Trousers rolled up to the knees, shoes in hand, Haitians cross the Dajabon river which separates their country from the Dominican Republic: every day, hundreds of them cross the border in this way to go to work and escape the administrative formalities often synonymous with bribes. -wine.
Traders, agricultural or construction workers, domestic workers go every morning to the wealthier island neighbor and return home in the evening, back and forth daily on this porous 380 km border that the Dominican government now wants to strengthen by a wall.
“Within two years, we want to put an end to the serious problems of illegal immigration, drug trafficking and the transit of stolen vehicles that we have known for years,” Dominican President Luis Abinader declared at the end of February.
Four official crossing points separate Haiti (11 million inhabitants) and the Dominican Republic (10.5 million) occupying respectively the west and the east of the island of Hispaniola. Most Haitians do not have identity papers and only a minority obtain a visa which allows to travel by bus between the two countries.
In Dajabon, in the north of the island, 225 km from Santo Domingo, twice a week, a tide of small Haitian traders also crosses the border bridge when the soldiers open a huge iron gate topped with barbed wire for a market. bi-weekly in a sort of free zone located before customs.
From 8 am, Monday and Friday, merchants rush along this passage, loaded with bags, boxes, pushing wheelbarrows, to sell all kinds of things, diapers, toiletries and clothes, often from charitable donations.
Haiti is one of the poorest countries in the world with more than 6 of its 11 million inhabitants living on less than $ 2.41 a day and more than 40% living in chronic food insecurity.
In the neighbor, a popular tourist destination, where some 500,000 Haitians live, illegal immigration, a point of recurring friction between the two countries for decades, remains a central theme of local politics.
The wall “is a project that no government had dared to initiate. It is not a simple wall. It also includes technological aspects with facial recognition, fingerprints and infrared cameras ”proudly affirms the director of immigration Enrique Garcia.
“A wall of companies! ”
But in Dajabon, opinions are divided.
“The Dominican Republic has filled with Haitians. They say they will build a wall! May God allow it! », Says Carlos Mateo, 43 years old.
“This will not solve anything at all, because people enter illegally by paying,” said Jean Willer, a 33-year-old Haitian who works in a school in the Dominican Republic. He regrets “the business” around controls. “Those who do not have papers are mistreated. I am outraged by the treatment reserved for them, ”he emphasizes.
Haitians crossing the border remain discreet and for the most part refuse to speak with the press for fear of trouble.
According to locals, the military collects 1,000 pesos ($ 18) per person who enters fraudulently. “We could build a wall the size of the Great Wall of China, it is useless if we let the people who pay in,” said Ivan Reina, a 30-year-old Dominican.
“A wall of agreement, but then a wall of companies, of industries! », Ignites Santiago Riveron, the mayor of Dajabon (60,000 inhabitants). “When someone has a job, he doesn’t think of emigrating. If Haitians feel good, we too will feel good ”.
“This wall is going to cost millions,” protests Maria Altagracia Perez, a 63-year-old Dominican. “And here we stopped building a hospital. People are dying because there is no doctor ”.
In the meantime, at 5 p.m., traders and cross-border workers come running so as not to miss the closure of the bridge. Once closed, the door will not open until three or four days later.