Had to pay a bribe to
the police, and he says, we don't get paid from the
government, so you understand, we have to get paid. That's gambling, that's where
they make the money. They love gambling. I lived in America in 1994. I got sent back, deported. -Deported?
-Yeah. What was that for? So, you never know wherever ——
might just happen on any day. She would be selling her goods
by the road, they would be ——, and then the —— will
fall all upon her belongings. Those would be ——. So the —— throw
—— into this building? Oh, yes. Those people in the ghetto
can't afford those ——, they can't even afford to eat, and how would they be able to
buy those —— and ——? You're saying the —— are
being handed to them by... By the politicians. And electricity, is it the locals who have put
cables into the main line, or how does it work? Yeah, that's what they do. I mean, if you look at this... -Okay, so it's for free?
-It is for free. This is how they collect gas. This is gas. They're gonna fill up those massive tanks? The gas stations are selling
the gas in the black market. At the port, a —— has control
of the importation of the fuel? He placed a GPS in one
of those garbage piles. He actually found the GPS
on another garbage pile. They take the garbage away, but then
they'll put it in another suburb? Exactly. -The level of corruption...
-Every single stage. Every single stage, the
level of corruption is there. -And so at the very end there's nothing left?
-No. What needs to happen in Haiti for this
to be turned around in a positive way? All I could say, I'll
leave in God hands... That seems to be many people's answer, so do you think that many people think
that it's got to a point of no return? 7.3 magnitude earthquake.
220.000 people ——. —— —— rages on in the
capital city of Port-au-Prince. —— and —— getting
even worse throughout the country. Armed violence has reached
unimaginable and intolerable level. Country's most powerful —— is believed to
be behind the —— of 17 missionaries. This has become daily life. Tires burning on city streets, protesters furious at the government's
inability to confront ——. These are amongst the
poorest people in the world. Two hundred migrants stopped at sea. Deep in the jungle in Panama, parents clinging to their children,
bracing for the hundreds of miles ahead. More than a dozen Haitian migrants are
dead after the boat they were on capsized. —— and terror
echoing in the streets of Haiti. What is this place? This is actually a —— zone. Guys with —— everywhere. These are some of the
roughest streets I've ever seen. And they said they're gonna arrest you. Well, I guess I'm going to
a Haitian prison right now. This country is so extreme. The furthest I've ever been
pushed on any of my trips. So basically now we
have to just get out of here because we don't want to
be caught in the crossfire. The bus will protect from
stray ——, is that right? We saw a ——. We have to wait behind this
wall until the —— stops. Kill by the ——, die by the ——. So welcome to Santo Domingo, capital
city of the Dominican Republic, here at the airport,
about to jump on a plane to Haiti. It's about six in the morning. Early start today. I'm heading to Port-au-Prince,
the capital of Haiti, a country and a city which
has a notorious reputation. United Nations just labeled it the most ——
place in the world, for whatever that's worth. Haiti is a country I've wanted
to visit for a very long time, since I visited Venezuela back in 2019. I actually heard of a guy
who went to Venezuela, which, if you know much about
Venezuela, it's not the safest place, and he went to Haiti after spending
a couple of weeks in Venezuela. Even in comparison to Venezuela,
Haiti was far too —— for him and he cut his trips short after four
days and got a flight out of there, so I am nervous, of course, but I'm just really interested to see what life
on the ground is like for the Haitian people. Obviously, it's a beautiful landscape, but mixed in with untold
suffering for centuries. So let's go and see
what Haiti has to offer. Okay, so arrived in Port-au-Prince. Driving through the streets now. Five minutes or so arriving and the cops
pulled us up, and we had to bribe them. This is... Here we are with Sean, Sean's going
to be looking after me in Haiti. He's going to be trying
to keep me alive, right? Oh, yes. We'd basically left the airport, maybe a kilometer
or so and then the —— pulled you aside, they had machine —— and
obviously armor and everything, and they wanted something from you. Oh yeah, he took my license
and then took my car paper and just stick it in his pocket
and keep walking around with it and I had to go and meet him, I said "what's up, are you gonna
give me a ticket or not?" He said "nah, you know
how it works" I said "okay" then I went, I gave him something, and he
gave me back my license and my car paper. First of all, big —— prisons here. Machine —— and armor and everything. Obviously, there's a —— and —— ——
going on at the moment in this country, has been for some time. They're very cautious, they're
checking cars, we got pulled up, had to pay a bribe to
the ——, and he says, we don't get paid from the government,
so you understand, we have to get paid. That was my introduction to Haiti. You can see behind me the
neighborhood on the hillside. We're about to venture in there. We've met up with some locals in there, it is —— territory, so we
are in touch with the ——. What better way to start day one in Haiti
then going straight into there, so let's go. Right here we are in the area of Jalousie. And how is safety and things here?
So, this is —— territory? Yes, partly there are some
—— activities inside of this area. —— activities is not the same
as downtown area or Cité Soleil. Which two places we're
going to go later in the trip. Even I a guide, I would have to
find a guide inside of this area. So, you say it's not safe here? It's not quite safe, but it's
safer than the other areas. -It's Haiti safe.
-Yeah. She had a stroke,
and she can't even move and go. -Had a stroke?
-Yeah. She had hypertension. She felt that her body was
catching some kind of cramp, and right away she didn't feel good at
all, and she called her husband, and then she called one of her older brother, and by the time they arrived here,
and she already had the stroke. Where I come from, on the news for Haiti it's painted like this place
with never-ending problems. Would you say that's true for
your experience living here? Yeah, it's a huge problem. She's a merchant and used to go
downtown to sell her goods, but now she can't even go because of all of
that —— that is constantly happening. So, you never know wherever ——
might just happen on any day? She would be selling a good by
the road, they would be ——, and then the —— will
fall all upon her belongings. Right, so not only it would be really
scary, but it would ruin her products. Yeah, and then what happened
is that she left downtown, and she left all her belongings downtown. She ran away from the
—— that was happening. All her belongings were stolen,
and now she doesn't have anything. One last question, what do
you think needs to happen for Haiti to be in a better
place than it is now? Only god himself can save this country
because we don't have a government, and we don't have any institution that
it's actually working at this moment. -That's your chef.
-Okay. He's the chef at the hotel
that I'm staying. I love the community vibes. As you can see, if you come here
you will see the crack, you see? You see all that crack,
that's from the earthquake. All here as you can see,
this is all the cracks from 2010, and what happened,
the owner tried to fix it. So, do you have lots of problems with
houses just sometimes collapsing randomly because of the pre-structural damage
from when the earthquake happened? From the earthquake, yes,
some houses did collapse, but those houses as you can see,
what you will call if you come here, this is what we call bedrock, you see? Those houses are built in bedrock,
so even if the earthquake happened, the rocks will actually
move with the house. So, it doesn't damage the house
as quick as a house build in flat land or what you would call, reclaimed land. So, those houses, many of them were
cracked, but they did not actually collapse. So it's like natural earthquake proof? -Yes.
-Okay. We got an audience. You were telling me something interesting
before about the garbage here in Haiti, and how the government move
it, but they don't get rid of it. I have a friend that
used to be in the army, and he placed a GPS
in one of those garbage piles, and he actually found the
GPS on another garbage pile, so they removed the garbage and dump it up
on another garbage in another area. They take the garbage away, but then
they'll put it in another suburb? Exactly, they don't pay them on time, so they get discouraged on doing
the job that they should be doing. We will always have this problem of pile of
trash everywhere in the metropolitan area. And how does sewage work here? Well, more people, what happened in
this area, they will build their own... They will dig a hole, let's say
it's about 30 feet to 35 feet deep, and that's where they
will dump all the waste. This slum area, the government have no control
over what is happening inside of this area. Is that because there's no building
permit, or because of the ——? Actually, there are building permits,
but they don't follow with it. When those people are building that
house, the government doesn't even show. To tell them this is how
the way you should build it, and you should leave space or even road
for cars, you don't even see that in here. It's all little corridors that you have to go
through, and the buildings are not well-built. And electricity? Is it the locals who have put
cables into the main line, or how does it work? Yeah, that's what they do. I mean, if you look at this, all
those little lines we can see here, there's people that are attached
to the main electricity cable. -So, it's for free?
-It is for free. So this is like a roulette
vending machine. -What do you think I should do?
-Six. Did they make this? Nothing? -We're gonna try again?
-Yeah, yeah, if you want. -Did they make this themselves?
-Let me ask if there's a... They make the box. -How many people a day play this?
-A lot. -Heaps.
-Yeah, that's gambling, that's where they make the money. They love gambling. -Let's go.
-Nothing? We could only go so far
into that neighborhood there because the guys that you had the contact
with are only in touch with the... I guess the —— that run a certain area, and if we crossed, like I
guess, an invisible border we would be in somebody else's
territory, and it could get... Yeah, exactly, that's how it
works in a big slum area like that, so you will have different
chief that control different areas. This building behind us has obviously
got some damage, some —— holes, and looks like it's been on fire and last
year your president was assassinated, right? Yes, exactly. —— in Haiti say two Haitian
Americans and more than 20 Colombians are behind the assassination
of president Jovenel Moïse, Moïse was —— dead during a
raid at his home on Wednesday. The country in utter turmoil, the Haitian government
requesting American troops to help keep the peace. Government officials here
declaring a state of siege, they urged people to stay in
their homes and to remain calm. This has some kind of connection to that? Right after when our
president was assassinated, he lived not too far away from here, then the mercenaries were trying
to escape, they came down this road, and then since the —— blocked that area because
that's the only way that they could go through, so they came and hide in that house. They came and hide in that
house and then the —— find out, so they're starting to —— at
them and then those would be ——. So, the —— threw
—— into this building? Oh, yes. Many of them were arrested. I think two or three of them got ——. You said many of the other ones ran to
the neighborhood that we were just in. Yes, exactly. So the people from that
neighborhood that we were just in, some of the —— members, they were strong
enough to capture Colombian mercenaries, keep them alive and take their ——
off them and hand them into the ——. Yeah, I was quite surprised that those people could
have —— those Colombians, but they didn't. They're rather turned them to the
—— along with all their ——. Okay, so we've come to a petrol station and
in Haiti there's a huge issue with petrol. You see behind me
these people are lined up. There's huge queues down the road. Can you just explain a little bit about what's
going on in Haiti with the fuel shortage and the black market and everything? It was caused by the —— members. The gas could not
make its route to this area, but now the —— was
able to secure this area and allowed the guys
to reach the gas stations. So the —— were blocking the fuel? Were blocking the fuel on route but now we are able to receive it,
but still, the gas stations are making... They're selling the
gas in the black market. Let's say they sell a part of
the gas and then store the rest, and sell it by midnight and
two o'clock in the morning. Who's awake around
this time? No one. So around this time they know exactly who to sell
it with, and you will find it in the black market. I find my gas in the black market. How come you didn't find it here. At three times, four times even
more expensive than the actual price, so this is basically what is happening. It's a problem that the government
should address in some kind of way, and I don't know how they
were going to be able to do it. We don't actually have a government
right now, we have an interim government which is run by Ariel
Henry, prime minister. And that was since the
president was assassinated? Since the president died a year ago. So he's still in power and I don't
know how long that would be. We have —— problems, we have
fuel problems, educational problems, we don't know if school
will be open in a few weeks, food, security all that it is a
huge problem in the country, so I believe, this guy just mentioned,
here it is a fair state right now and we need the international support. You should film that, I mean, this is how
they collect the gas, so there is no gas here. So what's happening, they're
waiting so they can fill these up? See this is exactly what's happening. So those will first to be filled, so they're
waiting so they can start putting it on there. At two o'clock, they should be open. And is there a limit per person or is
it just whatever who can take whatever? No really, if you can bribe the
guy working at the gas station. So every single level is corruption. -The level of corruption.
-Every single stage. Every single stage, the
level of corruption is there. -And so at the very end there's nothing left?
-No. Now you're gonna have to
raise the price of transportation, that would also raise
the price of food products. -And so, inflation must be absolutely rampant.
-So high. Long line of cars reaching
all the way down there to here and those people they can't even find gas and
they're looking for gas, and they want to work. This man's trying for those 22 days trying
to find gas, and he's unable to find gas. So he's just camping out by the petrol
pump, to hopefully some shows up. He's been here since 5 am,
just sitting here. They open and they close it.
They open and they close it. Walking along the line here. We will have the government car. That's a government car. Yeah, services, waiting for gas as well. What happened? -They're gonna fill up those massive tanks?
-Yeah. So even the government
can't get access to petrol. I see one government
car right on the line, and I asked him, even the government
car is on the line as well, he said, well, you see what's happening. -That's what he said?
-Yeah. This is insane.
This is totally crazy. I mean, the government
cars cannot have gas. Yeah, and you're saying
at the ports there's... A —— has control of
the importation of fuel? That was one of the main problem because they
could not get to the gas stations with the gas because it is being blocked by some ——. Said he wanted to be
sorry to put it that way, but it's the US government who put
Haiti in the position that it is today. US government, and France, and Canada that
actually put Haiti in the situation that is today. He said that Haiti helped
the US fight for independence. Our blood was thrown for the sake of the
independence of the US, for their liberty and now this is what they returned to us,
so they don't respect our values, so god will punish them for
what they're doing to Haiti. And can you just outline the
biggest problems in Haiti right now? Education, and security,
and the fall of states. The Haitian states, the Haitian government is
completely failed and collapsed in their duties. He believed the reasons of all of that, that's what caused a lot of
migrants are leaving the country by boats and leaving
and free this country. Some of them have been waiting here like
you heard since five in the morning, and a lot of them are
just buying it to resell it. So they buy for a cheaper price,
cheaper even though it's inflated, and then they'll sell it for
more, so it's just chaos. Okay, so we've met a
local man called Richard. You mentioned you moved
here 10 years ago from America, but you were born in Haiti originally? -Yeah, I was born here.
-And you moved to America when? I lived in America in 1984.
I lived there. A little while I got sent
back, deported, you know. -Deported?
-Yeah. -What was that for?
-Fighting. Assault case, somebody got hurt. -In what part of America was that?
-New York. Oh, okay. And so, you've obviously lived in
America, and you've lived in Haiti, so you've been able to compare. You said that Haiti was good when you
first came back but not now, right? When I first came out
here, things were easy, I'll not gonna say it was
the best, but it was easy, but now to what's going on, the president
lost, can't have a proper election, you got school, you got food, food is like the most... You must think you got to be
rich to eat a good meal out here, and if you go next door, Dominican Republic,
food is cheap, so everybody's suffering. Now we got the biggest situation right now is
the gas situation, so that's tend to get ugly, it's gonna get ugly. Right, and that affects everything. It affects everything because to
get somewhere, to go to school, you got to take transportation
to get to school on time. If I can't get to the gas station
because the streets is blocked, I can't get on the road, the streets are
blocked due to the gas station, cars piled up, how my kids are going
to get to school now? What needs to happen in Haiti for this
to be turned around in a positive way? Man, all I could say I'll
leave it in god's hand, but... That seems to be many people's answer, so do you think that many people think
that it's got to a point of no return? For me personally, in my opinion,
I think there's no return. You think that... So a savior, somebody's
gonna come from somewhere, going to say a dark knight, or superman
is going to come and deliver it. Where do you see the future, you
think it's gonna get a lot worse? Well, by the way things are going I don't see
it getting better right now, there's no promise, there's not even a false
hope of getting better. More or less the reality
of getting better, you know. The people gotta put their head together, and that's something that's very difficult out
here for people to put their head together. And so for somebody like me,
obviously, I'm very privileged, I have access to fuel and
petrol at home and everything and I don't have to worry, but so it's hard for
me to understand how do you keep going every day, day in, day out, like what goes through your mind
every morning when you have to go out to earn money. When you got to earn money, man. Okay, it's like two
different lifestyles out here. You can do the... How can I say? The —— life, negative thoughts, ——
people, or you can do what people do out here. I will say begging, or you actually
see somebody that you know, you're, I would like to
go, let me help you out, or I see somebody I see every day, like
the business owner I see you every day, yo, can I help for 500... Okay, so it's just like little
bits of work here and there. Yeah, yeah, odd jobs. That's how it works out here. Or some guy will go, I don't know, a
construction site might be breaking down, and I see some material, you could
take and go convert it into cash, those types of hustles, you know. So Richard has just
mentioned that he has two kids, so he has to spend multiple days out here to
earn money on the streets to feed his family, so he's showing us where
he lives, where he sleeps. You got guys in here watching TV. How many guys living in here? Well, it works like this: If you have a situation that, let me see, you're trying to pay rent
or you have nowhere to live, your family is in one spot,
you come here for an embassy, like okay I could lay here for a little
minute, and I'll scrap up some money. -That's like a refuge.
-Pretty much. Because we don't accept anybody who's
stealing in the streets, in the community, come here, come hang out with us
because all the cops out here know us. We have something missing,
they'll come here looking for it. You know, we still got a little weed out
here, that's about it, that's the limit. I suppose like putting ourselves
in danger for cops to come here, come searching us, come beating us up and
stuff like that, no, we're not gonna... They don't do that. Because if something happened out here,
we're the first one they call, like, yo, why you all let this happen. So, you're looked at as kind of like
the peacekeepers of the community. Basically, we're out here
because most of us we grew up... Most of these guys grew up out
here since kids in the same yards. Is that freestyle? You get a freestyle, but yeah,
about the situation right here. Because he said
something like journalists... You got the journalist here,
I don't know what you're doing, but whatever you do,
it's gonna be positive. In order to live in Haiti, you
got to be part of corruption. The reason why we're suffering because
we don't want to be part of corruption. Our kids got to go to school
and things are hard out here. He knows he was in jail. So, we've driven up to this
absolutely insane viewpoint here. Incredible to be invited in like
that by Richard and his friends. At the end, Sean bought them all food,
and they were so grateful. Obviously, they're in
a very difficult situation. Just to see that sense of community there,
and that the —— kind of rely on them to keep a bit of stability to
that area was quite touching. That's Port au Prince, yeah. A lot of hardship happens here, but at the
same time it's absolutely breathtaking scenery, and we've come to this rooftop café here,
restaurant and bar, and it's incredible. So just over there, the so-called most
—— neighborhood in the world, and that's where we're
going in the next video. It's called Cité Soleil, sun city, that's going to
be something, but up here it's really beautiful. Got the banana trees, avocado trees, I think
there's even yam plants, absolutely stunning. Imagine just walking out of your house in
the morning, grabbing an avocado off a tree. Over here is the downtown area, I think that's like one
of the most —— places in the country as well. Sort of —— disputed, and that's
where the lady that we met today, she used to go and sell her up goods, but
now she won't even dare to go down there because of getting caught
in the crossfire of turf ——. So Sean, you have a very interesting
story about almost being —— in the head. We were walking, researching an investigation
concerning —— distributions and —— in Haiti, and we're having the
interview with the —— member, but there was a rival ——
that comes to attack him, and then we stopped
the interview promptly. He got up, and we got up. Once I stepped out trying
to get away from his home, a —— went right around my head, and
it hit the wall that was right there, then we run back in, and then he
comes out and start —— at them and make a clear passage,
so we could go through. I believe that's when I almost got ——. Do you still go back into
these kinds of places? Yes, I was there just
recently with another guy. And what makes you
like, just okay with that, because most people, if
they almost get —— in the face they'll probably say
that's enough, but you... It's journalism, I love my job. What do you love about it? I like talking to people, I love meeting
new people, and I love finding new content. I love making sure that
people see the truth, the reality of what is happening
around this area. Not many media in Haiti
are going to those areas not because they don't have access,
but they're afraid of their own life. I mean, how is this news
gonna reach the people here and other people around the world will know what
exactly the reality of life in the ghetto in Haiti. I go by these words, that's why I'm not
afraid at all by the ——, it always says who —— by the —— will die by the ——, so I haven't ——. So Sean, something that is widely covered in
the news in Haiti is the ——, right? Yes. I remember back in the days when
there will be political problems, political trials in Haiti, and you will have the
government that will try the very best to find a solution, and also you will find the oligarchs, perhaps
with one voice they could try to find a way and persuade the government and even the
international community to do something, but the oligarchs keep their mouth shut
and none of them never get ——, they keep their mouth shut,
and nothing is happening. The only type of people that are being ——
are mostly the people in the middle class which is now the first to leave their own country and
go to the neighborhood country, Dominican Republic. If it was not an organized ——, why
they never go after those oligarchs? Who's bringing —— and
—— into this country? So it's very targeted to the middle class? Exactly, they're trying to
dismantle totally the middle class. You're mentioning that people that get
——, have to sell their homes to... They have to sell whatever the
possession that they possess, their lands, their cars, their house,
and who's buying it from them? Not the middle class, is the oligarchs. When all this money is
coming from? From the bank. Where do you take this all money, and
I'm really asking ten thousand dollars, a million dollars, where
is that money going? Do you think it's going to the ghetto? He said no, never a person from
the ghetto will kidnap a person, and they will have ten thousand dollars or
even a million dollars to go to the ghetto, that would raise a big —— between them. So the money doesn't
even go to the ghetto. So most people would think that ——
or the people organizing the —— are coming from the really
desperate parts of the country, but what you're saying is it
comes from the one percent. Of course. Those oligarchs
run anything, own the banks. Those people in the ghetto they can't afford
those ——, they can't even afford to eat, and how would they be able to
buy those —— and ——? I saw somewhere that somebody
couldn't afford a bowl of soup, but they were sitting there with
like a five thousand dollar ——. You're saying the —— are
being handed to them by... By the politicians, by the oligarchs. Respect for you. How are you doing? You look good. A —— informant. -Really?
-No, I'm just kidding. He's a good mechanic.
He works for the —— really. What a day. Haiti that was quite the introduction. You know, having to a bribe
a heavily armed —— officer literally 1 km from leaving
the exit to the airport. But you can see, Sean is the man to
have by your side in this country. He seemed to know people everywhere. Definitely the guy in such
an unpredictable country. I mean, we're still driving around with
the doors locked and things, obviously. Should come as no surprise, but
yeah, Haiti definitely delivering. I mean, to meet the people firsthand, and
you know that experience we had with Richard and his mates down at that
little kind of compound area. Something quite special too, you could really
feel that camaraderie between those guys. In the next video we're going to the most
—— neighborhood in the world apparently, according to the UN. Very recently there were 470 people
——, disappeared or seriously injured. Many, many houses burnt down. Apparently. lots of people have just fled from
the area completely, but some still remain. It's right on the coast there. Houses made out of
just corrugated iron tin. Been told by Sean it's very likely
that we're going to hear ——. I better get a good sleep, and I'll
see you in the next video for that one. Happy to be here in Haiti. It's been a long time coming, and in case I don't see you, good afternoon, good
evening and good night.
