The rebuilding of Haitian institutions, the MSS and the ecosystem of criminal violence: How to provide coordinated security and justice responses?

Haiti’s Prime Minister Garry Conille meets members of the first contingent of Kenyan police, who arrived on 25 June as part of the Multinational Security Support mission.

Source: © Guerinault Louis/Anadolu via Getty Images

After months of delays, the MSS force, mainly funded by the United States and led by Kenya, finally deployed in Port-au-Prince on 25 June. With this initial force of 200 officers, the MSS should bring operational oxygen to the Haitian police in the form of much-needed capacity, and will help recruit and train local officers. Hopefully, it will also provide some respite for the population, enabling them to return to a more normal life, and allow improved humanitarian access to the country.

However, there is still much uncertainty surrounding the mission in terms of its strategy and rules of engagement, and questions over mechanisms to provide oversight of the force. And it is still not clear how the mission will coordinate with the Haitian authorities, the international community and civil society.¹ In an environment of fragmented and violent governance, with institutional responsibilities dispersed between the Transitional Presidential Council (TPC), and the recently formed government of Prime Minister Conille, there is a risk of a lack of coordination of the MSS Mission on the ground, and lack of clarity regarding its oversight, with particular concerns over judicial and human rights repercussions.

The TPC was sworn in on 25 April, and Henry’s official resignation as prime minister came immediately afterwards.² The fruit of an agreement brokered by CARICOM in March, the TPC is a governance body made up of seven members from Haiti’s main political parties and representatives of the private sector and civil society.³ The TPC’s terms of reference state that it will exercise presidential functions until the investiture of the president-elect, ‘which must take place no later than February 7, 2026’. Garry Conille was appointed by the TPC as prime minister on 28 May.⁴

The decree establishing the council also mandates it to set up a national security council, although at the time of writing, it had not yet been appointed. The TPC is also required to collaborate with the National Commission for Disarmament, Dismantlement and Reintegration, and to oversee the installation of a truth, justice and reparations commission.

These initiatives, which are fundamental to the policy to be pursued for conflict resolution, seem to be making slow progress. The TPC must develop these structures if it is to formulate a clear proposal and strategy for the future of peace and stability in Haiti. In the context of the arrival of the MSS force, a way forward, framed by solid and transparent legal bodies, must be put in place to tackle the complexity of the Haitian security crisis, marked by a violent coexistence between criminal groups and the state. As is the case in other situations involving criminal groups, particularly in urban contexts — such as Rio de Janeiro, for example — armed confrontations, public governance and political-criminal relations do not operate as a zero-sum game.

As previously reported by GI-TOC,⁵ Haitian gangs do not follow an insurrectionary logic.⁶ They seek to maximize their position within the political and economic system, not outside of it, and to position themselves as indispensable brokers between the community, and the public and private sectors. To establish oneself as a broker, a future political ally, or to remain in place as a rent-seeking ‘legal bandit’, one must appear reliable, indispensable and powerful. This is precisely how gangs’ leaders, whether they choose to be visible in the media or not, want to position themselves in this moment of political transition, and particularly since the installation of the TPC.

Although the rhetoric of some Haitian gang leaders, such as Chérizier’s repeated declarations, might be inferred as a will to overthrow the system, they are not actually proposing an alternative ideological or governance model. Instead, criminal groups focus on gaining strategic territories or markets. Whether by force or negotiation, or usually both, the gangs are therefore able to extract rents from trade routes, ports and passenger transport, agricultural production and illicit trade, with cocaine at the forefront.

In this sense, gangs participate in governance, but without intending to replace the state model. Rather, gangs are part of a logic of shared sovereignty within territories where civilian populations must oscillate between the authority — and violence — of the gangs and of the state. The two coexist in an unstable order that now includes the Multinational Security Support (MSS) mission, formed by elite officers drawn from Kenya’s Police Recce Squad, Rapid Deployment Force and a Special Operation Group comprising Kenyan border police.⁷ Other countries have also pledged to provide personnel for the MSS, including Jamaica, Bahamas, Guyana, Barbados, Antigua and Barbuda, Bangladesh, Benin and Chad.⁸

While it is impossible to predict how the gangs will react to the deployment of the MSS force in the long term, it is likely that it will not be a homogeneous response. Some of them may fight, while others will seek to negotiate with the Haitian government. It is therefore critical that institutional roles are better defined, and that the Haitian authorities speak with one voice — both for the country’s citizens and the international community. As Haiti’s institutions look to transition to a more solid mode of operation, the two-headed functioning of political life will pose challenges.

Notes