Kenyan police challenged in confrontation with Haitian gangs

Pressure is mounting on Kenyan police officers to make good on their promise to help bring rampant gangs in Haiti under control, six weeks after they set foot in the Caribbean nation.

When the first contingent of 200 elite Kenyan police officers arrived in the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince on June 25, they stepped off their Kenya Airways flight with confidence, wearing helmets and combat gear, carrying their weapons and holding the Kenyan flag high.

They sang chants in Swahili as they warmed up at the airport, as did a second group of 200 Kenyan police who landed three weeks later.

“Let’s go!” and “Let’s go!” came the shouts.

There were high hopes that Kenyan police would flex much-needed muscle against Haiti’s embattled National Police (PNH), which has struggled to contain a deadly offensive by Haitian criminal gangs that have terrorized the capital and large parts of the country for more than three years.

The Kenyans are at the forefront of a UN-mandated multinational force tasked with restoring peace in Haiti.

They were initially welcomed and celebrated by Haitian government leaders and also by many in the Haitian media.

Radio Independante FM posted a welcome greeting in Creole for Kenyans on X, which read:

“Haiti is the country of all Africans. Because you are black, Haiti is your home… Your Kenyan soldiers are home and should be welcomed to help fight these wasters (the gangs) who prevent us from living in our country.”

However, weeks after the long-awaited deployment, which had already been delayed by legal issues in Kenya and logistical problems, many Haitians appear frustrated and disillusioned that the police, along with their Haitian police colleagues, have not acted more quickly and decisively against the gangs, their bosses and their known hideouts.

UN experts warned earlier this year that gangs have more firepower than Haiti’s police

There are increasing numbers of frustrated comments in the Haitian media and on social media, expressing impatience and disappointment.

There are chorus calls for ‘actions instead of words’ and ‘concrete results’.

One of the most pointed criticisms is that Kenyans behave like “theatrical” people and are merely “tourists”.

Critics point out that despite high-profile joint patrols by Kenyan and Haitian police in Port-au-Prince, during which they exchanged gunfire with suspected gang members, the gangs appear to have only tightened their grip on the capital’s southwestern and northeastern suburbs since the Kenyan mission began.

Gang members have attacked and burned or partially destroyed police stations and are still active on major highways from the capital and the interior.

Some believe that the Kenyan forces have been too slow to make their presence felt.

“What are Kenyans waiting for to take action against the bandits?” local news outlet AyiboPost asked in an article posted on X on July 11, two weeks after the East Africans landed.

About two weeks later, the online news website Le Filet Info wrote: “The presence of the Kenyan police in the country is failing to deter the bandits.

“They continue to slaughter civilians.”

Hundreds of thousands of Haitians have been forced from their homes by the violence

The Kenyan contingent has already suffered its first casualty since arriving in Haiti.

On July 30, a Kenyan police officer in Port-au-Prince was shot in the shoulder when a Kenyan patrol attacked gang members.

That same day, Haitian police chief Rameau Normil, accompanied by Kenyan commander Godfrey Otunge, appeared to try to counter negative commentary in the local media by reporting that Haitian and Kenyan police had killed more than 100 “bandits” in operations carried out under a state of emergency declared since mid-July in areas where gangs are most prevalent.

However, such statements have failed to allay public skepticism.

Confidence was further undermined when videos emerged online showing senior Haitian government officials, accompanied by Kenyan and Haitian police, hastily retreating from the abandoned General Hospital in downtown Port-au-Prince on July 29 amid a barrage of gunfire.

Both Haitian and Kenyan police said the facility was strictly under their control.

Despite the criticism, Haiti’s interim Prime Minister Garry Conille told BBC HARDtalk he welcomed the support, given the understaffed Haitian police.

“We need the help… but it is coming too slowly and Haitians are getting impatient,” he acknowledged.

The prime minister also hit out at those who questioned the use of Kenyan police officers given their heavy-handed handling of recent anti-government riots at home.

“Our laws and operational procedures are very well adhered to and we are very happy with the guidance we are getting,” he said, stressing that the role of Kenyans is to support and guide the police, not to operate independently.

Despite this, Kenyans face open resistance from prominent Haitian gang leaders.

Jimmy “Barbecue” Chérizier is a police officer turned gang leader

Just days after the first group of Kenyans arrived, Jimmy “Barbecue” Chérizier, an outspoken leader of the gang coalition “Viv Ansanm” (Live Together), appeared in a provocative video of nearly eight minutes posted on X.

As they led their masked foot soldiers in a strutting, singing war dance through his Delmas 6 stronghold, they held their automatic weapons aloft.

“Here is Kenya (the Kenyans), bullets (for them),” they chanted at one point in Creole.

Other gang leaders, including Wilson “Lanmo Sanjou” Joseph, the boss of the “400 Mawozo” gang, and young gang leader “Ti Bebe Bougoy”, also appear in videos ridiculing both Haitian authorities and Kenyans, while the gangs continue to boast about their attacks.

In mid-July, the Kenyan contingent of the multinational force launched their own X account, @MSSMHaiti, in an attempt to set the tone for the public narrative about their mission in Haiti.

The daily reports of the Kenyans’ activities range from hosting dignitaries at their base to lessons in human rights and optimistic stories of reassuring patrols on the streets of Port-au-Prince.

But the determined optimism of the @MSSMHaiti stream, particularly the references to “significant success” and “gradual return to normalcy,” appears to have irked many in Haiti.

Some Haitians have criticized the Kenyan reports as, at best, exaggerated and, at worst, “propaganda.”