Graffiti: the Hand Writing on Haiti’s Walls

I arrived in Haiti in December 2004 as part of that UN peace keeping mission. As I drove through the streets of the country’s capital, Port au Prince, my attention was immediately and forcefully drawn to the sheer number of graffiti that adorned the walls on main streets and road junctions. The messages were as rich as they were diverse: political party propaganda and slogans, denunciations, desperate appeals for peace and unity, warnings to leaders, motivational messages calling for an end to conflict. I shall later spend considerable time trying to figure out the true meaning and message behind the hand writing on Haiti’s walls and their relevance to any analysis of the qualitative and quantitative character of social communication in a conflict-rife environment like Haiti.

In other words I was asking myself the question: why were graffiti such a trendy means of popular expression and what were its implications for information management and dissemination within a peace-building context? How did the handwritings on the wall relate to the question of equitable access to the mass communication media?

Historically, graffiti has always been considered as a means of self expression for the poor and disenfranchised. In his study of Toronto’s graffiti culture, Dr Doug Frayn argues that since politics seem to have replaced religion as the contemporary repository for spiritual aspirations and existential frustrations, graffiti has become the art through which individuals depict their hopes and fears. This is very true of Haiti where graffiti has become a major part of the culture of popular political expression.

This is understandably so because repression and limitations to freedom of speech are hallmarks of Haiti’s past and contemporary political history.

These limitations exist in spite of a noticeable proliferation of both the print and electronic media in the country’s social communication landscape. Every commune in Haiti boost an average 5 FM radio stations and 3 TV stations, the bulk of them private. Unfortunately mass communication media in the country are generally seen as elitist, politically-inclined and serving the interest of the rich and the famous. The WACC has rightly noted that often times mass communication tools are used to manipulate the masses, incite class tensions, distort reality and consolidate oppression. Sadly, Haiti’s history is replete with instances of such media abuse.

Graffiti - the hand writing on Haiti’s walls - therefore speaks to the visible lack of any real and genuine communication between the governing class and the governed. It also speaks to the need to develop a cross-cutting and an all inclusive social communication content that aggregates the hopes and aspirations of the populace. This has never been an easy task in a country like Haiti where partisan politics has made it impossible for the state to truly and convincingly “communicate” with its citizenry. The immediate consequence of this kind of “communicational disconnect” has been the recurrent inability of Haiti’s leaders to evolve any form of general consensus around national policy matters. And in politics, lack of consensus invariably leads to a crisis and then to conflicts, armed or otherwise.

But there is hope. And it’s coming from Haiti’s hinterlands.

In 2004 the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti was mandated to foster an all inclusive political and national reconciliation process as part of its peace building process.In pursuing this mandate, the Mission was aware of the fact that Haiti’s social communication establishment could well be playing a major part in fueling the country’s intermittent pattern of violence and instability. The Mission consequently initiated a process of reactivating community dialogue structures in a bid to promote and facilitate inter-group and inter-sectoral communication at the grassroots. Over the last three or so years, the Mission’s Civil Affairs Officers have traveled the length and breadth of the country, moderating and facilitating hundreds of political forums and inter-community focus groups discussions on issues as varied and diverse ashuman rights,conditions for free and fair elections, socio-economic development, environmental protection, security, decentralization, public service reform, disarmament etc.

In a political context where the spoilers seem to exercise absolute control over the tools of mass communication, this kind of bottom-up approach to social communication engenders greater voice and ownership, and widens the borders of participation among marginalized sections of the Haitian society. This, I believe, is critical in bringing about the marginal conditions for achieving sustainable peace, stability and reconciliation in conflict-prone Haiti.

The Bible teaches us that where two or three are gathered in His name, God shall be in their midst. Haitians are a profoundly spiritual people and as they continue to gather in their hamlets, God shall be with them to guide them in their search for genuine peace, healing and reconciliation.

I probably don’t know if Haiti’s rulers - unlike King Belshazzar - shall ever see the back of the hand that writes on Haiti’s walls. But what I do know for a fact is that as we continue to widen the borders of an alternative but affirmative form of social communication through community dialogue structures, the hate and frustrations embedded in anonymous graffiti messages shall soon give way to the liberating, empowering but also visible message resonating from harmonious and peaceful grassroots communities.

About the Author:

Julius Nyamkimah Fondong is a Civil Affairs officer with the United Nations Mission in Haiti. In that capacity he played a lead role in developing and implementing the concept of grassroots community dialogue structures and inter-sectoral focus group discussions as alternative social communication strategies. This was within the framework of the Mission’s mandate to promote national dialogue and facilitate an all inclusive peace and reconciliation process as part of a peace-building plan. He is a former Edward S. Mason’s Fellow andWorld Bank Scholar at Harvard University, from where he graduated with an MPA (Public Policy Analysis and Strategic Management).

During the last decade Mr. Fondong’s professional and academic pursuits have included exploring innovative ways of consolidating peace-building activities both in his native Cameroon and in post conflict environments worldwide.