Demonstrators take to Port-au-Prince’s streets in 2022, after de facto Prime Minister Ariel Henry doubled fuel prices. Photo:
Anne Myriam Bolivar/Global Press Journal
By Kim Ives, Haiti Liberté, April 8, 2026
Hiking gas prices in Haiti, which are set by the state, inevitably triggers major protest and unrest.
On Jul. 6, 2018, under pressure (as always) from the subsidy-averse International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Haitian government of President Jovenel Moïse announced that it would raise the cost of a gallon of gas by 38%, of diesel by 47%, and of kerosene by 52%.
That ignited three days of huge riots – Jul. 7-9 – across Port-au-Prince and its suburbs, where stores, gas stations, and government offices were burned, and Prime Minister Jack Guy Lafontant was forced to resign.
But the 2018 protests’ ferocity was also fanned and stoked by a bourgeois opposition which was trying to oust Jovenel Moïse from the presidency that he had assumed the previous year.
Today, that same bourgeois opposition is arrayed behind and part of de facto Prime Minister Alix Didier Fils-Aimé’s government, which jacked up fuel costs on Apr. 2, for gasoline from 560 to 725 gourdes ($5.53) per gallon or 29%, for diesel from 620 to 850 gourdes ($6.48) per gallon or 37%, and for kerosene from 615 to 845 gourdes ($6.44) per gallon or 37%.
Unfortunately for Fils-Aimé and his cohort, in 2026, Haiti’s economic crisis, and their de facto government’s popularity, are much worse than Jovenel’s was in 2018. Despite the presence of two U.S.-sponsored mercenary forces – Erik Prince’s Vectus Global and the UN-blessed Gang Suppression Force (GSF) – their grip on power remains tenuous.
On Apr. 6, many demonstrations exploded along four of Port-au-Prince’s major arteries: Bourdon, Nazon, the Delmas road, and the Frères road.
Delmas was particularly affected, with barricades of burning tires and vehicles blocking the road at the key choke points of Delmas 32, 33, 39, 42, and 75.
Ferrying people is one of the few livelihoods still functioning in Haiti, so many tap tap and motorcycle taxi drivers tried to close some gas stations in protest of the hikes. Other taxi and bus drivers tried to continue on their routes but were blocked by demonstrators. Meanwhile, certain crowds confiscated the car keys of drivers along the roads.
These acts happened despite the Haitian National Police (PNH) deploying many large riot-fighting units, particularly the Company for Intervention to Maintain Order (CIMO), but they tended to be clumped together and not dispersed. Things were very tense between the enraged crowds and the heavily armed and armored policemen.
Several tap taps heading down Delmas from Pétion-ville were forced by the protests to stop their vehicles and discharge their passengers. Many of the demonstrators vowed to continue their mobilization until authorities rescind (as Jovenel did in 2018) the price hike, which the government blames on the war in the Middle East. The unilateral, illegal, unprovoked attack by the U.S. and Israel against Iran has pushed the cost of a barrel of crude to $110 at press times, and the price is going up daily.
In the past decade, the government has justified raising fuel prices due to the rise in the global price of petroleum projects. However, some observers note that when fuel costs have dropped in recent years – for example, early in the COVID crisis, a barrel of oil dropped to about $38 in April 2020 – prices have not dropped accordingly.
The widespread protests seen on Apr. 6 are almost certain to flare up again in coming days, especially as the ripple effects of the price hikes begin to bite in terms of higher transportation, cooking, and food costs.
“The demonstrations underscored the fragile balance in the capital, where economic decisions quickly intersect with security risks and public anger,” observed Juhakenson Blaise in the Haitian Times. “With additional price pressures expected, transport unions and observers warn that further unrest is likely if no relief measures are introduced.”
Well-known trade unionist Fignolé Saint-Cyr categorically denounced the fuel price hike, which the “Advisory Council,” established by the de facto Prime Minister’s Cabinet, rubber-stamped so it could be executed by the de facto, illegitimate Prime Minister Fils-Aimé himself.
Posted April 15, 2026