Haiti continues to grapple with rebuilding, distrust of government

Americas Now

Haiti continues to face challenges as one of the poorest nations in the Americas. The country has struggled for years to overcome the reign of terror by dictators Francois Duvalier and his son, Jean Claude ‘Baby Doc’ Duvalier, and it’s still recovering from the devastating 2010 earthquake. Americas Now correspondent Gerry Hadden reports many Haitians still distrust the government.

Just before the younger Duvalier died last month, he had returned to Haiti from years of exile and moved freely around the capital, Port-au-Prince. While some Haitians want to leave the past behind, others still want to see justice for the crimes committed under Duvalier’s reign.

Haiti continues to grapple with rebuilding, distrust of governmen

Haiti continues to face challenges as one of the poorest nations in the Americas. The country has struggled for years to overcome the reign of terror by dictators Francois Duvalier and his son, Jean Claude 'Baby Doc' Duvalier, and it's still recovering from the devastating 2010 earthquake. Americas Now correspondent Gerry Hadden reports many Haitians still distrust the government

The current President Michel Martelly has also been ruling without a functioning parliament for more than a year because senators cannot come to an agreement on when and how to hold legislative elections.

Adding to tensions is the scarcity of jobs in Haiti. Finding a job in the cities can be extremely difficult and millions are unemployed. Caracol, an industrial park funded largely by the U.S. government, will provide 10,000 jobs, however only 20 percent of those jobs have been filled due to political instability.

Farmers in the countryside are doing slightly better. Peanuts grow very well in the Haitian soil and farmers can sell them by the truckloads to companies, but farmers and fisherman are wary of plans by the Haitian government to capitalize on tourism on the island.

So far, the only tourists coming to Haiti travel to Royal Caribbean’s Labadee, a private beach resort where tourists can’t leave and locals, aside from those who work there, can’t enter.

While corruption, graft, and bribery is widespread, there has been some improvement. Some residents are heartened to see more clinics, schools, hospitals being built, while in the past money had been simply disappearing/

“We are not saying that there is no stealing,” said Marylin Aliet of Transparency International in Haiti, a anti-corruption organization. “We are saying that perhaps we have a group of people who are not stealing everything. And that’s something. That’s progress.”