On January 12, 2010, at 4:53 p.m., Haiti collapsed. In lower than a minute, a magnitude-7.0 earthquake pulverized Port-au-Prince, Léogâne, and Jacmel, killing greater than 250,000 individuals and injuring 300,000, based on official estimates (1). The very coronary heart of the State crumbled: the Nationwide Palace, Parliament, ministries, hospitals, faculties. Sixteen years later, the shock has by no means actually ended. It has remodeled. It has taken root. And it’s nonetheless killing.A textual content by Nancy Roc on the obligation of remembrance and the abandonment of a nation.
The Nationwide Palace in Ruins: Image of an Deserted State
On the Champ-de-Mars, the ruins of the Nationwide Palace nonetheless stand, frozen in time, like a brutal metaphor for Haitian and worldwide failure (2). No development website, no stone laid, no clearly articulated imaginative and prescient. This image of nationwide sovereignty has by no means been rebuilt, regardless of the practically 10 billion {dollars} pledged by the worldwide neighborhood after 2010 (3). Sixteen years later, the Haitian State has nonetheless not rebuilt its personal coronary heart.
The post-earthquake interval had however sparked an unprecedented world mobilization. NGOs, donors, UN businesses, international governments—all promised to “construct again higher.” However in a short time, Haiti grew to become the so-called “Republic of NGOs,” sidelining its personal establishments. Lower than 1% of humanitarian support handed by the Haitian State (4). The end result: lack of coordination, incoherent tasks, unfinished infrastructure, persistent dependency. Reconstruction was designed with out Haiti—and sometimes in opposition to it.
On the social entrance, the scars are immense. Tons of of 1000’s of displaced individuals lived for years in precarious camps. The cholera epidemic launched by MINUSTAH brought about greater than 10,000 deaths, deepening the nationwide trauma (5). Even immediately, practically half of Haiti’s inhabitants faces acute meals insecurity (6), whereas entry to water, schooling, and healthcare stays a luxurious for thousands and thousands of residents. As for the mental-health penalties affecting a whole individuals, they’ve been relegated to silence. Collective trauma, unaccompanied mourning, post-traumatic stress amongst kids and adults alike: no critical public coverage has ever been applied. Sixteen years on, Haiti stays a psychologically wounded nation, the place invisible struggling has been handed from era to era—with out care, with out recognition, with out reparation.
Gangs Deadlier Than the Earthquake: A Extended Collapse
However immediately’s deadliest catastrophe is not pure. It’s political, security-related, and legal.
For a number of years now, Haiti has been dwelling below gang rule. These armed teams, lengthy instrumentalized by political and financial elites, have taken on autonomy and energy (7). In 2024 alone, greater than 5,600 individuals have been killed by gang violence, based on the UN Excessive Commissioner for Human Rights (8). Since 2018, the cumulative variety of deaths linked to insecurity rivals, over time, that of the 2010 earthquake—turning day by day violence right into a slow-motion seismic catastrophe.
What the earthquake destroyed in a single minute, the collapse of the State destroys day-after-day. Kidnappings, massacres, gang rapes, compelled displacement: a couple of million individuals have fled their neighborhoods (9). At the moment, over 80% of Port-au-Prince is managed by armed teams, whereas the State is absent, dysfunctional, or complicit (10).
This tragedy just isn’t inevitable. It’s the results of irresponsible Haitian political decisions—corruption, impunity, the instrumentalization of gangs—but additionally of the blatant failure of the worldwide neighborhood, which selected to handle Haiti fairly than strengthen it. After 2010, support typically served to take care of a system, to not remodel it (11).
Sixteen years after the earthquake, Haiti just isn’t solely mourning its useless. It’s questioning the world.
What are guarantees price with out accountability?
What’s compassion price with out justice?
What’s “worldwide stability” price when it rests on the abandonment of a individuals?
The Nationwide Palace remains to be in ruins.
However the nation itself remains to be collapsing.
And this time, it’s not the earth that’s shaking.
It’s conscience.
Nancy Roc, January twelfth, 2026
- EM-DAT / UN – The Worldwide Catastrophe Database, CRED, Catholic College of Louvain.
January 12, 2010 earthquake toll: roughly 250,000 useless, 300,000 injured, greater than 1.5 million displaced. - Vant Bèf Data,
“Why the Nationwide Palace Was By no means Rebuilt,” investigation into the abandonment of the Champ-de-Mars. - World Financial institution / Interim Haiti Restoration Fee (IHRC),
Haiti Earthquake Reconstruction – Monetary Monitoring Reviews, 2011–2015. - Oxfam,
Too A lot Support, Not Sufficient Accountability: Haiti Six Years After the Earthquake, 2016. - United Nations,
Reviews of the Secretary-Common on cholera in Haiti (2016–2022). - World Meals Programme (WFP),
Haiti – Acute Meals Insecurity Evaluation 2024–2025. - Jean-Marie Théodat,
Analyses on collusion between gangs and political and financial elites (RFI, Le Nouvelliste, AlterPresse). - UN Workplace of the Excessive Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR),
Human Rights Scenario in Haiti – 2024 Report. - OCHA,
Haiti Inner Displacement Overview, 2024–2025. - Worldwide Disaster Group,
Haiti’s Gangs: The State Collapse and the Safety Vacuum, 2023–2024. - Human Rights Watch,
World Report – Haiti, 2018–2025 editions.