By Daniel Zazueta and Caitlin Robinett
Click here to read Caitlin Robinett’s blog. Daniel and Caitlin will be returning to Haiti for Spring break, the first week of March.
We stood together in the cold winter rain on the afternoon of Tuesday, January 12. We didn’t say much. News reports were pouring in of the 7.0 earthquake outside of Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Tears streamed down our faces. We had just returned from Port-au-Prince four days earlier. Bags were still half-packed on the floor. Shoes were still caked in dust. Mosquito bites were still fresh. A hot shower still seemed to wash away some part of the dusty and sweaty experience.
Caitlin Robinett, Marie Jeanne Jean, and Daniel Zazueta |
The continued news coverage is sobering. In a place where such horrific events are exacerbated by an already fragile state, Haiti stands to suffer unimaginable harm. Our newly formed affection for Haiti and the friends we left behind made the news unbearable.
It is surreal to sit in classes, knowing we narrowly escaped being caught in the earthquake. The room we shared in a concrete guesthouse is now flattened. A city that was already steeped in darkness is now almost entirely without light. We know some of our friends in Port-au-Prince survived, but others still have not returned repeated emails.
We are stunned from images of the aftermath. Exactly one week before the earthquake we visited downtown Port-au-Prince to take photos of the Presidential Palace, the Palace of Justice, and the National Cathedral – all now lay in ruin.
We flew to Haiti on Christmas night. Our objective was to spend two weeks interviewing people connected to two human rights trials, which were in response to the Raboteau Massacre of 1994.
Approximately forty people were murdered in an attempt by the paramilitary group FRAPH (Front for the Advancement and Progress of Haiti) to suppress pro-Aristide demonstrations in the small town of Raboteau, outside of Gonaives (about one hundreds miles north of Port-au-Prince). The demonstrations called for the return of Jean Bertrand Aristide, Haiti’s first democratically elected president. Aristide won the election by a landslide in 1990. Within seven months of his presidency, a military coup removed him from power. The victims of the massacre, however, were mostly innocent men and women who were shot trying to escape into the sea, not anti-military activists.
Our motivation to go to Haiti came after meeting Haitian human rights attorney Mario Joseph last March. Mr. Joseph was the lead attorney representing the victims of the massacre. Santa Clara University awarded Mario Joseph with the Alexander Law Prize for his dedication to human rights in Haiti.
During his time on campus, Mr. Joseph told us an inspiring story about Marie Jeanne Jean, a woman whose husband was murdered during the 1994 Raboteau Massacre in Haiti. After an internationally acclaimed trial in Haiti in 2000, where many of the military officers responsible for the massacre were tried and convicted, Marie Jeanne served as the lead plaintiff in a subsequent lawsuit was filed in the United States against one of the officers, Col. Carl Dorelien.
Haiti, before the January 12, 2010 earthquake. |
Dorelien fled to the United States in 1997 to escape prosecution and subsequently won $3 million in the Florida state lottery. The Center of Justice and Accountability, an international human rights organization, filed suit against Dorelien. A Florida court ultimately awarded Marie Jeanne with $430,000. Instead of keeping the money for herself, Marie Jeanne spread the settlement award among the victims in her community. We went to Haiti to tell this moving story of community.
We received a grant from Santa Clara University to travel to Haiti to conduct interviews and write the article. Leaving for Haiti, we had an idea in our minds of the story we thought we would tell. It was a story of community, justice, and the rule of law in Haiti.
After interviewing over 30 victims and survivors of the massacre, it became clear to us that the story we intended to write was a minor footnote in a much bigger story. How can we begin to talk to about justice in a country where people eat cakes made from mud and lard so their bellies don’t ache with hunger? There is little justice to be found for a woman whose husband was found shot dead in the sea, while she starves and her possessions are washed away by hurricanes. Justice in Haiti is not simply retribution. Justice in Haiti is to allow Haitians the democratic freedoms we ourselves enjoy. Justice in Haiti is clean water, decent roads, schools, and perhaps one full meal a day.
Driving through the country we saw every element of Haiti’s fragile infrastructure hanging by a thread. Trash lines the streets and chokes the waterways. Open sewers drain into the sea from virtually every street and alley. Poorly constructed buildings of cinderblocks and cement cover the city. Cars, trucks, and buses cough black plumes of exhaust as they clog the tight corridors of the cities. Every vehicle is slowly destroyed by the constant plague of potholes. The streets have a constant haze hanging above them. Sirens cannot be heard in the distance because there are no emergency vehicles; no ambulances, no fire trucks, and sparse police presence. Haiti has schools, but what good is an education when there are no jobs or food to fill a child’s stomach? Now, it is much worse. Schools are piles of rumble and jobs that were scarce to begin with are now gone.
We are still glued to the internet a week after the quake, continuing to feel desperate. Some help is on the way, but Haiti needs more than the Red Cross, an aircraft carrier, or Wyclef Jean. The people of Haiti need us to stay focused. They need us to continue to send help. They need the whole world to come together, as President Aristide said, to help move the country “from misery to poverty with dignity.”
Across Port Au Prince the words, “nou bouke” or “we’re tired” are spray painted on walls and buildings. It’s hard to imagine that there will be any strength or hope remaining in the Haitian people. We owe it to them to find it in ourselves to give those who have survived a reason to hope again.
