Carril Desrosiers, Independent Journalist, Haiti
According to a report, which was published by the Institute for Psycho-Social Family Issues (IPSOFA) in collaboration with UNICEF under the title: “Juvenile domestic servitude in Haiti,” nearly 300,000 children are placed as domestic servants (restavèk in Creole).
According to the testimonies of several of them, the girls who live in the streets are sometimes former restavèk, deliberately having adopted the streets as their refuge because they can no longer suffer the ill-treatment of the man or lady of the house.
In Croix-Desprez located in the south-east of Port-au-prince, a restavèk girl of 14 identifies herself and recounts her poignant testimony. After spending 7 years in domestic servitude at the house of a lady who she qualifies as nasty, she is fed up. With a trembling and pathetic voice, she draws up a serious evaluation of the consequences of the domestic servitude on her personal development. Read more ...
Patrique Lamour, Correspondent of Radio Ibo in the Northeast, Haiti
A campaign called “Clean up Trou‑du‑Nord” took place from October 20th to 22nd in this town in the Northeast of Haiti.
This activity, which was financed by PLAN International, a non‑governmental organization, and the local private sector, mobilized nearly 10,000 people, including a number of teachers, students, children, adults, clergy and business men, organized in various neighbourhood committees.
To facilitate this work, which was organized in the scope of the “Clean up the World” campaign, started in Australia in 1989, equipment was distributed by a specially formed committee. Read more ...
At the dormitory of the prison for minors, located in an old barrack of the district of Fort-National (North-East of Port-au-Prince), 26 prisoners live together, incarcerated for different motives.
Among them is an adolescent of 15 years: J.G., born in Jeremie, a secondary city located in the South-West of Haiti, some 365 kilometers from the capital.
Physically fragile but endowed with a good intelligence, J.G is the oldest of a modest family. His mother used to sell tobacco and his late father was a former school principal in Jeremie.
By the time he reached first grade in a college in his home town, J.G had to abandon school because of financial hardship. Read more ...