Cockburn Town, September 3, 2025.- After a mass killing in Providenciales at the end of July, Prime Minister Charles Washington Misick pointed the Haitian community to crime on the archipelago. These statements, reported by Ayibopost, fuel a climate of stigmatization against Haitian migrants, yet essential to local economic and political life.
At the end of July, three people were killed and a dozen injured during a shooting in a nightclub in Providenciales, the main tourist and economic centre of the Turks and Caicos Islands (TCI). Qualified first « Mass killing » On the archipelago, this tragedy provoked a lively emotion.
Dans la foulée, le Premier ministre Charles Washington Misick a dénoncé « des meurtres de type gangster » concentrés, selon lui, « dans les communautés haïtiennes « . Il a exhorté les migrants à collaborer avec la police, affirmant que certains d’entre eux détiendraient des informations sur l’introduction clandestine d’armes aux TCI.
Ces propos ont accentué le malaise des Haïtiens établis dans l’archipel, nombreux à dénoncer un sentiment anti-haïtien croissant. « Au moindre acte de banditisme ou d’homicide, on pointe les Haïtiens « , témoigne Alex, installé depuis 2014, auprès d’AyiboPost. Guyvenson Laine, arrivé en 2021, observe lui aussi que « cette perception négative est étroitement liée à l’image ternie d’Haïti par les gangs « .
A large but fragile community
In 2012, Haitians accounted for almost 35% of the population, almost as much as natives (39%). Some have integrated into the political and economic world, like the Eliphat Register, naturalized since 1999, which recalls: « Our votes count. » But poverty, unemployment and insecurity hit this community hard, making it a target of official discourse.
Between migration and transnational crime
The archipelago has been one of the main destinations of Haitian migrants for several decades. But the massive influx of new arrivals, often in an irregular situation, worries the authorities, who recently suspended the issuance of new work permits to Haitians.
Already in 2022, Misick accused irregular migrants from Haiti of feeding violence. According to a British parliamentary report, insecurity in TCI is part of a regional dynamic fuelled by arms and drug trafficking, compounded by poverty and local inequalities.
Providenciales and Grand Turk, where a large proportion of Haitians reside, concentrates most of the crimes. Homicides are on the rise: 13 cases in 2019, 22 in 2020, 13 in 2021, in an estimated population of 50,000.
W.A.
