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Delivery from Haiti is a month ago. The less young you work as a cleaner in a hotel; the youngest still hasn’t found anything. She is 20 years old, and later she picked up the conversation in different euphemistic forms of offering her sexual services to her: «Se te ve cansado. Do you want a massage?”. She insists: «Do we want to spend an enjoyable day? ».
And then she says that she tener hambre, which is a form of pedir ayuda and is, also, the reason for her offering of her. Dajabón is a small Dominican city that borders, to the west, with a wall. Behind the wall, cross the Masacre River, which in this section marks the border between the Dominican Republic and Haiti. The expansion of the wall and Haitian migration in general were the main theme of the electoral campaign for the general elections of the past Sunday 19. Sobre esta cuestión todos los candidates decían lo mismo: taller, wider, more supervised.
He welcomed Luis Abinader, and revalidated his mandate to the presidency of the Dominican Republic in 2020. In one of his campaign announcements, with background music, distinct scenes took place on the front with the wall as the protagonist and many soldiers and soldiers combat tanks, also, flying helicopters, multi-panel video surveillance, biometric records, drones, aircraft and aircraft: «Because everything has a limit except the pride of being Dominican».
But the reality in the Dajabón border pass is very distinct. The movement of people and goods on the front is intense and the controls are very lively. There are many people, including all Haitians, and the flow of those who walk is constant.
There are also lots of vehicles, and there are some problems because it is a chaotic situation for so many people as they enter and sell. our governments, without distinction of ideologies, to move our armed forces to slow it down. In the middle of the bridge above the Masacre river, the line is in front and now there is a double metal door (open to the eye at the end of the day ) flanqueada for Dominican and Haitian soldiers, each on their side.
Don’t stop crossing people, on one path or another, tens and hundreds, on foot or on motorbike, without just controlling anyone. There are people bathing in the river and people drifting into the two orillas.
They are all Haitians, because the Dominican wall, even if it does not reach two meters high, makes it difficult to access from this side. Previously, at the headquarters of the Catholic organization Centro Montalvo, an UNHCR worker (who declined a formal request) I announce it: «He has nothing to do with what he says to politicians with what he wants to see». At the bridge, one of the soldiers said more or less the same, even after the matizaba: «Have another control where you get to the aduana or to the market, or you must enter Dajabón».
El río Masacre, the border between Haiti and the Dominican Republic. I have to, groups of people who frequent the A. Cabrera zone In neutral land The market of what is called the Binacional Market (hoy cerrado), located in the Dominican soil between the two controls, in a sort of neutral zone precisely to facilitate the trade between the two countries. The soldier’s explanation continues: «The ‘motoconchos’ who are associated with the union enter
Dominican territory, but only go to authorized trade zones. You can’t get out of Dajabón.” In practice, in the second check they notice a lot more of the cargo motorbikes and fewer of the people going on foot. Control in step with the borders of Dajabón is the highest number of markets compared to people. On the tow of a motorbike are several Haitians who come to work in the workplace.
One of them says: «Dominican jefes mistreat Haitians. Nos coup. The guards also make our coup.” And another addition: «Nos hacen pagar para pasar». Workers enter and come from construction and field, and students with uniform, traders who sign with the vacío tow and return loading food for their businesses in Haiti; there are people who go to Dajabón to send or receive money, men who load bags of fertilizer, and there are women who lift blocks of ice onto trolleys because in Haiti there is no electricity and the solar plates do not have enough power for a refrigerator.
For the Haitians, the difficulty is not entering Dominican territory, but climbing from Dajabón by road, which is where the controls are true; and above all, in the case of going to another city, avoid being deported. But with the deportations it happens as with the wall: they are meditated with a lot of propaganda force but with limited effectiveness.
Because despite the growing return of Dominicans to Haitian immigration, and the valorization that each step of the costs and benefits of this immigration has had, there are three parties that have clearly benefited: their own Haitians, the entrepreneurs with average wages pay and the extensive network of corrupt officials who cobran por mirar hacia other side. Son inmigrantes haitianos alrededor 5% of the 11 million inhabitants of the Dominican Republic; Dominican children of Haitian origin around 6%.
Son of Haitian immigrants close to 5% of the 11 million inhabitants that the Dominican Republic currently has, David (not his real name) is the owner of a bar-colmado in Dajabón, three manzanas del muro. He is behind the bar, and I see it like this: «It seems that we have the obligation to accommodate them. They come with a cube, they sell you water, you sell Coca-Cola, you sell everything… And, therefore, if the authorities withdraw from the street, they say that they are mistreating them. And it’s not that they are mistreating, it’s that they are making an informal sale.”
He is married to a Haitian woman and has two children with her. He was in Haiti for the last time in 1973, and he didn’t enjoy what he had because she was in a market and had pear meat. «Quitan all the work. In the construction you are already just them. The Dominican, you go to work on the construction, the minimum daily is 1,500 pesos daily (23.50 euros), the Haitian will do it for 600 (9.40 euros)”.
Schools at the market time in Dajabón Alfons Cabrera «Is it worth it all this? In Haiti it was dark, not here” August by supporting a well-stocked fan in the repair shop. He takes 1,000 pesos (16 euros), but he only has 200. He is 46 years old, August is not his real name and he is from Cap-Haïtien, a town on the north coast of Haiti. If installed on Dajabón he spent four years with his wife, and a year after the birth of his daughter. «He was born here thanks to his father Roberto, who accompanied us to the hospital and encouraged us to keep her here».
The parish provides her with assistance, but his main livelihood is construction work. There is no stable work, as long as he goes up every day and earns it, and with perseverance he can work two or three days a week for 800 pesos (12.5 euros) each day. You live with your wife and his wife in a ‘flat’ of 12 square meters for which they pay 60 euros. They keep the clean clothes in bags attached to the wall so that the rats don’t handle it. Is it worth all this? «In Haiti it was dark and here no». Our Lady of the Rosary Father Roberto was sent to the cafeteria next to the church of Our Lady of the Rosary.
Even if I replied to David, it’s just a coincidence (or that the theme is so used that it always takes place in the same places): «You can say that we quit the work in the construction, but what makes the heavy work, more hard, I’m ellos.” The cafe is in front of the Milagritos park: “Do you see that? Ahí there are two Dominican children playing with two Haitians, this is the reality of Dajabón.
This Dominican-Haitian pleito is a pleito that occurs on television and on the radio, but the primary relationships on the border are peaceful relationships: commercial relationships, family relationships, collaboration.” Through the Montalvo Center, part of the parish’s charitable work is focused on accompaniment of Haitian immigrants: «Where we are, we work with the most vulnerable and one of the problems is immigration.
Let’s not help those who come to Dominicana, until they respect their rights when they come.” A Haitian child of 8 or 9 years old is looking for and offers to clean the shoes for 50 pesos (80 cents). Upon climbing from Dajabón, at the first 70 kilometers you have one control. I’m very little exhaustive because the moment I get clear skin, I don’t look at anything more.
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