CIVICUS speaks with Sinomme Saint Claire (Dieubon) about attacks on his organisation, Green Alternative Action (Alternatif Action Vert, AVV), a grassroots peasant organisation that supports farming communities in Haiti’s southern peninsula region.

AVV was recently targeted by a gangster group seeking to take over the land of local farmers. Tensions came to a head in April, when armed men laid claim to land, killed the lawyer defending the community’s rights and damaged property. Recently, the police arrested three activists and issued warrants for several others, forcing their families into hiding. Civil society has succeeded in getting two of the detained activists released. It demands the cancellation of arrest warrants and the implementation of measures to guarantee the safety of human rights defenders.

What’s the source of the recent attacks on AAV?

The most recent attacks, consisting of anonymous phone calls threatening activists and leaders, happened in July and August 2024, but are part of a long-running war of attrition aimed at dispossessing farmers of their land. They occurred in Abraham and Bon Dos, two localities in the Nippes department.

Earlier, on 8 May, an official from the General Tax Authority (DGI) travelled to Bon Dos with law enforcement officers to seize 58 hectares of land where farmers have lived and worked for generations. They faced resistance from local residents led by AAV and the Association of Milk Producers of Nippes (APROL-Nippes), who successfully thwarted the land grab by organising peaceful protests and appealing to the local press, human rights organisations and judicial authorities.

In response to the farmers’ resistance, the campaign of harassment, intimidation and threats against community members and leaders intensified, aimed at creating panic and fear.

How did the authorities react?

When AAV and APROL-Nippes appealed to them, local authorities expressed their solidarity with the farmers, the activists leading the resistance and their organisations. But they didn’t take any tangible action, even though they are supposed to play an important role in this respect.

The community leaders have also met several times with an official of the Nippes court of first instance, who agreed to organise a meeting with the other departmental authorities involved. A meeting was held in August with the Nippes Departmental Delegation, which represents the executive in the department.

During this meeting, the delegate pointed out that, by law, the area within 100 metres of the coast belongs to the state. This is true, but in practice this doesn’t apply to all the privatised beaches in Haiti. Following this meeting, a campaign was launched to destroy farmers’ crops and cut down trees well beyond 100 metres from the coastline. It would appear these new land grabs are part of a government project, but there is absolutely no information about it.

As for the DGI, it has categorically refused to meet with the farmers.

Why are land rights defenders the target of repression?

Land grabbing, which has increased in the Nippes region since 2023, involves high-ranking members of the police, judiciary and DGI, notaries, lawyers, surveyors and regional and national executive authorities. Land rights defenders are harassed, intimidated and threatened for their work to monitor and denounce land grabbers, the land mafia and the complicit authorities.

By April 2023, at least five people had been killed in land disputes, three were in prison and several others were living in hiding to protect themselves from criminalisation, intimidation and violence.

Land grabbers benefit from an extraordinarily slow and complicit justice system. Over a year ago, in August 2023, Celito Renelus, an activist with Combite Peyizan Abraham (COPA), was arrested in Abraham for protesting against land grabbing. He remains in prison without having been sentenced. Two young men, sons of COPA peasant activists, who were arrested on the same day were recently released after over a year in pretrial detention.

The peasants need more media coverage, competent legal assistance and support from human rights organisations.