Long lines formed at gas stations in Port-au-Prince this week due to an apparent fuel shortage which stoked Haiti’s already crisis-ridden political atmosphere.
"I got 4000 gallons yesterday, but it’s already finished," one gas station owner said. "It’s as if it went with one gulp."
Frantic motorists, panicked by rumors, scoured the capital for gasoline and diesel fuel, and, in some places, merchants hawked drums of black market fuel. Several other Haitian cities also reported fuel shortages.
But Mario Dupuy, Communications Secretary of State, downplayed the apparent shortage and the response of motorists. "There is no panic, and gas is not rare in the country," he said, charging that certain "profiteers" were creating a false alarm to generate black market price-gouging.
The National Association of Petroleum Product Distributors (ANADIPP) also declared that there was no fuel shortage, despite the gas station lines and the marked thinning of public transport traffic on Aug. 12.
A tanker of diesel fuel arrived in Port-au-Prince bay on the morning of Aug. 12, somewhat taming tensions. Despite its earlier pronouncements, the government called for the public’s patience while gas stations are replenished.
Cops Busted for Drugs in Jacmel
Police Inspector General Harvel Jean-Baptiste ordered the arrest on Jul. 30 of over a dozen cops in and around the southeastern city of Jacmel, including the district’s Police Director, Jean Neslie Elie. The arrests came on the heels of an investigation into the delivery of between 1000 and 2000 kilos of cocaine near the town of Sable Cabaret in July.
Elie was arrested for refusing to collaborate with investigators. "I cannot be the Inspector General of the Police if, when I summon an officer, he refuses to come," Jean-Baptiste explained. "So I had him arrested. If you don’t want to answer to me, you are out of the police. You’ll take your insubordination elsewhere."
Also arrested was Eugens Bazelais, a security officer for Sen. Immacula Bazile. Police also seized the senator’s official vehicle. Several parliamentarians protested that the seizure was disrespectful and unwarranted. Deputy Millien Rommage complained that the Inspector General should have telephoned Sen. Bazile before the arrest and seizure of her vehicle to inform her of his intentions.
"I am not going to get into a polemic with any given senator, who is an authority I respect," Jean-Baptiste responded. "I don’t want to give the impression that I am on a witch-hunt. Our goal is to better understand what is going on within the police institution."
Investigating judge Marc St. Ange also announced that 12 other people had been arrested in connection with the Sable Cabaret drug drop, including four Colombians and Adonis Noël, a communal section administrator (ASEC).
Visa Racket at the Dominican Consulate?
According to Haitian and Dominican investigators, a Haitian has to pay about $80US to travel legally to the Dominican Republic. At the Dominican Consulate in Pétionville, a person pays $40 for consular fees, and another $40 to one of the "facilitators" stationed on the sidewalk outside the building. Haitians have begun to accuse the Dominican Consulate of being in cahoots with the men who expedite obtaining a visa, a charge the Alberto D. Cabral the Dominican ambassador angrily denies.
"The Dominican Consulate is under my control, I can assure you of that," Cabral said. "Inside the consulate, there is no racket. If there are racketeers, it is the Haitian racketeers who are in front of the consulate. I have denounced that several times, but the Haitian police have done nothing."
Nonetheless, many of the racketeers at the Pétionville Consulate, like that in Cap Haïtien, carry "authorization cards" which appear to be issued by the consulates.
Exam Correctors Demand Pay
Several hundred teachers involved in correcting final exams (Baccalauréat) for about 380,000 Haitian high school students protested last week to demand their pay.
"They found money to pay off the demonstrators in Gonaïves, even though the demonstrators got mad and said they didn’t want the money," complained one teacher. "We, who have worked diligently doing a job which has importance for the republic, we need to be paid. Up until now, they haven’t paid us a cent."
The protesting teachers have threatened to block the correction process on remaining exams, even though results for most of Haiti’s nine geographic departments have already been released. Education Ministry officials claimed that electrical blackouts caused exam scores stored on a computer to be lost, which caused a delay in the announcement of test results.
The protesting correctors also charged that the Education Ministry hired many "mediocre" and "unqualified" teachers on the basis of favoritism to correct the exams.
"The [Education] Ministry is not respecting the contract signed with the correctors," said Jean Lavaud Fréderique, secretary general of the National Federation of Haitian Teachers (CNEH), "and that is the root of the problem. Many are the fathers of families, some left their homes to come and correct exams, and now they aren’t paid. We think that the Education Ministry authorities truly do not care about teachers, do not respect teachers."
