel Doris has been a key advocate for MWBEs long before he was appointed to lead New York City Small Business Services in May 2020, having previously led the Mayor’s Office of MWBEs and having served as chief diversity officer for Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s Office of Storm Recovery. In addition to overseeing the city’s MWBE program at SBS, Doris co-chairs the Small Business Subcommittee of the Taskforce on Racial Inclusion and Equity. His colleague Dynishal Gross, the deputy commissioner for SBS’ Division of Economic and Financial Opportunity, manages the city’s certification of MWBEs while also connecting them with resources for procuring city contracts. She previously worked for members of the New York City Council and was assistant commissioner for business programs in SBS’ Division of Business Services.
3. Michael Garner
Chief Diversity Officer, Metropolitan Transportation Authority
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Michael Garner ( Pat Cashin )
As the MTA’s chief diversity officer, Michael Garner has overseen significant growth in MWBE contracting. The transit authority, which has the state’s highest discretionary program threshold at $1 million and assists with lending, appropriated $722 million to MWBE firms in the 2019-2020 fiscal year, the largest amount of any New York agency, and is on track to hit Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s goal of utilizing MWBE firms for 30% of the state’s contracting. Garner previously worked at the New York City School Construction Authority, another agency leading the way on MWBE contracting, and serves as president of One Hundred Black Men of New York, a nonprofit empowering the Black community.
4. Rodneyse Bichotte Hermelyn
Chair, Assembly Subcommittee on Oversight of Minority and Women-Owned Business Enterprises
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Rodneyse Bichotte Hermelyn ( Office of Rodneyse Bichotte Hermelyn )
Assembly Member Rodneyse Bichotte Hermelyn is a vocal advocate for MWBEs in Albany. As chair of the Assembly’s MWBE oversight subcommittee, the Brooklyn lawmaker has provided legislative support for Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s 30% MWBE contracting target, expanding MWBE lending options and educational resources, pressuring state agencies to collect more data on MWBE firms that seek government contracts and making resources available at the state level for MWBEs and other small businesses impacted by COVID-19. She is a member of the Mayor’s Advisory Council on MWBEs.
5. James Sanders Jr.
Chair, State Senate Committee on Banks
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State Sen. James Sanders Jr. has long been a leading voice in Albany for MWBEs. As chair of the Committee on Banks, he has sought to expand lending options, combated predatory lending practices in marginalized communities and ensured access to lending resources during the COVID-19 pandemic. Last May, Sanders and Assembly Member Rodneyse Bichotte Hermelyn hosted an MWBE and small business call to discuss the pandemic’s impact and how to provide resources for inclusion and recovery.
6. Magalie Austin
Senior Adviser and Director, Mayor’s Office of Minority- and Women-Owned Business Enterprises
Maggie Austin last May was appointed to lead the New York City Mayor’s Office of Minority- and Women-Owned Business Enterprises. She has led the city’s MWBE program during a critical period, as the coronavirus pandemic threatened many small businesses and disproportionately affected people of color. In July, as city agencies were required by executive order to appoint chief diversity officers to help reach the city’s goals for MWBE contract procurement, the Mayor’s MWBE office was tasked with implementing the executive order and ensuring compliance.
7. Robert Cornegy
Chair, New York City Council MWBE Task Force
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Robert Cornegy ( Raeshon Robinson )
New York City Council MemberRobert Cornegy, who represents Bedford-Stuyvesant and Crown Heights, is seeking to represent all of Brooklyn as he campaigns to be the next borough president. In addition to chairing the Housing and Buildings Committee, Cornegy also leads the New York City Council MWBE task force, which supports efforts to boost MWBE contract utilization and increase the number of minority-owned businesses throughout the city. He is also a member of the Mayor’s Advisory Council on MWBEs.
8. Nina Kubota & Suzanne Veira
President; Chief Diversity Officer, New York City School Construction Authority
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Suzanne Veira ( Scott Lindeman )
After Lorraine Grillo was appointed senior adviser for recovery by New York City Mayor Bill DeBlasio in February 2021, she handed off the reins at the New York City School Construction Authority to Nina Kubota. Kubota, who served as the SCA’s senior vice president for capital plan development and implementation, has big shoes to fill. But she’ll continue to work alongside a fellow SCA veteran in Suzanne Veira, above, the authority’s chief diversity officer, to boost the number of contracts made available to MWBE firms and involve minority communities in dialogue about school construction throughout New York City.
9. Crystal Peoples-Stokes, Inez Dickens & Latrice Walker
Assembly Members
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Office of Assemblywoman Crystal Peoples-Stokes
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Inez E. Dickens ( Office of Inez E. Dickens )
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Latrice Monique Walker ( Photo by Celeste Sloman )
Long before she became Assembly majority leader in 2018, Buffalo lawmaker Crystal Peoples-Stokes was an advocate of MWBEs. She served on an MWBE task force Gov. Andrew Cuomo created in 2011, helped create the Assembly Subcommittee on MWBEs and served as its chair for several years starting in 2012, a time when the state began setting more ambitious MWBE contracting targets. This year she notched a big win with the passage of her legislation legalizing recreational marijuana, which includes language ensuring revenue is reinvested in communities of color. Fellow Assembly Member Inez Dickens of Harlem has also supported MWBEs in Albany, supporting a 2019 measure extending the state’s MWBE program. Assembly Member Latrice Walker of Brooklyn has also championed MWBE causes, including efforts to establish a Women of Color in Tech Day last year and eliminate net worth requirements for MWBE certification.
10. Louis Coletti
President and CEO, Building Trades Employers Association
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Since 1997, Louis Coletti has served as president and CEO of Building Trades Employers Association, which represents construction contractors in New York and has been an important player in the industry’s local MWBE community. Coletti has spearheaded the BTEA’s MWBE Leadership Council, which meets quarterly to discuss and strategize on MWBE topics in the construction industry. Additionally, Coletti is a member of the New York City Comptroller’s Advisory Council on Economic Growth through Diversity and Inclusion.
11. Wendy Garcia
Chief Diversity Officer, Office of the New York City Comptroller
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Wendy Garcia ( Submitted )
Wendy Garcia has served for seven years as chief diversity officer for New York City Comptroller Scott Stringer, a mayoral candidate whose office has kept close tabs on MWBE contracting. Garcia leads the Office of Diversity Initiatives, which publishes “Making the Grade: New York City Agency Report Card on Minority- and Women-Owned Business Enterprises,” an annual report assessing city agencies’ progress towards diversity goals. She also runs the Comptroller’s Advisory Council on Economic Growth through Diversity and Inclusion, which aims to increase supplier diversity.
12. Stephanie Burns
President, Women Builders Council
Stephanie Burns is president of the Women Builders Council, a leading New York membership association focused on empowering women in the construction industry. In this capacity, her efforts of implementing programming and strategic planning have proven essential to New York’s construction MWBE community. Her responsibilities have also included building a pipeline of students studying in STEM programs to find careers in construction and engineering. As a vice president at Turner Construction, she leads strategic project and community planning on numerous workforce development projects.
13. Michael Massiah
Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer, Port Authority of New York and New Jersey
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Michael Massiah ( Submitted )
As the chief diversity officer for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, Michael Massiah spearheads the authority’s diversity efforts, including awarding more contracts to MWBE firms. The veteran Port Authority official has had a higher target since 2018, when the MWBE contract participation goal was raised to an ambitious 30%, including 20% of contracts going to minority-owned firms and 10% to women-owned enterprises. The authority has reported that two-thirds of the companies it works with are MWBE-certified.
14. Reuben McDaniel III
President and CEO, Dormitory Authority of the State of New York
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Reuben R McDaniel III ( DASNY )
Last summer, Reuben McDaniel was confirmed as the president and CEO of the Dormitory Authority of the State of New York, a trailblazer in awarding contracts to MWBEs. McDaniel arrived at DASNY after a career in finance, most recently at Raymond James. McDaniel, who gained governmental experience as chair of the Atlanta Board of Education while still in the private sector, now runs an authority that awarded $184 million to MWBE firms in the 2019-2020 fiscal year, or nearly a third of all its contracts.
15. Elizabeth Velez
President and Chief Contract Officer, Velez Organization
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Elizabeth Velez ( Greg Morris )
Elizabeth Velez is one of the leading contractors in the MWBE space, building her construction firm into a heavyweight in an industry dominated by white men while continuing to advocate for smaller operations seeking to follow in her footsteps. Her Velez Organization was launched in 1972 and has built affordable housing in the Bronx and Harlem as well as a portfolio of health care, educational and other large-scale projects throughout New York. A member of the Mayor’s Advisory Council on MWBEs, she was named chair of the New York Building Congress last year.
16. Jacques Andre DeGraff
Chair, Minority Business Enterprise Leadership Summit
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Jacques DeGraff ( Celeste Sloman )
Rev. Jacques Andre DeGraff has been involved in MWBE coalitions for a quarter century. His role as a spiritual leader of Canaan Baptist Church of Christ in Harlem has placed him on the front lines of numerous social justice efforts, including boosting coronavirus vaccination rates among Black New Yorkers. He is an active member and former vice president of 100 Black Men of New York and helped launch the Eagle Academy for Young Men of Color. DeGraff previously chaired the New York City School Construction Authority Diversity Council.
17. Sandra Wilkin
Founder and President, Bradford Construction Corporation
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Sandra Wilkin ( Andre Beckles )
As founder and former president of the Women Builders Council and a member of the Mayor’s Advisory Council on MWBEs, Sandra Wilkin has been recognized for mentoring other MWBE firms as means to boosting capacity and achieving city and state contracting targets. She has also led successful efforts to use legislation to boost MWBE contracting. Her women-owned Bradford Construction Corporation is also part of the Bravo Group, a partnership with fellow MWBEs Velocity Architecture & Engineering Group, Chu & Gassman Consulting Engineersand Skyline Engineering.
18. Cheryl McKissack Daniel
President and CEO, McKissack & McKissack
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Cheryl McKissack Daniel ( McKissack & McKissack )
Cheryl McKissak Daniel leads McKissack & McKissack, a minority-owned design and construction firm that dates back more than a century. Her company worked on Columbia University’s expansion, the World Trade Center and the former Atlantic Yards development. A past president of the Women Builders Council, she is a member of Women in Transportation, the New York Building Congress and the Mayor’s Advisory Council on MWBEs. Her sister, Deryl McKissack, runs another construction company named McKissack & McKissack, with a headquarters in Washington.
19. Samuel Padilla
President, Padilla Construction Services
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Samuel Padilla ( Submitted )
Samuel Padilla leads Padilla Construction Services, an MWBE-certified construction firm that quickly established itself after its founding in 1993. Padilla was appointed to New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio’s MWBE advisory board when it was launched in 2015. His construction company has completed projects at the World Trade Center and the United Nations while working with major city and state agencies, including the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and the New York City School Construction Authority.
20. Nayan Parikh
President, Ashnu International
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Nayan Parikh ( PNC Photo )
Nayan Parikh started out as a civil engineer in India and is now the owner of a Queens-based construction firm with multiple offices around the country and abroad, and along the way he has become a leader in New York’s MWBE community. Parikh founded Ashnu International as a general contracting and construction management company in 1998, becoming a trusted contractor to federal and state agencies along with clients in the private sector. He serves on the Mayor’s Advisory Council for MWBEs and is executive vice president of the National Association of Minority Contractors and president of NAMC's New York Tri-State Chapter.
21. Christopher Williams
Principal, Siebert Williams Shank & Co.
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Christopher Williams ( Travis Curry )
As board chair at Shank Williams Cisneros & Co. and principal of the affiliated Siebert Williams Shank & Co., Christopher Williams leads one of the largest MWBE financial services firms on Wall Street. Williams, who previously led The Williams Capital Group and Williams Capital Management, merged with Suzanne Shank’s Siebert Cisneros Shank in 2019. Other key executives at the company include former HUD Secretary Henry Cisneros and former New York City Comptroller William Thompson Jr.
22. Anyori Hernandez
Director of Emerging Managers, Office of the State Comptroller
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Anyori Hernandez ( Office of the State Comptroller )
While much attention is paid to how many contracts New York agencies award to MWBEs, another significant source of government funds that minority and women business owners compete for is in the pension fund managed by the state comptroller. State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli’s Emerging Manager Program has diversified the portfolio of the Common Retirement Fund, with Barclays alum Anyori Hernandez investing more than $20 billion in assets with MWBEs.
23. Ehab Shehata
President and CEO, Bravo Group
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Ehab Shehata ( Kim Tyler Photography/BRAVO Group )
Ehab Shehata heads up Bravo Group, a full service architecture and engineering firm. Spearheaded by Shehata and Sandra Wilkin, Bravo is a collaborative effort of Velocity Architecture and Engineering Group, Chu & Gassman Consulting Engineers, Bradford Construction Corporation and Skyline Engineering, all leaders in construction and engineering. Under Shehata’s leadership, Bravo Group has taken on projects with educational institutions, national organization headquarters, health care facilities, transportation hubs and industrial projects, such as the ongoing restoration work at the Brooklyn Navy Yard.
24. Quenia Abreu
President and CEO, New York Women’s Chamber of Commerce
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Quenia Abreu ( Niurka Vidal )
Quenia Abreu co-founded the New York Women’s Chamber of Commerce in 2002, when it became the first and only women’s chamber of commerce in the state. Abreu, who previously directed the Women’s Business Centers at the Queens Economic Development Corporation and the Hunts Point Economic Development Corporation, has led the NYWCC since 2004, spearheading its efforts in assisting firms seeking MWBE certification. A member of the Mayor’s Advisory Council on MWBEs, she also launched a women and minority business development center in Upper Manhattan.
25. Thai Lee
President and CEO, SHI
Since SHI was founded in 1989, Thai Lee has been at the helm of the leading information technology firm. The New Jersey-based company, formerly Software House International, has billed itself as the country’s largest minority- and women-owned business, with certifications from the Women’s Business Enterprise National Council, the New York & New Jersey Minority Supplier Development Council and New York City. Lee’s firm is currently the top MWBE contractor in New York City, with more than $100 million received on a $285 million contract.
26. Roly Acosta
President and CEO, JAG Companies
Roly Acosta runs JAG Companies, the New Jersey-based parent company of construction heavyweights such as Northeast Remsco Construction and Caldwell Marine International. The family-owned JAG Companies is one of the country’s biggest Hispanic-owned firms. The company has supported supplier diversity by growing and utilizing their MWBE subcontractor database. Northeast Remsco Construction is currently a top MWBE in New York City, having received $52 million to date this fiscal year.
27. Lourdes Zapata
President and CEO, SoBro
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Lourdes Zapata ( Kimberly Singh/LOFT )
Lourdes Zapata in 2019 took the top position at the South Bronx Overall Economic Development Corporation, or SoBro, a community development organization serving one of the poorest congressional districts in the country. Zapata, the first Latina and woman to hold the position, had previously served as the organization’s director of community development. In between, Zapata served as chief diversity officer under Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a position in which she oversaw increased contracting for MWBE firms.
28. Lloyd Williams
President and CEO, The Greater Harlem Chamber of Commerce
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Lloyd Williams ( Hubert Williams )
Lloyd Williams, a lifelong Harlemite and the godson of Malcolm X, is the longtime leader of the Greater Harlem Chamber of Commerce. The organization, which dates back to 1896, aims to improve the lives of Harlem residents, and during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic it delivered hundreds of meals and personal protective equipment each day. Williams, who co-founded Harlem Week and the Harlem Jazz & Music Festival and serves on the board of NYC & Company, has also been an outspoken proponent of MWBEs.
29. Barbara Armand Kushner
President and CEO, Armand Corporation
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Barbara Armand ( Armand Corporation )
Barbara Armand is the owner and chief executive of Armand Corporation, a program and construction management firm she founded in 1991 that now has offices in New York City, New Jersey and Philadelphia. She is a consultant on MWBE policy and her clients have included large organizations in the private and public sectors, such as the New York City Economic Development Corporation and the New York City School Construction Authority. She’s also the president emeritus of the New York chapter of Professional Women in Construction.
30. Deborah Bradley
President, Deborah Bradley Construction & Management Services
Deborah Bradley launched her construction management firm in 1994 after graduating from Columbia University, her first client. A past president of the Women Builders Council, she formed a partnership with the United Nations to encourage women to enter the construction industry, helped launch student chapters and lobbied New York officials to adopt a 30% MWBE utilization goal. The former accountant is a member of the New York Building Congress and has served since 2019 on the Mayor’s Advisory Council on MWBEs.
31. Bill Howell
President, Howell Industries
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Bill Howell ( Megan Kelly )
Bill Howell’s company started out in the petroleum business before transitioning to construction work. Howell Industries today mentors small MWBE contractors and contracts with large governmental bodies including the New York City School Construction Authority, Metropolitan Transportation Authority and the Dormitory Authority of the State of New York. It also assists Service Disabled Veteran Owned Businesses through the MTA Small Business Development Program. In 2019, Howell was appointed to the Mayor’s MWBE Advisory Board.
32. Bonnie Wong
Founder and President, Asian Women in Business
Bonnie Wong is the founder and leader of Asian Women in Business, a national membership organization to support Asian women-owned businesses. The nonprofit offers mentorship and networking for Asian women in corporate and legal sectors. AWIB has grown to become a widely recognized organization championing MWBE efforts in New York and nationally. Wong serves on MWBE and diversity boards for both New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio and City Comptroller Scott Stringer.
33. Tunisha Walker-Miller
Principal, Capalino
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Leigh Beckett
Tunisha Walker-Miller, a principal at Capalino, manages the leading lobbying firm’s MWBE Consulting Group, which has helped procure contracts for firms on both state and local levels across a variety of sectors since 2015. She also founded the Association of Black Lobbyists and Consultants in 2019. She has previously served as executive director of the state Senate Conference of Black Senators.
34. Charles Williams III
Partner, Peckar & Abramson
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Charles E. Williams III ( Tony David Photography )
As a partner at Peckar & Abramson, Charles Williams III practices construction and real estate law, with a special expertise in MWBE regulations and certification. Williams previously served as vice president and general counsel of the New York City School Construction Authority, a leading agency in awarding MWBE contracts, and he also has worked with the Office of the Manhattan Borough President, the New York Department of State and the NAACP. He’s also general counsel for the Building Trades Employers Association’s MWBE Leadership Council.
35. Kenneth Thomas & Jason Cintron
Co-Managing Directors, Minority & Women Contractors & Developers Association
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Kenneth Thomas ( Sepia Prince )
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Jason Cintron ( Jason Cintron )
Kenneth Thomas and Jason Cintron launched the nonprofit Minority & Women Contractors & Developers Association in 2019, with the goal of empowering MWBE firms and diversifying the real estate and construction industries. MWCDA has been focused on growing its membership and promoting workforce development training. Cintron previously held key staff positions with the New York City Council, while Thomas worked in the real estate industry.
36. Brian Matthews
Senior Consultant, Brown & Weinraub
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Brian Matthews ( Timothy Raab/Northern Photo )
After three decades working in state government, Brian Matthews joined top Albany lobbying firm Brown & Weinraub in January and has been helping to build out its MWBE practice. Matthews brings plenty of relevant experience, including as chief financial officer for the state Office of General Services and director of the Bureau of Financial Administration in the Office of the State Comptroller. Matthews recently called for revisions to evaluation standards for government contractors to prioritize the “value of community progress” as much as cost and experience.
37. Rick Miranda
President and CEO, Brooklyn Hispanic Chamber of Commerce
As the longtime leader of the Brooklyn Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, Rick Miranda has driven the membership organization’s efforts to support Hispanic-owned businesses across the borough. A member of the Mayor’s Advisory Council on MWBEs and other diversity boards and councils – and as a small business owner himself – Miranda has helped boost the number of certified MWBEs through a partnership with New York City Small Business Services.
38. Kristin Malek
Director of Business Diversity, CDW
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Kristen Malek ( Margaret Koukos Photography )
Since December, Kristin Malek has overseen business diversity initiatives for CDW, an Illinois-based information technology services provider that does significant business in New York. Malek has managed some $2 billion yearly in investments through the company’s supplier diversity program, partnering with hundreds of minority- and women-owned firms. Since Malek joined the company in 2017, it has twice been a finalist for the National Minority Supplier Development Council Corporation of the Year.
39. Justin Nelson & Jonathan Lovitz
Co-Founder and President; Special Adviser, National LGBT Chamber of Commerce
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Jonathan Lovitz ( Topher Scott )
The National LGBT Chamber of Commerce recently reached an agreement with the New York City Department of Small Business Services to certify firms owned by LGBTQ New Yorkers. Supporters say the move connects these firms with city resources, but without undermining official MWBE government contracting efforts. The agreement, which was reached in lieu of passing proposed legislation, is a victory for NGLCC’s Justin Nelson, who is typically more active on the national level, and Jonathan Lovitz, who was previously NGLCC’s New York director and lobbied for the recent local change.
40. Paul Williams Jr.
Founder, Brown Hatchett & Williams
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Paul T. Williams, Jr ( Paul T. Williams, III )
Paul Williams is a founding partner at Brown Hatchett & Williams, a law firm well-versed in corporate governance, finance and real estate matters. Williams made history in 2008 as the first African American to lead the Dormitory Authority of the State of New York and established DASNY as an innovator in developing new strategies to award contracts to MWBEs. He also chaired then-Gov. David Paterson’s MWBE task force, and continued to lead DASNY under Gov. Andrew Cuomo until 2015. Williams now advises companies on diversity and inclusion.
41. Jacqueline S.L. Williams
Founding Partner and Co-Owner, State & Broadway
Jacqueline S.L. Williams is a fierce advocate for MWBEs in New York. The owner of the lobbying firm State & Broadway served on Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s MWBE task force in 2011 in her capacity as MWBE Coalition coordinator, and she continues to work with firms owned by women and minorities and on broader economic development and labor issues as a top lobbyist in Albany.
42. John Flateau
Professor, Medgar Evers College
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John Flateau ( NYC Board Of Elections, Annual Report 2019 )
John Flateau is the co-founder of Medgar Evers College’s DuBois Bunche Center for Public Policy and US Census Information Center. Previously, he served as chief diversity officer at Empire State Development under former Gov. Mario Cuomo, executive director of the New York State Black and Puerto Rican Legislative Caucus and chief of staff to former New York City Mayor David Dinkins. A founding father of New York MWBEs, he played a key role in conducting a disparity study that paved the way for New York City’s MWBE program.
42. Hazel Dukes
President, NAACP New York State Conference
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As a longtime leader with the venerable civil rights organization the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, Hazel Dukes has spent decades seeking to create social and economic opportunities for New Yorkers of color. Dukes’ consulting firm Hazel N. Dukes and Associates focuses on public policy, health and diversity, and she was appointed to serve on Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s COVID-19 Vaccine Equity Task Force. She’s also a member of New York City Comptroller Scott Stringer’s Advisory Council on Economic Growth through Diversity and Inclusion.
43. Valerie White
Executive Director, LISC NYC
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Valerie White ( Roger Archer, Phaats Photos )
Valerie White took the reins of the New York City office of the Local Initiatives Support Corporation, or LISC NYC, a year ago. White, who previously led Empire State Development’s Division of Minority and Women’s Business Development, now is tasked with continuing initiatives that have pumped $3.1 billion into affordable housing, health care, jobs and business development programs. LISC, which was founded in New York by the Ford Foundation and corporate partners in New York in 1979, now has a presence in 45 states.
44. Liz Neumark
Founder and CEO, Great Performances
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Liz Neumark ( Great Performances )
Liz Neumark has led Great Performances for four decades, building it out from a part-time staffing agency for women in the arts into a top-tier catering and events company. In 2019, Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced that Neumark’s women-owned firm was relocating from Manhattan to the South Bronx, while creating nearly 200 new jobs and investing $4.4 million into a 40,000-square-foot space.
45. Jean Kristensen
President and CEO, Jean Kristensen Associates
After a career in private security, Jean Kristensen switched gears to run her own consulting firm, Jean Kristensen Associates. The firm, which is a minority- and women-owned business, assists other small business owners in getting certified with city and state MWBE programs and pursuing government contracts. Government agencies have also consulted Kristensen to identify firms for their supplier diversity programs.
46. Jacqui Williams
Principal, 99 Solutions
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Jacqui Williams ( TL Holmes/MCG )
Jacqui Williams is one of New York City’s top lobbyists, specializing in everything from real estate to recreational marijuana to retail and grocery stores, including helping the popular Wegmans Food Markets bring a supermarket to Brooklyn. As the longtime owner of the consulting firm 99 Solutions, she has long sought to assist business owners who are people of color.
47. Larry Scott Blackmon
Founder and CEO, The Blackmon Organization
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Larry Scott Blackman ( Andrew Morales )
When Larry Scott Blackmon founded his consulting firm The Blackmon Organization, it was the latest stage in a career straddling the public and private sectors. He previously served as vice president of public affairs at FreshDirect, forging relationships with MWBEs in the company’s supplier network and managing government and community relationships. He also worked for the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation and New York City Small Business Services and is an active member of One Hundred Black Men of New York.
Blackmon is a member of City & State’s advisory board, but did not have direct input on this list.
48. Mohammad Razvi
Co-Founder and Executive Director, Council of Peoples Organization
An immigrant from Pakistan and a former businessman, Mohammad Razvi founded the Council of Pakistan Organization five months after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Now the Council of Peoples Organization, the nonprofit assists low-income immigrant families, primarily of South Asian and Muslim descent, as they adapt to life in New York City. An advocate for minority and immigrant owned businesses, Razvi also serves on the Mayor’s Advisory Council on MWBEs.
49. Stacie NC Grant
Chief Brilliance Officer, C&G Enterprises Unlimited
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Stacie NC Grant ( Emma Burcusel Photography )
An author, motivational speaker and MWBE advocate, Stacie NC Grant leads C&G Enterprises Unlimited, which provides meeting facilitation, professional development and event services for various community, nonprofit and educational organizations. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the company pivoted to providing decontamination services for small businesses and meeting spaces. Previously, Grant was selected as the facilitator for the JFK International Airport Redevelopment Community Advisory Council, a part of the $13 billion redevelopment project.
50. Everett Perry
President and Founder, Urban EcoSpaces
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Everett Perry ( Urban Ecospaces, Inc )
In 2009, Everett Perry launched Urban Ecospaces, a development and general contracting firm and a certified MWBE. Perry’s firm has worked on major projects with the New York City Department of Design and Construction, the New York City School Construction Authority and the Build It Back program after Superstorm Sandy. Perry is also the fundraising chair for the NYC MWBE Alliance, a diverse coalition of MWBEs that works with city, state and federal agencies and contractors to secure government contracts.
Naomi Osaka Expanding Tennis Academy to Haiti and Los Angeles: 'All Kids Deserve a Chance to Play'
Play Academy, which Naomi Osaka created with Nike and Laureus Sport for Good, originally launched in Japan last summer.
Naomi Osaka is lending a helping hand to even more aspiring athletes.
The tennis superstar's Play Academy with Nike and Laureus Sport for Good — which first launched in Japan last summer — is expanding to two new locations: Los Angeles, California, and Haiti. Play Academy provides grants and capacity-building training for community organizations in order to boost girls' access to and participation in sport.
"We believe that all kids — especially girls — deserve a chance to play, no matter where they come from or what they look like," Osaka tells PEOPLE. "The more we provide girls with opportunities to get active, the more opportunities we are giving them to become leaders in their communities."
In Haiti, Play Academy will be partnering with GOALS Haiti to reach underrepresented youth. Osaka says they're hoping to "hire more female coaches, and provide girls with education to help build up their confidence, self-esteem and leadership skills."
Play Academy is still seeking community partners in Los Angeles, and aiming to focus on girl athletes from Black, Asian and Latino communities. Osaka notes that interested partners can apply at http://laureus.com/playacademyla.
Both locations have special meaning to the athlete: Los Angeles is where Osaka currently lives and trains, and Haiti is where her father is from.
Osaka's own tennis journey is, of course, part of the inspiration for Play Academy. "Growing up I dreamed about winning Grand Slams and becoming number one in the world," she recounts. "While it was not easy, my family was dedicated to helping me get the access I needed to reach my goals. But unfortunately, not all girls have the same opportunities that I did."
Continues Osaka, "There are huge barriers that girls face in getting active. Some girls, especially those from marginalized communities, never even get the chance to play. The more I learned about these barriers — through my work with Nike and Laureus Sport for Good — the more I felt determined to do something about it."
"It started with conversations and it became this incredible program working with community partners that are committed to leveling the playing field for girls."
And Osaka sees how much sports impact youth in all areas of their lives. She notes that research shows active kids are not only healthier, but happier and more confident. She hopes to be a role model for youth to see all those things are achievable.
"Growing up, I saw my mother work incredibly hard to support me and my passion for play," says Osaka. "She always put others first and encouraged me to embrace my diversity. Every role model I've had has inspired me to dream big. To level up in every way. And while I'm still working on how to be the best role model I can be, I want to show them that I stick to my beliefs and love who I am. Then maybe one day it will help them feel confident that it's okay to be different and create their own lane – as long as they remain true to themselves."
The first group of the new Play Academy partners will be announced summer 2021.
FIFA bans Haiti women's soccer official in sexual abuse case
ZURICH (AP) — A soccer official in Haiti was banned for 10 years on Monday for her part in the systematic sexual abuse of women’s national team players.
FIFA ethics judges ruled Nella Joseph, former supervisor of the Haiti Under-20 women’s team, was guilty of “actively coercing and threatening (players) into engaging in sexual relationships” with the then-president of the Haitian Football Association.
FIFA expelled the long-time former Haitian FA president, Yves Jean-Bart, from soccer for life last year.
A FIFA judgment in Jean-Bart’s case said he raped girls as young as 14 and took “habitual mistresses” among players starting in 2014.
Joseph “failed to protect the physical and mental integrity of various female players who were under her authority and responsibility” at the national training center in Haiti, FIFA said in a statement.
She was also fined 20,000 Swiss francs ($22,000).
FIFA said its ethics committee is working on other cases pending against Haitian soccer officials.
The allegations were first revealed in British newspaper The Guardian in April 2020.
Biden Nominates US Haiti Ambassador to State Department Position
WASHINGTON - U.S. President Joe Biden has nominated U.S. Ambassador to Haiti Michele Sison for the position of assistant secretary of state for international organization affairs.
Sison, a career ambassador, the highest rank in the U.S. Foreign Service, has served in Haiti since 2018. She is a respected diplomat in Port-au-Prince, where she has been outspoken about democratic governance, the rule of law and respect for human rights.
"We are very concerned about any action that risks undermining democratic institutions in Haiti," Sison told VOA during an exclusive interview in February.
Before arriving in Port-au-Prince, she served as U.S. deputy representative to the United Nations with the rank of ambassador from 2014 to 2018.
She is experienced in global coalition building, transnational threats, peacekeeping, international development and humanitarian relief.
Among Sison's prior posts are U.S. ambassador to Sri Lanka, the Maldives, Lebanon and the United Arab Emirates; assistant chief of mission in Iraq; and deputy chief of mission in Pakistan.
At the State Department, she held the position of principal deputy assistant secretary of state for South Asian affairs.
Sison has been recognized with multiple awards, notably the Distinguished Service Award and the Presidential Meritorious Rank Award.
The U.S. Senate must confirm her nomination before it becomes effective.
Fundraiser aims to bring trail-blazing Haitian EMT to US for paramedic education
Haiti Air Ambulance EMT Claudel Gedeon aims to become Haiti's first-ever paramedic by completing the program at Dixie State University
ST. GEORGE, Utah — A fundraising effort has been launched to help a trail-blazing Haitian EMT complete his paramedic education in the United States.
Haiti Air Ambulance EMT Claudel Gedeon aims to become the country's first-ever paramedic after attending the program at Dixie State University in St. George, Utah, according to the St. George News. Currently, there are no paramedic programs in Haiti, but Gedeon said he hopes to teach paramedic courses in the country after receiving his certification in the United States.
Gedeon is already an EMS educator, having established EMPACT Haiti in 2012, a non-profit that provides and develops EMS education in Haiti. The fundraiser for Gedeon's paramedic education was started by St. George resident Armadeus Davidson, a fellow medical responder who met Gedeon while providing aid in Haiti after the devastating 2010 earthquake. Gedeon was a high school student at the time and helped translate for the American medical volunteers.
Dixie State University Director of International Student Services Shadman Bashir said the department is working with Gedeon to ensure he meets the prerequisites to apply for the program. Donations will help fund Gedeon's tuition and additional expenses during his time in the United States.
"Claudel has demonstrated the traits of selflessness, commitment to his profession and humanity and asked for nothing in return," Davidson wrote in the description for the online fundraiser, which has so far raised nearly $11,500 of its $20,000 goal.
'Descent into hell': Kidnapping explosion terrorizes Haiti
PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) - A wave of kidnappings is sweeping Haiti. But even in a country growing inured to horrific abductions, the case of five-year-old Olslina Janneus sparked outrage.
Olslina was snatched off the streets of the capital Port-au-Prince in late January as she was playing. The child's corpse, bearing signs of strangulation, turned up a week later, according to her mother, Nadege Saint Hilaire, a peanut vendor who said she couldn't pay the $4,000 ransom. Saint Hilaire's cries filled the airwaves as she spoke to a few local radio stations seeking help raising funds to cover funeral costs.
Saint Hilaire is now in hiding after receiving death threats, she said, from the same gang that killed her daughter. "I wasn't supposed to go to the radio to denounce what had happened," she told Reuters.
Police in her impoverished and crime-ridden neighborhood, Martissant, told Reuters they were investigating the case.
Haiti’s epidemic of kidnappings is the latest crisis to befall this Caribbean island nation of around 11 million people, roiled by deepening political unrest and economic misery. Kidnappings last year tripled to 234 cases compared to 2019, according to official data compiled by the United Nations.
The real figures are likely much higher because many Haitians don't report abductions, fearing retribution from criminal gangs, according to attorney Gedeon Jean, director of the nonprofit Center for Human Rights Analysis and Research in Port-au-Prince. He said the research center recorded 796 kidnappings last year.
Haiti's national police force did not respond to a request for comment. President Jovenel Moise has said repeatedly that his government is doing all it can, and has put more resources into anti-kidnapping efforts. Still, he publicly acknowledged on April 14 that “kidnappings have become generalized” and that efforts to combat persistent insecurity have been "ineffective."
Human rights activists and a new report from Harvard Law School’s International Human Rights Clinic allege that Moise’s government has allied itself with violent criminal gangs to maintain its grip on power and to suppress dissent. Opposition groups have called for Moise to resign and hand power to a transitional government that would delay presidential and legislative elections slated for September until the nation is stable enough to ensure a free and fair contest.
Haiti’s acting Prime Minister Claude Joseph denied those allegations and the report's findings. He said anti-democratic forces are whipping up violence to destabilize Moise's administration in an election year. “They are fomenting the gangs to stop there being elections,” Joseph told Reuters.
Criminals have targeted some poor people, like Saint Hilaire, for modest sums. Many more victims come from the ranks of the Haitian middle class - teachers, priests, civil servants, small business owners. Such targets aren't rich enough to afford bodyguards but have enough assets or connections to scrape up a ransom.
In one of the most high-profile recent cases, five Catholic priests, two nuns and three laymen were kidnapped on April 11 in the commune of Croix-des-Bouquets, northeast of the capital. Four members of the group were subsequently released and six are still missing, according to an April 25 statement by the Society of Priests of St. Jacques, a French missionary society linked to four of the kidnapped priests. An official with that group declined to comment on whether a ransom was paid.
“For some time now, we have been witnessing the descent into hell of Haitian society,” the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Port-au-Prince said in a statement earlier this month.
‘KILLING THE ECONOMY’
Haiti last experienced a major surge in kidnappings and gang violence after a rebellion toppled then-President Jean-Bertrand Aristide in 2004, prompting the United Nations to send in a peacekeeping force.
The departure of that force in October 2019 was followed by a resurgence in gang crime, according to human-rights activists, who say kidnapping has proven lucrative at a time when Haiti's economy is teetering.
Rights activists say politics also play a role. They allege Moise’s government has harnessed criminal groups to terrorize neighborhoods known as opposition strongholds and to quell public dissent amid street protests that have rocked the country the past three years.
The report released April 22 by the International Human Rights Clinic at Harvard Law School alleges “high-level government involvement in the planning, execution and cover-up” of three gang-led attacks on poor neighborhoods between 2018 and 2020 that left at least 240 civilians dead. The report relied on investigations of the attacks by Haitian and international human rights experts. It alleges the government provided gangs with money, weapons and vehicles and shielded them from prosecution.
The U.S. Department of the Treasury in December sanctioned reputed Haitian gang leader Jimmy Cherizier and two former Moise administration officials - Fednel Monchery and Joseph Pierre Richard Duplan - for helping orchestrate one of the attacks. All three have denied wrongdoing.
Kidnapping is an outgrowth of impunity for criminal organizations, according to Rosy Auguste Ducena, program manager of the Port-au-Prince-based National Network for the Defense of Human Rights.
"We are talking about a regime that has allied itself with armed gangs," Ducena said.
Justice Minister Rockefeller Vincent denied any government alliance with gangs. He told Reuters in December that the wave of kidnappings was the work of political enemies seeking to undermine Moise "by creating a sense of chaos."
The rise in kidnappings has petrified many Haitians. The heads of seven private business associations this month issued a joint statement saying they had reached "a saturation point" with soaring crime. They endorsed a nationwide work stoppage that occurred on April 15 to protest Haiti’s security crisis.
"Kidnapping is killing the economy," said Haitian economist Etzer Emile. He said the tourism and entertainment sectors have withered.
Moise's administration says it is working hard to end the terror. Two years ago it revived a commission aimed at disarming gang members and reintegrating them into society. Over the past year, the government has increased the police budget and solicited advice from Colombia, which once battled its own kidnapping epidemic. In March, Haiti created an anti-kidnapping task force to attack the problem with tactics such as tracing laundered ransom money.
Still, four policemen died last month in a gun battle with alleged criminals in a slum where kidnapping victims are often held. The government declared a month-long state of emergency in gang-controlled neighborhoods. Yet abductions continue to mount.
Moise, who has opted not to seek re-election this September, has defied the opposition's calls for him to step down early. On April 14 he issued a statement saying he aimed to form a government of national unity to better tackle the "pressing problem of insecurity."
HOODS, GUNS AND TORTURE
Many Haitians remain skeptical - and on edge.
One victim was a 29-year-old doctor. He was kidnapped in his own vehicle last November after leaving the Port-au-Prince hospital where he had just finished an overnight shift. He told Reuters his story on condition of anonymity.
At dawn, four armed assailants hustled him into the back seat, threw a hood over his head and held him at gunpoint as they drove, he said. His captors eventually tossed him into a room with three other abductees - a man and two women - who had been snatched earlier.
The physician said his kidnappers ordered him to phone his family to request $500,000 for his release. The first two people he tried said they couldn’t pay. The kidnappers slapped him and delivered a threat.
"They said that if I called a third person that didn't give me a satisfying response, they would kill me," he said.
The doctor's girlfriend said she and three friends negotiated with the gang. She wouldn't say how much they paid, fearful of becoming targets for other criminals.
The doctor said he reported his abduction to Haiti's national anti-kidnapping police unit. That unit did not respond to requests for comment.
The physician does not know the fate of his fellow abductees. He said the kidnappers poured melted Styrofoam on their skin because their families had yet to pay up.
Saint Hilaire, the mother of the young girl who was kidnapped and murdered, said she continues to watch her back after speaking publicly about the abduction.
The kidnappers "told me to make sure I never ran into them, because they would kill me," she said.
Three Killed as Heavy Rains Lash Haiti
At least three people have died and three others missing following the torrential rains that have caused widespread damage and flooding in Haiti.
Officials said that the rains, linked to the passage of a frontal system, lashed Haiti for the past three days, resulting in the people being killed, three others missing and extensive damage being reported in several departments.
Floods and river overflows have been recorded in the Center, North, North-East and North-West and several communes are affected by flooding.
“I visited the affected families following the flood in Jean-Rabel. On this occasion, I spoke with the city authorities including the mayoress, members of the civil protection (and) I asked the Prime Minister to issue instructions to the Ministers of the Interior and of Social Affairs in order to come to the aid of some 60 affected families,” President Jovenel Moïse said after visiting the affected families.
The authorities said that two deaths have been confirmed in the commune of Bois de Lance (North) and three other people are missing in the department. More than 1,270 houses were flooded in the communes of Terrier-Rouge, Caracol and Trou-du-Nord (North-East).
Heavy rains affected several main streets in the city of Cap Haitien and the districts of Blue-Hills, Haut du Cap, Petite Anse, Charrier, Zo-Vincent Cité du Peuple, Fort Saint Michel, Bas-Champin were flooded.
The authorities said that one shelter that has been activated in Cap Haitien houses around 85 people and that the departmental directorates of Civil Protection partially had activated their emergency operations centers.
The Hydrometeorological Unit is warning people to continue to be prepared as the rains will continue to spread to the rest of the country.
Fritz Daguillard, immunologist who studied art and Haitian history, dies of covid-19
To those who knew him, Fritz Daguillard was a man driven by curiosity. He reveled in the culture of his native Haiti, loved studying its history and also collected artwork that viewed the accomplishments of Black people through the eyes of European artists.
But the doctor, who died of covid-19 at Suburban Hospital on Nov. 30, 2020, could point with equal pride to a remarkable career in medical research. He was 85.
In the 1970s, Daguillard founded one of the first schools in the field of immunology at Laval University in Quebec and served on the Canadian Medical Research Council.
Later, at the Hôpital des Enfants-Malades in Paris, the world’s oldest pediatric hospital, he studied severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID), the genetic condition that causes children to live as “bubble babies” in a plastic-cocooned, germ-free environment.
“He was proudest of his work on the T cell; he was one of the first researchers to identify its involvement in immune response,” said his wife, Rita. “He also organized one of the earliest leukocyte conferences in 1972 at La Malbaie in Quebec.”
His work with UNESCO and the World Health Organization in the 1980s took Daguillard to sub-Saharan Africa at the height of the AIDS epidemic. He continued his study of HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, when he came to the District in 1985 to lead the AIDS evaluation clinic for the D.C. Department of Health.
In the last two decades, after his retirement from medicine, Daguillard zealously focused on historical research and art collecting, teaching a course on the Haitian Revolution at Benedict College in Columbia, S.C., and serving on the Committee for the Celebration of the Haitian Revolution.
His collections formed the basis of three art exhibits sponsored by the Haitian Embassy, one on the abolitionist Sen. Charles Sumner of Massachusetts and his efforts to gain U.S. diplomatic recognition for Haiti; a bicentennial celebration of the Haitian Revolution; and “Enigmatic in his Glory,” an exploration of the frequently contradictory likenesses of revolution leader Toussaint L’Ouverture in artwork. Daguillard returned several times to his native land to lecture on L’Ouverture and the Haitian revolution and even used his medical background to explore the controversies surrounding the Haitian liberator’s death and autopsy.
“He expressed pride that he was a medical professional who had interests outside his work,” his son Robert said.
Daguillard began acquiring sketches, prints and paintings in the 1960s, but the avocation really took hold during a Paris sabbatical. By the 1980s he had cultivated innumerable relationships in the Parisian art world, not only with galleries and dealers but often with the artists themselves.
French informalist painter and sculptor Jean Messagier gifted him a sketch of civil rights icon Angela Davis. He purchased several portraits of renowned American jazz musicians by Polish painter and poster artist Waldemar Swierzy and later commissioned a portrait of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. from Swierzy.
Fritz Daguillard was born June 1, 1935, in Les Cayes, Haiti. His father owned an import-export business. He received a medical degree from the University of Haiti in Port-au-Prince and came to the United States in 1963 for a residency at Albert Einstein Hospital in Philadelphia. He received a master’s from Harvard Medical School and, after moving to Canada, a PhD from McGill University in Montreal.
Daguillard and wife Rita, an attorney who has retired from the U.S. Transportation Department, were married for 53 years and lived in Bethesda.
John Lawrence, a retired curator with the Historic New Orleans Collection, worked with Daguillard on an exhibit about the Haitian migration to Louisiana before the Louisiana Purchase. He recalled how devoted the doctor was to chronicling the story of his people.
“He was always a student,” Lawrence said. “He never stopped learning.”
“That’s what makes a good collector,” he added. “You’re never at the point where you know it all. It’s having a great eye and a sharp mind and passionate pursuit for the material coupled with a willingness to share it — the ability not only to present these things but to tell the story and also state where the objects drive the narrative.”
Human Trafficking Intensifies Along Haiti-Dominican Republic Border
PORT AU PRINCE (CMC): The trafficking of children and adolescents along the border shared by Haiti and the Dominican Republic has intensified.
This is according to Jorge Galván, a human-rights activist in the Dominican Republic, who says the trafficking mainly takes place along the border of the province of Dajabon.
According to Galván, when these minors are illegally transferred from Haiti, they are exposed to all kinds of abuse from the traffickers, stressing that the problem is dramatic and that an urgent solution must be sought because more and more of them are arriving every day.
He said most of the children and adolescents spend nights in public places or sleep in abandoned buildings.
“On the day, they walk the streets with shoe polish boxes, others clean the windows of vehicles, still others devote themselves to begging, collecting bottles, plastics and other objects that people throw away and that they can resell, often on behalf of unscrupulous individuals.”
He added that some victims of mafias operating in Haiti, in collusion with Dominicans, are being exploited and often abused or sold in prostitution networks.
According to Haitian Professor Jean Baptiste, who is also a former leader of Civil Protection in Cap Haitien, child trafficking to the Dominican Republic is serious.
Meanwhile, the vice-president of the Coordinator of Popular Organizations of the South Zone of Santiago, José Alberto Peña, says that along with representatives of other entities, he recently saved seven Haitian children who were residing in the poor area known as ‘Cañada del Diablo’, where they were being exploited.
Haiti’s Doctors, Lawyers and Handicapped Join Pro-Democracy, Anti-Kidnapping Protest
WASHINGTON/PORT-AU-PRINCE - Thousands of Haitians filled the streets of the capital, Port-au-Prince, again Sunday to call on President Jovenel Moise to step down and to demand a crackdown on kidnappers, who they say are holding the nation hostage.
“We cannot accept this kind of society,” said a doctor, who was part of the protest but did not give his name. “We have an incapable government. We need the proper conditions to work and treat patients.”
Medical professionals who spoke to VOA said they are outraged over the Feb. 28 attempted kidnapping and killing of one of their colleagues. They organized a two-day work stoppage March 2 in a show of solidarity and took to the streets Sunday.
Haiti has seen a spike in the last year in abductions targeting citizens from all sectors of society. The criminals have been indiscriminate in their targets, asking for ransoms as large as $5 million from the poor as well as the rich. Protesters hold the president responsible for failing to bring the perpetrators to justice.
During the first week of March, Moise took several steps to respond to the kidnappings, which have raised alarm among officials from the U.S., the United Nations and the European Union. The president held a series of meetings with law enforcement officials and members of his cabinet. Moise said a special anti-kidnapping unit of Colombia’s police force will help Haiti shape a more targeted response.
“Law enforcement has been instructed to intensify their efforts against insecurity. They must better coordinate their strategies, share intelligence, launch interventions and take all necessary actions to this end,” Moise tweeted on March 2.
Lawyers from the legal human rights group Collectif des Avocats pour la Défense des Droits de l’Homme (CADDOH) also joined Sunday’s protest, offering free legal assistance to anyone who might be arrested. Lawyer Arnel Remy decried the government’s disregard for the rule of law and had a message for the international community.
“It’s important for the international community to respond to this protest. … Jovenel (Moise the president) has been here for five years, and the judicial system has not functioned properly during that time,” he told VOA.
Remy took issue in particular with a communique announced this week by Prime Minister Joseph Jouthe that outlaws tinted glass on all vehicles except government and diplomatic cars. The measure outraged Haitians who have spent a lot of money to have their windows tinted as a measure against kidnappers and will now lose their investment and that protection.
The prime minister defended his communique, saying it was aimed at kidnappers who ride around in cars with tinted windows, preying on victims.
“Kidnapping is state-sponsored. So of course it will never be defeated,” alleged ex-Senator Steven Benoit, who marched with protesters. “Just wait, two or three weeks after Jovenel (Moise) is no longer in power, the kidnappings will stop.”
The president has denied any link to kidnappers.
Businessman Wolfi Hall, himself a kidnapping victim, said people need to understand that the trauma of the crime lingers long after a person is freed.
“There are pains that remain with you for the rest of your life,” he told VOA. “God only knows why your life was spared. Because after you’ve been traumatized, it doesn’t go away in a day. It’s an ugly experience — I don’t wish this on anyone — and you can only understand what I mean if you’ve been kidnapped.”
A group of handicapped people told VOA they had decided to join the protests for the first time to send a clear message to the president and the international community.
“Jovenel Moise, you are Haitian just like me, you say you love the country, please leave us the key to the (national) palace. You can’t be pleased with the situation we are in now. You represent everything that is wrong,” a blind woman told VOA.
She then turned her attention to U.S. officials.
“You say you are the friends of Haiti. Jovenel Moise does not represent us. I know the United States can’t do anything for Haiti — we know you have your own interests (to defend),” she said. “You take good care of dogs in your country, they get special care — I know you love people, too — well, we the handicapped are in the streets of Haiti today. You understand what that means. This is something we never do. We are the most disadvantaged (people) in society and look USA today we are in the street.”
It is rare for handicapped people to participate in street protests due to the grueling nature of the course, largely on foot at a brisk pace, climbing up steep, winding hills on roads that are sometimes not well paved, do not have sidewalks, in a hot and humid climate.
On March 5, two men linked to kidnappings were arrested in Haiti and turned over to U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency and FBI agents.
Peterson Benjamin, also known as Ti Peter Vilaj, and Lissner Mathieu, also known as Ti Nwa and has used the last name of Joseph, were flown to the United States where they are wanted in connection with drug trafficking, violating terms of probation and kidnapping.
Mathieu, a U.S. citizen, pleaded guilty in 2006 to drug charges in the U.S. but fled to Haiti in 2008.
Benjamin has been linked to a dozen kidnapping cases, some of which involved U.S. citizens, the Miami Herald reported.
Prison Break Lays Bare Haiti Gang Leader’s Ties to Elites
A gang leader killed after a deadly Haiti prison break may have been sprung intentionally — raising further concerns about toxic relationships between gangs and political elites in the run-up to new elections.
A February 25 riot at the Croix-des-Bouquets prison in Haiti’s capital, Port au Prince, led to the deaths of 25 people and the escape of about 400 inmates, including notorious gang leader Arnel Joseph.
Prime Minister Joseph Jouthe told the newspaper Le Nouvelliste that the detainees had kidnapped the prison director, who was later killed, and escaped via a ladder at a lookout point. According to Alterpresse, gunshots were heard shortly before the prison break.
Secretary of State Frantz Exantus announced the formation of three commissions to investigate the causes and circumstances of the break.
Observers have suggested that the point of the riot was to free Joseph, who led a gang active in the low-income neighborhood of Village de Dieu, south of Haiti’s capital, and two rural areas. Famous for having escaped prison on two different occasions in 2010 and 2017, Joseph was Haiti’s most wanted criminal until his arrest in July 2019.
A day after the prison break, Joseph was stopped by police at a checkpoint while riding on the back of a motorcycle in l’Estère, a municipality in the Artibonite department, a spokesperson for Haiti’s National Police told reporters. Police say that Joseph attacked the officers, who shot and killed him in response. The person driving the motorcycle escaped.
According to investigators, half the inmates who escaped in the prison break remain at large.
InSight Crime Analysis
Arnel Joseph’s ties to Haiti’s political elites have been exposed on multiple occasions, including recently.
During a January 25 appearance before a judge in his case, Joseph made revelations about members of the state and private sector who facilitated his criminal operations. This information was shared by journalist Valéry Numa on his radio show February 1, along with a series of related Tweets.
Following Joseph’s arrest in 2019, the Village de Dieu gangs, which formerly opposed the government of Jovenel Moise, reportedly joined the G9 and Family, which supports the current leadership. The G9 united nine gang chiefs in the low-income neighborhoods of Port-au-Prince in July 2020. It was promoted by Jimmy Chérizier, one of Haiti’s most powerful gang leaders. In response to armed attacks against police patrols last year, security forces have conducted several offensives to evict the gangs from Village de Dieu but have yet to report results.
Relations between allies of the Moise government and armed groups — including the G9 – have been denounced by human rights organizations like the National Human Rights Defense Network (Réseau National de Défense des Droits de l’Homme — RNDDH), the Fundasyon Je Klere and the Center for Analysis and Research on Human Rights (Centre d’analyse et de recherche en droits de l’homme — CARDH). The groups have expressed concerns that ties between politicians and gangs have compromised the rule of law in Haiti.
Most recently, Haiti has seen a surge in gang kidnappings, which has even prompted the president himself to call on citizens to cooperate with authorities to try and confront the problem.
With parliamentary elections scheduled for September this year, Haiti’s human rights organizations have reiterated their concern that the government will use these gangs to help keep the ruling party in power.