Police Brutality Against a Teacher, CONEHQ Demands Justice and Reparations

PORT-AU-PRINCE.— The National Collective of Haitian Teachers for Quality Education (CONEHQ) learns with consternation of the violent assault inflicted upon Professor SAINT-FLEUR Williamson by two agents of the Haitian National Police, on May 18, 2025, on the forecourt of the Cap-Haïtien cathedral, while he was peacefully exercising his fundamental right to demonstrate for legitimate demands related to teachers' working conditions.

“This brutal behavior, unworthy of a rule of law, goes beyond the bounds of what is acceptable,” CONEHQ stated in a press note published on Wednesday, May 21. According to the organization, it is a barbaric, humiliating, and revolting act that reflects the authoritarian drift of a security apparatus disconnected from the suffering of the people and, more particularly, of the teaching community.

“CONEHQ wishes to condemn with the utmost severity this police action, which we describe as cowardly and repressive, directed against an intellectual recognized for his rigor, integrity, and commitment to education,” reads the note, in which CONEHQ states it interprets this act as an attempt to stifle the voice of teachers who, it believes, dare to denounce the injustice, precariousness, and abandonment they suffer.

“We refuse to remain silent in the face of this dangerous slide. We refuse to let fear muzzle our demands. We refuse to normalize repression,” declare the signatories of this note, while demanding: clear explanations, immediate sanctions against the perpetrators of this act described as vile, and justice for the victimized teacher.

Jean Mapou