The Haiti National Police force has begun an internal investigation into allegations that officers shot and killed a local photojournalist and seriously injured two others who were covering a garment workers protest in the capital over higher wages on Wednesday.
Police spokesman Garry Desrosiers said the internal investigation into the shooting that led to the death of Maxiben Lazarre, who also went by Maxihen, will be conducted by both the inspector general’s office, which investigates accusations against police officers, and the Central Directorate of the Judicial Police.
Witnesses are accusing Haitian police of firing the fatal shot that led to Lazarre’s death.
Lazarre, who worked for the online media outlet Rois des infos, or Kings of Info, was killed when men wearing police uniforms drove by the protest and fired into the crowd of protesters. They were traveling in a white, unmarked vehicle with a “government service” license plate, said Robest Dimanche, spokesman for an online journalists association, CMEL, who was at the protest. Two other journalists were also injured as well as a factory worker, he said.
“Everything unfolded before my eyes,” said Dimanche, who noted that right before the shooting police had broken up the protest by firing tear gas. “Of the three journalists who were shot, one died on the scene, Lazarre.”
On Friday, Lazarre’s family and Dimanche, speaking on behalf of the association, condemned the killing and demanded justice.
Lazarre is the third journalist killed in Haiti in two months. In January, John Wesley Amady and Wilguens Louis-Saint were fatally shot by suspected gang members while they were reporting a story on the country’s gang problems. The killing was immediately condemned by the international watchdog group Committee to Protect Journalists.
Haiti has been seeing an increase in the slaying of journalists, none of which have been solved. In 2018, photojournalist Vladjimir Legagneur went missing while working on an independent project inside the Port-au-Prince slum of Grand Ravine. The following year radio journalists Pétion Rospide and Néhémie Joseph were killed. Last June, Diego Charles, of Radio Vision 2000, was gunned down along with human rights advocate Antoinette “Netty” Duclaire.
“Every time a journalist is killed, the police says the same thing, ‘An investigation has been opened,’ “ Dimanche said. “Since Jean Dominique there has been an investigation opened and since then, there has never been any progress with the investigation. We have no choice but to put pressure ... and ask all journalists’ associations, local and international, to take a stance to end the impunity.”
Jean Dominique was a Haitian journalist, agronomist and human rights advocate in Haiti. His April 3, 2000, assassination remains unsolved, and has served as a symbol of the country’s ongoing problem bringing the killers of journalists to justice.
In a message on his Twitter account, Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry said he deplored Lazarre’s death and condemned the violence. “I offer my sympathies to the family of the deceased, as well as to the other victims of these brutal acts,” he wrote.
The incident was also condemned by the monitoring office of the Montana Accord, a group that seeks to take charge of the country and lead a two-year transition to elections. A tweet from the group referred to Lazarre’s death as “murder” and condemned “all acts of repression against workers.”
“The de facto power cannot continue to allow the police to shoot at Haitians like all of us who are claiming for a better life,” the tweet said.
The protests for higher wages by garment workers have been ongoing for several weeks. On Monday, the government announced a hike in the daily minimum wage by as much as 54%.
The hike would take the minimum salary for factory workers from $5 a day to just under $7.50 a day. The main union representing factory workers has said the increase is not enough and has called for continued demonstrations. The unions are demanding a minimum of $15 a day.
On Thursday, factories throughout Port-au-Prince shut down in protest of the violence that has accompanied the strike. Some factory owners say buildings have been attacked with rocks, and that workers who have joined the protests have been violently dragged from their working stations.
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