Future of Haiti seems to be miserable. Countless children at a very tender age are seen throbbing in the prison stadium. Yes, you read it write, when kids in the other part of the world are preparing themselves to read and write, children in this country are spending their important years at Fort Dimanche, Port-au-Prince’s children’s prison. And the irony of the situation is that, most of them do not know why they are living there.
The boys in here are the products of poverty, child abandonment, rampant homelessness and an educational system that has failed to enroll 1 million school-age children.
Their plight reflects a country overwhelmed by the problems of its young more than 200,000 Haitian children have lost one or both parents to AIDS and 300,000 work as unpaid domestic servants in a system of bonded servitude.
Some of the inmates of this hillside prison were as young as six when they arrived. However, it’s a different issue all together that their actual age is beyond measure because of the inadequate proof.
Maryse Penette-Kedar, head of PRODEV, a foundation that is trying to improve conditions in the children’s jail, is trying to convert the prison to a rehabilitation center for the kids. Since, the prevailing socio-political conditions are such that the life of these kids is in danger.
The prison, for all its deprivations, can be a refuge from a hostile environment. A few parents have begged officials to imprison their children, even when they have not been accused of a crime because they believe Fort Dimanche is safer than the streets. Gang members murdered several children shortly after being released because of suspicions that they gained their freedom by becoming informants.
Along with the innocent kids, there are children who have been detained for some or the other crime and often bully the ‘juniors’ when they do come in. But they are treated equally by the authorities and are forced to abide by the laws along with the others. For instance, Ricardo, who was arrested for banditry was forced to take shower, which however, he avoided when living outside the walls of Fort Dimanche.
