Overview:
On Worldwide Girls’s Rights Day, hundreds of displaced Haitian girls dwelling in makeshift camps denounced their dire dwelling situations and urged the federal government to revive safety so they might return house. Many have fled repeated gang assaults in neighborhoods resembling Delmas 30, Carrefour, Carrefour-Feuilles, Cité-Soleil, Solino, Bélair, Fort-Nationwide and Gressier, discovering non permanent shelter in public buildings like faculties and the Ministry of Public Works, Transport, and Communications (MTPTC).
PORT-AU-PRINCE — Sitting on the entrance of a cramped makeshift shelter, 21-year-old Evaïna Pierre tries to appease her crying youngster whereas her different youngster sleeps. As soon as a resident of Solino, then a refugee in Delmas 30’s Acra Manufacturing facility Outlet camp, she has now taken shelter contained in the Ministry of Public Works, Transport, and Communications (MTPTC) constructing. Her solely want on March 8, Worldwide Girls’s Rights Day? To return house.
“I simply need safety,” she mentioned throughout an interview with The Haitian Instances. “If I might return to my neighborhood, I’d be so glad. Right here, we don’t reside properly. Water leaks into our tent when it rains, and we are able to’t sleep.”
Pierre is one in every of hundreds of internally displaced girls in Haiti, the place 55% of the country’s 1,041,229 displaced individuals are girls and ladies, in response to the Worldwide Group for Migration (IOM).
Many have misplaced their properties, companies and even members of the family to gang violence. Now dwelling in overcrowded, unsanitary situations, they are saying the federal government’s failure to revive safety has left them in limbo, weak to starvation, illness and gender-based violence.
A refugee camp with no reduction for displaced girls
In displacement camps throughout Port-au-Prince, together with on the MTPTC in Delmas 33, girls endure harmful, unsanitary situations.
- No privateness: Girls and kids bathe within the open, usually in the identical area as males.
- Lack of sanitation: Residents should pay 10 gourdes or about 76 cents simply to make use of the bathroom.
- Well being dangers: Piles of rubbish unfold illness, whereas stagnant water creates a breeding floor for mosquitoes.
- Risk of violence: Girls are vulnerable to harassment and sexual assault within the camps, the place safety is minimal.
“Each March 8, they do not forget that we ladies exist, however what we actually want is safety,” mentioned Mirlande Lebrun, a mom of 4 who fled Delmas 30 through the newest escalating gang violence. “We reside on this camp with no assurance that we received’t need to run once more if gangs assault.”
For a lot of girls like Pierre, this isn’t the primary time they’ve needed to flee.
“Between working away at two occasions, I misplaced all the things. Even my start certificates is gone,” Pierre mentioned, cradling her child boy, who gave the impression to be disturbing her as he stored crying. “Earlier than, I bought cosmetics, however now I’ve nothing.”
“We ask for nothing however safety,” Haitian girls insist
Forty-eight-year-old Bethie Joseph shares a tiny, makeshift area along with her son within the parking zone of the MTPTC constructing. As soon as financially impartial, she now is determined by charity to outlive.
“We don’t reside properly right here. Even sleeping is tough, however we now have no selection,” Joseph mentioned. “If the federal government had taken duty for our safety, we might not be working from place to position like this.”
“Each March eighth, they attempt to do not forget that we, girls, exist. Nonetheless, what issues to us at the moment is our security. We reside on this camp with none assurance that we received’t need to flee once more as a consequence of gang assaults.”
Mirlande Lebrun, mom of 4, fleeing Delmas 30.
Like many displaced girls, she now not trusts authorities guarantees and feels deserted.
“We aren’t asking for something however safety—so we are able to return to our properties.”
Worldwide Girls’s Rights Day overshadowed by disaster
Haiti noticed Worldwide Girls’s Rights Day 2025 below the UN theme “Rights, Empowerment, and Alternatives for Each Displaced Girl and Lady, In all places within the World.”
Nonetheless, for displaced girls and ladies in Port-au-Prince, March 8 was simply one other day of survival.
“Girls’s Rights Day is a time for reflection, however extra importantly, motion,” the IOM mentioned in a press release. “Displaced and migrant girls want pressing help and safety to rebuild their lives.”
The United Nations and humanitarian teams emphasize that displaced girls should be included in discussions on Haiti’s future. Options should deal with:
- Financial empowerment packages to assist girls regain monetary independence.
- Entry to schooling for displaced youngsters.
- Social safety methods to make sure the dignity and safety of ladies.
However for ladies like Saloude Ciméus, 44, these options really feel out of attain.
“I’ve fled Canaan, Delmas 3, and the Acra camp, and now I’m right here,” Ciméus mentioned, standing in entrance of her small shelter on the MTPTC web site. “I don’t know the place else to go.”
She tries to outlive by promoting bottled water, however gross sales are sluggish.
“If it weren’t for God, I don’t understand how we might survive.”
Haitian girls demand motion
As girls’s organizations gathered for panel discussions and occasions, displaced girls felt forgotten, ready for motion as a substitute of speeches.
Their message to the Haitian authorities?
Restore safety, open the roads, and allow us to go house.
“Let the federal government give us safety,” Ciméus mentioned. “We don’t want support. We simply wish to go house.”