A survey carried out from April 18 to May 10, 2022, supported by the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) in disadvantaged and hard-to-reach neighborhoods in the metropolitan region of Port-au-Prince, including Cité Soleil, Croix-des-Bouquets, Delmas, Ganthier, Pétion-ville and Tabarre, whose results were presented on Friday, June 24, reveals that out of a total of 3,000 schools targeted, 290 (9.6%) were attacked directly by armed groups and 174 of them (60%) were victims of acts of vandalism : loss of teaching materials, archives, furniture, etc... The damage also affected the boundary walls and school buildings, 7 of which were completely destroyed, 54 schools, have been forced to close their doors for several months while 239 schools are disrupted in their operation. Among these 239 closed or dysfunctional schools, 8% are occupied either by armed groups, or by refugees or displaced persons, or by other people.

Three factors explain the closure or dysfunction of these schools: Rivalries between armed groups; clashes between armed groups and the police; difficulties for teachers to access their places of work (roads blocked by armed groups: roadblocks erected by the police or the town hall).

According to the analysis of the data collected: 55,000 children have not returned to school since last April, affecting the work of nearly 2,000 teachers.

According to Nesmy Manigat, the Minister of National Education, it was important to have this data in order to have a (partial) idea closer to the school situation in these areas plagued by armed violence.

He is convinced of the need to continue the community dialogue in order to strengthen the initiatives that have enabled the resumption of activities at the Lycée National de la Saline, the Lycée Daniel Fignole, the Lycée de Cité-Soleil, the National School of Boston (Cité-Soleil), at the national school of Application of Martissant and at the national school Republic of Peru (Martissant).

During the presentation of the results of this survey, Bruno Maes, the resident representative of UNICEF in Haiti declared to have a special thought for the children, the parents, the pedagogical and administrative staff of the schools who are deeply afflicted by these acts of violence. Some were kidnapped, others were forced to abandon their homes, and many had to take refuge in precarious displacement sites...

He wanted to remind the protagonists of this blind violence responsible for this climate of terror, the importance of establishing a humanitarian corridor to allow children to complete the 2021-2022 school year and return to school next September. safely concluding "It is a right that all of society is called upon to guarantee and a duty that it cannot neglect".

HL/ HaitiLibre