CDS (II) 2021 General Knowledge · Question 111 of 120

Correct — B, Haiti. Jovenel Moise was the forty-eighth President of Haiti, a businessman before he entered politics, and he was shot dead in the early hours of 7 July 2021 when armed men attacked his private residence at Pelerin 5, in the Petion-Ville district above Port-au-Prince. He was fifty-three. His wife Martine was wounded in the attack and was flown to Miami for treatment; their three children were unhurt. The acting prime minister at the time said the attackers included men speaking Spanish, and the investigation that followed produced indictments over the next several years, including of the president's widow and of the acting prime minister, one of which was later overturned on appeal. The killing left Haiti without a functioning presidency and deepened a political crisis that has continued since.

• (a)Dominican Republic — The most tempting wrong answer by far, because the Dominican Republic shares the island of Hispaniola with Haiti and the two are constantly confused. Its president was not assassinated.
• (c)Guatemala — A Central American country on the mainland, not in the Caribbean island group at all, and unconnected to this event.
• (d)Cuba — The largest island of the Caribbean, and prominent in the news of 2021 for its own reasons, but its head of state was not the subject of this attack.

Haiti occupies the western third of Hispaniola, the island it shares with the Dominican Republic, and is the second-oldest independent country in the Americas after the United States. Its independence in 1804 came out of a slave revolt against French rule, making it the first state in the world founded by formerly enslaved people. French and Haitian Creole are its official languages, and Port-au-Prince is the capital.

Questions of this shape — a name in the headlines, four countries as options — are testing whether you attached the person to the place when you read the news. The safeguard is geography rather than politics: the Dominican Republic option works only on candidates who know that Haiti is on Hispaniola but cannot recall which half is which. Haiti is the western third, French and Creole speaking; the Dominican Republic is the eastern two-thirds, Spanish speaking. Since this exam, Haiti has remained without an elected president and the country has been governed through transitional arrangements, so the vacancy this assassination opened has not been filled by an election.

• Jovenel Moise was the forty-eighth President of Haiti and was assassinated on 7 July 2021 at his residence in Petion-Ville, above Port-au-Prince.
• His wife Martine was wounded in the attack and taken to Miami for treatment; their three children were unharmed.
• Haiti occupies the western third of Hispaniola, sharing the island with the Dominican Republic.
• Haiti became independent in 1804 following a revolt against French colonial rule, and its official languages are French and Haitian Creole.
• Investigations into the killing led to indictments over the following years, including of his widow and of the acting prime minister, with one indictment overturned on appeal in 2025.

• Swapping Haiti with the Dominican Republic; language is the quickest check, since Haiti is French and Creole speaking.
• Placing Guatemala in the Caribbean islands when it is on the Central American mainland.
• Assuming a head of state named in the news must be from the largest or best-known country in the region.

As a leader-to-country item, or inside a match list of countries with their capitals and recent political events.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Haiti shares the island of Hispaniola with which country?

  • (a)Cuba
  • (b)Jamaica
  • (c)Dominican Republic
  • (d)Puerto Rico

  Answer(c) Dominican Republic — Haiti occupies the western third of the island and the Spanish-speaking Dominican Republic the eastern two-thirds.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The capital of Haiti is

  • (a)Santo Domingo
  • (b)Port-au-Prince
  • (c)Kingston
  • (d)Havana

  Answer(b) Port-au-Prince — Santo Domingo is the capital of the neighbouring Dominican Republic, Kingston of Jamaica and Havana of Cuba.