Yearbook 2017
Haiti. On January 3, Haiti’s Provisional Authority finally announced the final result of the November 20, 2016 presidential election, which confirmed victory for Jovenel Moïse of the PHTK (Haitian Tèt Kale Party) with 56% over its closest opponent, Jude Célestin of LAPEH (Alternative League for Progress and Release). Thus, PHTK retained the presidential post and a two-year, drawn-out and complicated constitutional process could be completed. The electoral authority also published the results of the congressional elections held simultaneously. They showed that PHTK also became the largest party in Congress, but without gaining its own majority. In March, Congress approved, for the relief of the world community, President Moïse’s proposal for Prime Minister Jack Guy Lafontant, a procedure that in the past has caused political lockdowns. See ABBREVIATIONFINDER for frequently used acronyms and abbreviations related to as well as country profile of Haiti.
According to Countryaah.com, the new government’s first draft budget was met by violent protests. In September, thousands of people protested in the capital Port-au-Prince, killing two people in clashes with police. The dissatisfaction was mainly due to the budget’s increases in certain public service fees and adjustments to congressmen’s financial compensation and benefits, including salary increases of 74%. President Moïse’s promised raise of the minimum wage came in July but was significantly below inflation and trade union demands, and was met by protests. The rebuilding after Hurricane Matthew, which struck in October 2016, also put extra pressure on the state budget. Estimates in March indicated that 54,000 tonnes of food and seeds were destroyed by the hurricane and that 70% of the population depended on emergency aid.
In October, the mandate for the UN’s 13-year stabilization mission (MINUSTAH) was terminated, and was replaced by a smaller program to support the legal process (MINUJUSTH). The purpose of the new program is to strengthen the judiciary and police and to evaluate the development of human rights in the country. MINUSTAH’s outgoing chief Sandra Honoré praised Haiti for the progress made since 2004. At the same time, critics pointed out that both the cholera outbreak in 2010 and the sexual exploitation of UN personnel could be linked to MINUSTAH, as well as delayed UN responses in both cases.
After all, some bright spots could be seen in poor Haiti. For example, the murder rate dropped significantly during the second quarter of the year, as did the degree of violence in connection with public protest actions.
The distribution of the population still suffers from a dualism that dates back to the time of the discovery, when among the indigenous peoples, including all in the Arawak group, Aruagi and Cebaney occupied respectively (wholesale) the eastern and western half of the island. The contrast, perpetuated in colonial times, for the division of Haiti between the Spanish and the French, was accentuated over time by the overlapping, on the indigenous ethnic background and on the white immigrants, of black elements, introduced to give life to tropical crops; overlap which, while it was contained in E. (S. Domingo) within modest limits, eventually submerged, numerically and politically, in the other part of the island (Haiti), indigenous and European settlers, creating a state of more or less Negri pure. Just the force, and for short periods of time (nineteenth century), it was possible to bring together the whole island under a common government, but, if the ethnic differences remained profound, the economy gradually became uniform, as was possible in so much variety of natural landscapes, for the affirmation of a few fundamental crops. The influence of the United States contributes to this process of assimilation today, and will probably continue to contribute for a long time to come. of restless political instability.
Nevertheless, the contrast between the two state units that divide the island (the Republic of Haiti with little less than the 2 / 5 of the total area, but with about 3 / 4 of the population, and the Dominican Republic) remains unparalleled within the Antilles. If Jamaica has a proportion of 77% of Negroes, these exceed 90% in Haiti, but represent just 4% in Santo Domingo, where the mulatto element predominates by far (92%). The conditions of the population are also partly dissimilar: the overall density of the island is about 43 residents per sq. km. (lower than that of Puerto Rico and Jamaica, but higher than that of Cuba), which rises to over 80 in Haiti, while it does not reach 20 in the Dominican Republic. On the other hand, the absolute prevalence of the rural element over the urban, the concentration of this along the coast and the plains, the dispersion of that in the hilly areas, the predominance of the small property, the direct management, and, at least up to Now, the tendency towards the conservation of closed forms of economy, which generally exclude the specialization of crops, which the new agricultural policy in both states aims at. Noteworthy is the fact that no city on the island still reaches 100,000 residents; the figures that usually mark them in the statistics include, in addition to the actual urban center, the population of the municipality, which embraces more or less extensive rural areas. Of the two capitals, Port-au-Prince, in Haiti, has about 80,000 residents; S. Domingo slightly exceeds 30,000. The dispersion of peasants in isolated houses or in tiny clusters of houses contrasts with the scarcity of communication routes (620 km. Of railways throughout the island, over 700 for plantations), which had a decisive development only after the North American intervention: