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Pink, green, blue, red. From a distance, the
thousands of brightly colored houses look like a painting. An
observer can’t see the suffering and the dangers threatening the
residents of the Jalousie neighborhood; suffering and dangers
that are also being ignored by the government, which is spending
US$6 million on a massive make-up job.
“Danger” because just last
month, experts announced the hillside slum, home to 45,000 -
50,000 people, sits on a secondary fault.
“Not only does a fault run
through Jalousie, but there is also the serious danger of
mudslides in the area,” geologist Claude Prépetit explained at a
press conference on Aug. 2, 2013. Prépetit was introducing a new
seismological study of certain regions of Haiti’s capital region
he recently coordinated.
Jalousie is also dangerous
because many of the small houses have been built into the side
of Morne L’Hôpital, on steep slopes or in ravines that serve as
canals for rainwater. A recent government document notes that
more than 1,300 homes should be moved because of they threaten
both their residents and people living in the city below, given
the frequency of mudslides during and after heavy rainstorms.
Jalousie residents are
“suffering” because their neighborhood has no water system.
Neighbors sometimes have to fight at the few water distribution
points. Sanitation is also a problem for the almost vertical
neighborhood where houses are linked by narrow stairways and
alleys.
A recent study by the United
Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization
(UNESCO) notes, “the population density may be as high as 1,800
people per hectare, and the living quarters range from eight to
30 square meters. Another aspect of this brutal scene is the
fact that the 45,000 residents live in Pétion-ville, also home
to most of the country’s wealthy neighborhoods. The social
divide
is striking. Massive mansions sit
right next to the slum.”
Make-up to
mask the misery and dangers
The Michel
Martelly government says it is in the process of spending over
US$6 million on the slum, but not to deal with the double-danger
or to provide services.
Instead, the administration is doing what some have called a
“make-up job” – painting the houses in a project called “Jalousie
en couleurs” (Jalousie in Colors), as homage to the Haitian
painter Préfète
Duffaut (1923-2012), who often
filled his paintings with brightly colored hillside houses.
But
a new coat of paint is not the top priority for residents,
according to a mini-survey conducted by Haiti Grassroots Watch (HGW).
Asked what was most needed, 24 of 25 said they wanted schools
for their children, and one fourth added they wanted better
access to water.
Just
one year ago, the government announced its intention to destroy
part of the neighborhood in a project called “Sove Lavi Mòn
Lopital” (“Save Morne l’Hôpital”). The project aimed to
knock down over 1,300 homes, reconstruct drainage canals, and
undertake other infrastructure improvements in order to protect
the slopes and diminish the risk of mudslides and flooding.
During heavy rainstorms, walls of water rush down the sides of
Morne l’Hôpital, where officially it is illegal to construct or
cut down any trees. Due to the lack of vegetation to hold it
back, the mud can carry away people, animals, and even entire
houses. A wall of mud sometimes blocks the Union School, an
Anglophone school affiliated with the U.S. embassy and attended
by the children of diplomats and the Haitian elite.
In
May 2012, Environment Minister Ronald Toussaint explained
“Operation Save Morne l’Hôpital” to Le Nouvelliste:
“Morne L’Hôpital is a region that needs to be reforested in
order to stop flooding downstream. We are also going to
construct retention walls in the ravines, after the first
demolitions. We will do this peacefully; the government does not
have any problems with the population.”
But
the plan was suddenly cancelled after residents protested.
Rather than try to resolve the differences and
misunderstandings, the government opted to fire Minister
Toussaint and cancel the plan to move people out. Today, “Sove
Lavi Mon Lopital” continues, but has been reduced to
reforestation, infrastructure work, and public information
campaigns.
Protests vs.
“pride”
In spite of the
difficult conditions, the threat from earthquakes and the
possibility of mudslides, on Aug. 16 the government announced
Phase 2 of Jalousie en couleurs.
Phase 1, carried out at the end of 2012 and in early 2013, cost
the government US$1.2 million and coincided with the
inauguration of the Hotel Occidental Royal Oasis, a five-star
establishment where a simple room costs US$175 and a “junior
suite” runs more than US$350. The hotel faces the slum. Phase 1
assured 1,000 houses were painted, making the view a little more
palatable.
“Phase 2 will be even bigger,” Prime Minister Laurent Lamothe
told 100 people gathered at the side of a soccer field at the
Aug. 16 inauguration. Lamothe said Phase 2 will cost US$5
million
In
his speech, Lamothe said 3,000 more homes would be painted and
that the soccer field would get new stands, dressing rooms, and
synthetic turf. The prime minister also promised a 1.2 kilometer
(less than one mile) asphalted street and the improvement of 2.8
kilometers of alleyways.
As
Lamothe sang the praises of “Phase 2,” two dozen protesters with
signs shouted:
“We want water! We have no water” and “Schools!” and “We need a
clinic!” Lamothe asked demonstrators to be “patient.”
“We’ll deal with all the problems little by little, but you know
that you have many problems, and we are trying to do a little
with little means,” Lamothe promised before leaving.
At
least one resident – who, like most people questioned by HGW,
said she would prefer to remain anonymous – is out of patience.
“What we need are water and electricity,” said a woman who lives
in a small home with 11 others, including two children who do
not attend school.
None
of the beneficiaries surveyed by HGW were consulted regarding
the choice of colors.
“Sure, we profited from a good initiative even though we didn’t
get to pick out our color, but our needs are much greater than
that,” said another resident. “We can paint our houses
ourselves.”
For
others, the coat of paint has no importance.
Doing laundry by hand on her little porch, one resident said she
was not at home when the painting took place, and that she is
not satisfied.
“I
can paint my own house,” she said. “When I got home, I saw a
bunch of splashes of paint on my wall.”
One
Jalousie resident, Sylvestre Telfort, has the same opinion as
many people here: the project is meant to cover the slum with a
kind of make-up or greasepaint because it sits directly in front
of the hotels Oasis and the new Best Western Premier.
From
a hotel balcony, the colors look striking. But houses not facing
the hotels are not painted, and for all the houses, only the
walls seen from the hotels are being painted.
On
its Internet site, the Oasis promises its clients a “magnificent
views of the city.” Best Western, where rooms run US$150 a
night, tells its future visitors that the hotel is “located in
the beautiful hills of Pétion-Ville, a well-known fashionable
suburb of Port-au-Prince.”
“The
project to paint Jalousie is nothing more than a social
appeasement carried out be the government to satisfy the
bourgeoisie who for years has tried to exterminate us, in vain,”
Telfort said. “They can’t drop a bomb to eliminate people. So
they took another tack and colored the exteriors our houses.”
The
former environment minister Toussaint is worried. “The Morne
l’Hôpital situation is chaotic,” he said. “It’s a matter of
public safety. Some 22% of residents of Pétion-ville live on
Morne l’Hôpital, in Jalousie and Philippo. The concrete
constructions prevent rainwater from seeping into the soil.
Painting is not the answer.”
Claude Prépetit, coordinator of the seismologic study, is also
concerned. Many residents are in danger “because of the risk of
mudslides and earth movements [and] the magnification of
vibrations during an earthquake, because certain homes are built
on a slope steeper than 30%, because it is near the southern
peninsula and because a secondary faults cuts through it,” the
geologist said.
Prépetit thinks the government should “stop all future
construction in the region” and “identify the more hazardous
areas and move out everyone whose lives are at risk.”
As a
last step, after assuring the population has social service,
“they can paint the facades of the permitted houses, if they
want to make them pretty,” he added.
During his visit to the slum, only 14 days after Prépetit and
other experts announced the secondary fault, Prime Minister
Lamothe made no mention of the seismic risks. “You are going to
see what we can do to improve people’s lives,” Lamothe promised.
“Your will be proud! You will be happy!”
After his speech, Lamothe and his entourage got into an SUV to
drive back down the mountain. Residents went back to their daily
journeys, going up and down stairs to find water, trying to
survive one more day in the slum called by Best Western “a
fashionable suburb.”
Haiti
Grassroots Watch is a partnership of
AlterPresse,
the
Society of
the Animation of Social Communication (SAKS),
the Network of Women Community Radio Broadcasters (REFRAKA),
community radio stations from the Association of Haitian
Community Media and students from the Journalism Laboratory at
the State University of Haiti. |
