Are we going to continue doing the same thing? | OPINION

I spend a lot of time thinking about how many other countries share a similar background, history, trajectory, and challenges as Haiti in an attempt to try and understand and, hopefully, find solutions out of the cyclical dysfunction we find ourselves in.

My searches typically lead me to countries like Ireland and England, given the geopolitical dynamics of two countries coexisting on one island—similar to Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Or countries like Honduras grappling with the same levels of gang violence and insecurity as Haiti’s capital.

Last weekend, during a panel discussion held on March 14 as part of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) sessions, my eyes were opened to the lessons we can learn from Rwanda. The event, organized by the Haitian Women’s Collective, Nègès Mawon and the Institute for Justice & Democracy in Haiti, focused on the worsening crisis facing women and girls in Haiti and how it reflects the country’s broader governance failures.

Laura Nyirinkindi, chair of the UN Working Group on discrimination against women and girls, pointed to Rwanda as an example Haiti could look to amid its ongoing political instability.

The 1994 Rwandan genocide disproportionately targeted women for sexual violence, said Nyirinkindi, one of the panelists featured during the session. In the months and years following the genocide, women played a leading role in peace and reconciliation efforts despite the trauma they had endured. 

“It demonstrates how a crisis can be transformed into an opportunity to enhance women’s leadership,” she said. 

Like Haiti, Rwanda has a constitutional mandate requiring women to hold at least 30% of government positions. However, unlike Haiti, Rwanda enforced and exceeded that mandate, with women today making up 60% of its government.

As Haiti attempts to pull itself out of the chaos it finds itself in, learning from Rwanda’s history and transitional justice processes could be a guiding post, centering women in decision-making—a stark contrast to what we see playing out in Haiti. 

“In the CPT, we only have one woman with no vote in the presidential council,” highlighted Lucia D. Pasacale Solages, general coordinator of Nègès Mawon, and one of the panelists, “and less than 20 percent of women in the government of Alix Didier Fils-Aimé.”

How can we move forward when we’re already violating our own constitution at the most basic level—and no one is talking about it or seems to care?

How can we get past our latest crisis when forward-thinking leadership like that displayed by Dominique Dupuy is thwarted?

This critical moment of transition is the perfect time to change course.

There’s a saying: If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got.

So, I ask the powers that be in Haiti: Are we going to continue doing the same thing?

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