Haiti death toll rises, thousands more homes flood as rain threat continues

Pierre said the mayor’s office, along with the local garbage collection agency, are in need of equipment. Their only truck for garbage collection isn’t working and the public works department lacks a budget for fuel.

“They need to give the mayor’s office the financial means,” she said about the central government in Port-au-Prince. “All of the money from the largest contributors is blocked in the capital, and we need it to be distributed so the mayor’s office can do what needs to be done. I have spent seven years as mayor, and it’s seven years that the money from the largest contributors have never come to Cap-Haïtien.

In December alone, Pierre said, the city contributed over $82 million to the country’s coffers “that went to Port-au-Prince. But while the city was flooded, there hasn’t been one cent that stayed in Okap to support Okap.”

Among the contributors to the city’s tax base is Royal Caribbean, which in March announced it will suspend ports of calls at Labadee, its private beach in Haiti, even though the area has not seen the kind of violence unfolding in Port-au-Prince.

Pierre said even though the cruise ship tourists didn’t come to the city itself, there are a lot of vendors who depend on cruises to earn a living.

“There is an impact,” she said, adding that this means there even less money going into to the public treasury.

On Monday, the United Nations said the armed violence in Port-au-Prince continues to affect the population, with more people fleeing the capital.

“The latest attacks in Delmas, in the metropolitan area of the capital Port-au-Prince, that took place on Friday forced thousands of people to flee violence,” said Stéphane Dujarric, spokesperson for U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.

Dujarric said the head of the U.N. Population Fund, Natalia Kanem, warned that the majority of those displaced are women and girls and are particularly at risk.

“Conditions in the displacement sites are deplorable, with women and girls at heightened risk of sexual exploitation and violence and with people struggling to secure food, clean water and the most basic commodities,” he said.

On Friday, Guterres asked the global community not to forget Haiti. Taking to X, formerly Twitter, he wrote “Hunger in Haiti has reached unprecedented levels. Almost half of the population are now facing acute food insecurity.”

The United Nations’ $674 million humanitarian response plan for the country, Guerres said, is only 15.2% funded.

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