(RSF/IFEX) – On 24 February 2003, RSF stated that Radio Haïti Inter’s decision to shut down because of threats to its staff was a “serious blow” to press freedom in the country. RSF Secretary-General Robert Ménard accused the government of being largely responsible for the station’s closure. On 21 February, station director Michèle Montas announced […]
(RSF/IFEX) – On 24 February 2003, RSF stated that Radio Haïti Inter’s decision to shut down because of threats to its staff was a “serious blow” to press freedom in the country. RSF Secretary-General Robert Ménard accused the government of being largely responsible for the station’s closure.
On 21 February, station director Michèle Montas announced on the air that the station was closing the next day. “Three of our people have already been killed and we don’t want to lose anyone else,” she said. Montas’ husband, station owner Jean Dominique, was shot dead in 2000.
“The station’s enforced closure is a serious blow to press freedom and news diversity in Haiti,” said Ménard. “The government is largely responsible because it has not made any serious investigation of the regular threats and attacks on the [radio station’s] staff.”
“Virtually all government institutions have blocked the enquiry into the murder of Dominique and the station’s guard, who were killed on 3 April 2000. The failure to punish those responsible has allowed the station’s enemies to continue their attacks on the people who work for Radio Haïti Inter. This climate of impunity created by the authorities allows killers to dictate their terms to society,” Ménard stated.
The station’s closure came after serious threats to journalists and technical staff, who wrote to management on 1 February 2003 expressing their concern about a number of recent incidents.
Montas said employees had received anonymous telephone calls threatening them with the same fate as Maxime Séïde. Séïde, Montas’ bodyguard, was killed on 25 December 2002 when gunmen attacked Montas’ house (see IFEX alert of 27 December 2002). Station staff have also been harassed while reporting and watched from vehicles without licence plates lurking near the radio station.
Montas said that the station was only closing temporarily and that staff would continue to work on in-depth reports that would be broadcast on other stations or on Radio Haiti Inter when the situation had improved. “We’ll be back,” she said.
She condemned the general atmosphere of intolerance and impunity in the country. “Our silence will continue to raise the issue of various freedoms – the freedom to inform the public and freedom of expression – that are currently threatened by people who think they are above the law.”
Montas said the fight to punish those who killed Dominique would never be abandoned despite the obstacles and pressures exerted on the investigation into his death and that of the station’s guard, Jean-Claude Louissant, who was murdered at the same time.
Threats against the station increased, Montas stated, after it was announced that the killers would soon be charged. Since then, proceedings appear to have come to a halt and the investigating judge has taken no action to allow formal charges to be made.
The outspoken Dominique, Haiti’s best-known journalist and political commentator, was shot dead, along with Louissant, in the courtyard of the radio station as he arrived for work. He had been critical of supporters of the former Duvalier dictatorship, of military figures, of the country’s wealthy families and, not long before his death, of those in President Jean-Bertrand Aristide’s ruling Fanmi Lavalas party whom he suspected of wanting to “turn the movement away from its ideals.”
The murder investigation was turned over to Judge Claudy Gassant in September 2000, after another judge, Jean-Sénat Fleury, resigned from the case after being threatened. Gassant’s mandate was not immediately renewed by Aristide when it expired on 3 January 2002, and he fled to the United States. He had been under great pressure after deciding to lay charges against a former military officer, Dany Toussaint, who is a Fanmi Lavalas senator.
The Justice Ministry has never given the investigating judge adequate protection despite the repeated threats, and police have refused to carry out arrest warrants. Police are also suspected of handing over an important suspect to a mob that hacked him to death.
The senate has refused to lift Toussaint’s parliamentary immunity so that he can be properly investigated. Only pressure by Haitian civil society and international organisations has prevented the case from being closed outright.
