Almost a month ago, during the visit on 11th October by Haiti’s Prime Minister Garry Conille to Nairobi, President William Ruto appealed for urgent financial support from the international community to sustain the Kenya-led security deployment in Haiti, which has been extended by a year.
The Kenya-led multinational security mission, which began in June, is helping fight gangs controlling much of the capital, Port-au-Prince, and suburban locations in its vicinity.
President Ruto has been upbeat about the performance of the Kenya Police contingent in Haiti as he reiterated that they had worked hard and had positive results to show for it. Haitian leader Conille, reiterated President Ruto’s concerns as he also requested the international community to support them with both the personnel and funds they had pledged earlier.
Haiti, the poorest country in the Americas, has over sixty percent of its population living in abject poverty and it is not a wonder for a country whose history has been dogged by devastating natural disasters and political instability. The latter is the precipitator of the present crises where organized gangs unleash devastating violence on the public and police in opposition to any organized authority.
From January to October, more than 3,600 people have been killed including over 100 children, whereas over 500,000 Haitians are internally exiled, according to the UN. Human rights experts are now warning that Haiti’s violent gangs have now infiltrated new flu-flung areas from the Capital City, causing further displacement.
In August 2023 when the US was presiding over the U.N. Security Council, it put forward a resolution to approve a mission in Haiti led by Kenyan police. Up until then Kenya had never been known to have taken part in such a mission regionally or internationally, was Kenya biting what it could not chew?
To compound Kenya’s inappropriateness for the assignment, Kenyans do not speak French, which is the official and widely-spoken language in Haiti. Seemingly unperturbed by these inadequacies, President William Ruto pledged to lead the proposed multi-national force in Haiti to restore peace and normalcy. Had he acted ultra vires? Parliament was soon roped in to regularize the deployment when the courts rejected the plan.
Ruto said a total of 1000 police officers would be deployed to the mission. Indeed, Kenya took to Haiti 400 of its pledged 1,000 police officers in June and July this year and promised the final group of 600 officers, on completion of training within this month, would also be deployed.
It has, however not been smooth sailing for Kenya to deploy its part of the multinational force in Haiti. In March, Republican American lawmakers were still holding onto millions of dollars in the Haitian mission funding that the White House desired to be released to help with the mission.
Secretary of State Blinken, in a first, had to override the lawmakers and order for a speedy release which enabled Kenya to deploy. But Republican members of parliament are of the opinion that the US has severally intervened in Haiti with little to show for it. The United States of America, however, remains the largest financier for the Haitian mission as noted when the Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced that the U.S. was upping its pledge to $300 million in March this year.
The triumph of Trump and the Republican Party could be the death of the Haitian mission
At stake now is the immediate and eventual status of the Haitian mission which could be jeopardized when the American political schism over Haiti comes into play with the new administration. The Democratic party has been in support of the Haitian multinational stabilization force while the Republicans have often showed little time for it.
Outgoing President Biden’s administration has single-handedly pushed for the formation and funding of the Haitian mission and as he exits many international observers are unanimous that Haiti will not be the Republican government’s priority. This factor will directly affect the status and performance of the Kenyan police contingent on the ground.
Last month, President Ruto mentioned that the status of the funding was shaky and might only last until the first quarter of the coming year. The election of Donald Trump as the 47th President of the United States of America has definitely left President Ruto with his fingers crossed as to the fate of his security officers on the ground and the future of the whole mission. His strongest covert option now should be to have an evacuation plan for his officers at short notice but outwardly he should strongly lobby the U.S. to push for a hand-over to the United Nations (U.N.)
The local envoy to Nairobi from Washington, Meg Whitman has been very instrumental in the warm relationship between Nairobi and Washington but with the change in guard in Washington, will this hold? Trump’s policy towards Africa and indeed most of the world, if it follows his stint during the first term from 2017 to 2021, will undoubtedly be one of disengagement from situations that do not impact the lives of people in the U.S.
His slogan for the first term, “America First!” is still remembered by many observers. His slogan for the second term, “Make America Great Again!” is not a stone throw away from the first slogan. In 2018, Donald Trump referred to Haiti, El Salvador and African nations as “shithole countries” during a meeting with a bipartisan group of senators at the White House, it would be unlikely he would give Haiti the smallest benefit of the doubt today.
Several dynamics have hindered the Haitian mission to date. Its launch and operations have experienced a funding shortfall. Kenya had calculated that the mission needs around $600 million annually to operate properly, but total current donations have grossed just over $400 million. The lack of money has meant slower deployment and a crisis when it comes to equipping the security forces within the mission.
Last month, Leslie Voltaire, the present head of Haiti’s Transitional Presidential Council, made a formal request to the UN Security Council to have the multinational stabilization force in Haiti be converted to a full-fledged UN peacekeeping operation.
However, the Council did not take a vote to effect this widely proposed shift but it is hoped that the U.S. will once more table the proposal before the end of the year successfully. U.S. officials feel that if the mission comes under the United Nations, it would assure the Haiti mission steady funding and increase the mission’s effectiveness.
It will not be the first time to have UN peacekeepers in Haiti as the last time they were there, is not more than five years ago. The UN blue helmets left under a grey cloud as claims of inadvertently poisoning water sources with sewage waste water blew up into a cholera epidemic which claimed over 10,000 lives as well as left hundreds of “UN-Babies” who were the products of largely coerced young Haitian women by UN peacekeepers. Human Rights abuses and harm to civilians in the course of anti-gang operations by UN peacekeepers further created a mistrust of the UN in Haiti.
But five years down the line has left many Haitians desperate as the gang violence rages unabated, and the idea of UN peacekeepers has become more acceptable in the country.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres needs to have a buy-in, even though he had earlier said “Haiti is not conducive to peacekeeping”; it is only the UN that can handle the depravity in Haiti if it commits to a robust mandate and discipline.
