CARICOM to mount fact finding mission to Haiti

BRIDGETOWN,
Barbados, Feb 19, CMC – Caribbean Community (CARICOM) leaders have agreed to
send a fact finding mission to Haiti in a bid to finding a solution to the
ongoing social and political unrest in the French-speaking CARICOM member
country where opposition parties are demanding the removal of President Jovenel
Moise.

See also - CARICOM deeply concerned about political situation in Haiti

The mission
will be led by CARICOM Secretary General Ambassador Irwin LaRocque and will
include representatives from the Bahamas, Jamaica and Barbados.

Moise was
among several Caribbean leaders who did not attend the two-day Inter-sessional
summit that ended here on Wednesday.

The opposition
parties have accused Moise, who came to power in 2017, of corruption and have
been staging street demonstrations in support of their demands for him to step
down. Moise has denied the allegations and has been spearheading efforts for
the establishment of a government of national unity.

At their last
summit in St. Lucia, CARICOM had agreed on a prime ministerial delegation to
visit the French-speaking country but that never materialised and Dominica’s
Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit said that it was important for the region to
send a fact finding mission to Haiti.

“It is felt
that if we do not help address the domestic issue confronting Haiti we will
continue to have tremendous negative impacts on countries like the Turks and
Caicos and the Bahamas who are seeing a large number of migrants coming into
these countries and creating some domestic challenges for them.

“So we need to
work with the various stakeholders in Haiti to find some kind of lasting
solution to the current impasse,” Skerrit said.

He also warned
that CARICOM cannot afford to neglect is duty to Port au Prince amid the
ongoing turmoil.

“We must not
appear on any way to have, what has become in many parts of the world, Haiti
fatigue. We recognise that Haiti is part of the community and we have a
responsibility and a duty and obligation to assist a member state in
unravelling its challenges and to work with (it) towards lasting solutions,” he
said.

However
Skerrit acknowledged that finding a solution to the current impasse will not
solve the country’s problems and there is need for engagement with Haiti and
the international community on the social and economic challenges.

Meanwhile
CARICOM Chairman, Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley, said she recognised that
the situation in Haiti is a complex one, but it can be addressed.

“The first
step is for us to have the legitimacy and the integrity of facts that we can
rely upon, and that therein after we then work with the relevant players to see
how best we can work with Haiti to ensure that they don’t face instability
within their boundaries, and as a result there are no negative consequences to
the people of the Bahamas or to the people of the Turks and Caicos.

“Difficult
conversations are not often welcome but they are at the end of the day what are
necessary in order to be able to gain progress and move forward. And I am
satisfied the Haitian Foreign minister came this morning, we were able to
engage with him as a whole, I was also able to speak at a personal level to
President Moise; the heads are engaged,” Mottley told the media.

She added that
regional leaders are due to meet in three weeks for the CARICOM Mexico summit,
by which time they expect to have the results of the fact finding mission.