VENICE, Fla. — The race is on tonight to evacuate foreign nationals who are trapped in Haiti as the political crisis driven by gang violence intensifies. Gov. Ron Desantis said Wednesday that the state of Florida has brought 90 people back with more rescue flights scheduled.
France and Canada are working on evacuating thousands of their nationals. They have successfully evacuated vulnerable nationals with some among 155 who landed in Miami on Monday. Another evacuation flight arrived in Orlando on Tuesday carrying 28 Floridians.
Sarasota County-based missionary group Agape Flights has also been helping with evacuations. Dual U.S. and Canadian citizens, Marc Honorat and his wife Lisa, escaped Haiti this past weekend with the help of an Agape Flight's plane that returned to Venice.
Honorat is the founder of the non-profit Haiti Arise Mission which does extensive community-based missionary work in health, education, shelter, vocational training for youth and social welfare programs.
But because of the ongoing violence, continuing to stay in the country and be actively involved in those activities in a personal capacity was no longer a wise and practical option.
"What's happening in Haiti? It's tough, it's lots of killing, kidnapping, shooting," Marc Honorat said.
With several armed gangs terrorizing communities and families, burning schools and police stations, and looting homes and shops, Haiti's capital Port Au Prince was unsafe and situational security unpredictable at any given time, according to Honorat.
"Beheading, kidnapping, raping, they are burning communities down all the way, flatten things out. That's what's going on in Haiti. It's terrorist stuff," he added.
Such strife and adversity are not new to Honorat whose early life growing up in Haiti was very unpleasant.
"My parents gave me away when I was five years old as a slave child and I spent seven years as a slave and then when I turned 12, I was out of the situation. One of my siblings rescued me from there," he said.
"I was put in a children's home orphanage and that's how at 12 years old I started kindergarten," Honorat explained.
He was later adopted and sponsored by a Canadian family who helped him finish high school at 25 and sent him to a college in Jamaica to get his higher education. He then met his wife with whom he started a family of his own.
Honorat would later return to set up the mission which employs nearly 200 people and cares for hundreds of orphans and families in a bid to give back to his homeland.
But the violence has gotten in the way of any small progress that has been made. According to a United Nations report, much of that violence has been facilitated by the influx of illegal guns from places in the United States including Florida.
"They are powerful weapons. They are not just 9 mm. They are heavy, heavy weapons, weapons of war and we're not at war with any country," he said.
"When we were driving through Port Au Prince, you can see them. It's 12 years old, 15, 14 with AK-47s and they can't even carry them and they do not really care. That's what happens when you put weapons into kids' hands and they don't think about it. They don't even know about the danger that things have," Honorat added.
Despite the bleak situation, a glimmer of hope has remained for Honorat. He believes the crisis is an opportunity for the world and Haitians in the Diaspora to now pay attention to the island country and rescue it from the frequent downward spiral.
"The Haitian people are tired, they are tired. I want to see Haiti, the people that used to be laughing and playing all over the street, we need to see that Haiti coming back," he said.
"Haiti is the first Black republic in the world, you know. Haiti fought with the most powerful army at the time, Napoleon's army, and set up examples of freedom. We call our ministry 'Haiti Arise' because Haiti will arise one day and nobody can receive the glory except God," Honorat concluded.
Honorat is among the few who can get out of Haiti because of the privilege of a foreign passport but he hopes to return to his home country as soon as it is deemed safe.
In the meantime, he plans to continue working with Agape to procure and send supplies like baby warmers to his staff of locals who can only pray peace and political stability prevail in Haiti soon.