ARTICLE - HAITIANS CONFIDENT IN POLICE FOR SECURITY

HAITIANS OVERWHELMINGLY CONFIDENT IN LOCAL POLICE FOR SECURITY
(Defend Haiti) - By Samuel Maxime

GENEVA, Switzerland - An independent study undertaken by researchers in Switzerland found that Haitians are overwhelmingly gaining faith in local police for their security than any other entity. The study also found that Haitians believe crime to be less of a problem since the earthquake, contrary to popular belief.

The independent research group, small arms survey (SAS) http://www.smallarmssurvey.org/home.html from the Geneva Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies (GI) http://graduateinstitute.ch/ in its annual report published on Wednesday examined security and violent crime in Haiti.

A summary of the SAS 2011 Yearbook, Chapter 8: "Securing the State" furnished to DH, considered the context of security promotion efforts in the years preceding the 2010 earthquake through a series of household surveys administered before and after the earthquake.

Security and Crime in Haiti
The study found that inefficiency and corruption has allowed the Police Nationale d'Haiti (PNH) to be vulnerable to Haiti's political climate.

In years where an unelected government was in power, such as the interim governments of 1991-94 and 2004-06, public trust in the police had declined dramatically. The researchers cited the use of police forces as tools by affluent Haitians in politics or business to be the cause of the mistrust.

In the years of an elected government, faith in the PNH had trended positively, increasing as time went on.

The SAS survey found that in 2010 66.7% of Haitians said they would turn to their local police officers if they felt threatened, an incredible increase from the year prior when that number had failed to reach 40%. See Table .

The researchers point to a heightened confidence in public institutions and a decrease in the credibility of the United Nations as the cause.

An interesting statistic is that 62.9% of households questioned on whether crime was a serious problem before the earthquake (2009) responded in the affirmative. After the earthquake the number dropped significantly with only 42.9% of respondents finding crime to be a serious problem.

Ownership of Firearms
The survey found that at least half of all of the respondents believe that there were too many guns in Haiti. The respondents answered a follow up question as to which groups do they feel have too many guns, to which they responded: 'criminal groups', 'business people' and 'ex-soldiers' respectively. 'Armed political groups', 'politicians' and 'households' were the least identified, respectively. But still, more than 75% believe that more control over firearm licenses would make communities safer.

Conclusion
The conclusion of the SAS summary found that increasing security should be related to increasing the capacity and responsiveness of the PNH. For the most part the researchers found that Haitians believe there is currently an 'intolerably' unequal provisioning of local police throughout the country.