(latimes.com)
Port-au-Prince, Haiti— In the face of international pressure to keep him out, former Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide returned home Friday after seven years in exile, tossing a combustible new ingredient into the presidential election that is scheduled to take place Sunday.
Aristide arrived on a charter flight from South Africa, where he has lived for most of the time since he was flown out of Haiti on a U.S.-supplied plane amid turmoil in 2004.
He was greeted at a VIP arrival area at the airport in Port-au-Prince, Haiti's capital, by some supporters and 100 or so airport workers, some waving little Haitian flags.
Aristide, in a dark suit, waved and clasped his hands as he stepped down to the tarmac, and was then swarmed by dozens of journalists.
Aristide, a leftist former priest, remains a deeply polarizing figure in Haiti, where he is revered by many poor residents as a defender of the downtrodden but detested by wealthy elites and others who see him as a volatile force in the country's politics.
Speculation over Aristide's return had gripped the country since the Haitian government issued him a passport in February, just weeks after former Haitian dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier made a surprise return.
But it became clear only in recent days that Aristide would return, as his supporters and lawyer began to promise that he would be back on Haitian soil before Sunday, when voters go the polls to choose a new president and parliament.
At the house on the edge of Port-au-Prince where Aristide once lived, workers repainted a tall surrounding wall in faint rose pink and planted scores of tiny Haitian flags along the top.
U.S. officials, including President Obama, had sought to keep Aristide from making the trip home, arguing that his arrival could prove a destabilizing factor during the closing phase of the presidential runoff between Michel Martelly, a popular singer, and Mirlande Manigat, a university vice rector who was once Haiti's first lady.
But South African officials said they had no power to prevent the former Haitian leader from going anywhere he chose.
Aristide left Johannesburg late Thursday, accompanied by his wife, two daughters, actor Danny Glover and the former leader's Miami-based lawyer.
Aristide has said he wanted to return to work in the education field, not politics. He has also said chronic eye problems are aggravated by South Africa's cold weather.
But Aristide's profile and the fractured condition of Haiti left may make it difficult for him to stay out of political life entirely.
Friday, March 18, 2011
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Haiti Election - March 20, 2011
Haiti to combat vote fraud
(upi.com)
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti -- Haitian election officials say providing help for voters and better-educated poll workers will ensure fairness in the upcoming presidential runoff election.
Presidential candidates Mirlande Manigat and Michel "Sweet Micky" Martelly, the top vote-getters in the preliminary round, will square off March 20, along with the two top candidates in legislative districts where no one got 50 percent of the vote, The Miami Herald reported.
The Provisional Electoral Council has set up a call center that provides 24-hour assistance for voters. In addition, all poll workers will be required to have a high school education and workers at the polling stations where fraud was most noticeable have been dismissed.
Gaillot Dorsinville, the council's president, told candidates the body is "prepared to make all of the corrections necessary to better the second round.''
The Organization of American States has also increased its delegation of observers from 120 to 200 for the runoff.
Haitian observers are dubious about the changes. Pierre Esperance heads a group that reported massive fraud in the preliminary voting.
"I have no confidence in the electoral machine," he said.
---------
UN plans to reinforce police for presidential run-off elections
(un.org)
The 3,500-strong United Nations police force in Haiti is planning to reinforce its support of national police for the presidential run-off election on 20 March, although it does not expect trouble, according to the head of the contingent.
“I don’t see any major risk for this second round,” Marc Tardif, head of the police component in the UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH), told the UN News Centre in an interview.
“Clearly it’s going to be a tense period but I don’t think we will have big trouble. We have a good working relationship with the national police and our robust presence will deter anybody wanting to create problems,” he said, noting that in the first round in November the two forces worked together, and despite some incidents, the poll took place in much greater calm than previous elections.
“Still, we’re going to reinforce our positions at those places that were unstable during the first round,” he added.
Trouble broke out after the announcement of provisional results in December from the first round, with thousands of protesters rampaging through the streets of Port-au-Prince, the capital, accusing the ruling coalition of rigging the polls, after tallies put former first lady Mirlande Manigat and outgoing President Rene Préval’s party candidate Jude Celestin in first and second place, thus qualifying for the run-off.
Popular musician Michel Martelly was less than one percentage point behind in third place, but thus excluded from the run-off, and his supporters set up burning barricades of timber, boulders and flaming tires.
After a re-examination of the ballots, the Provisional Electoral Council last month announced that Mr. Martelly had come in second and would thus face Ms. Manigat in the run-off.
Apart from its police component, MINUSTAH, which has been on the ground in Haiti since mid-2004 after then president Jean-Bertrand Aristide went into exile amid violent unrest, fields some 8,500 peacekeeping troops in the impoverished country.
---------
Haitian candidate wary of Aristide's planned return
(reuters.com)
MIAMI - A candidate in Haiti's decisive presidential run-off said on Thursday she hoped popular former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide would delay his planned return to the country until after the election later this month.
"Personally, as a citizen, I would prefer that he comes back after the elections," former first lady Mirlande Manigat said in a news conference at Miami's International Airport.
"We are waiting for elections and the situation has been particularly agitated," she added.
Manigat, 70, faces musician Michel "Sweet Mickey" Martelly in the March 20 run-off. She emerged as a front-runner in the November 28 election in the volatile, earthquake-ravaged Caribbean country. The poll was widely criticized as chaotic and fraudulent.
The election also drew controversy over the fact that Aristide's Fanmi Lavalas political party was barred from running a candidate in the poll.
The run-off comes against the backdrop of Aristide's recent announcement that he is planning to return home, ending his prolonged exile in South Africa. He has kept everyone guessing about the timing.
"I think what we need now is more peace," Manigat said, The return of Aristide, a fire-brand left-wing populist, only threatened more "agitation" ahead of the election, she said.
Manigat did not elaborate on her comments suggesting possible unrest. But Aristide, a charismatic former Catholic priest, is loved by many of Haiti's poor and loathed by business leaders and the wealthy elite.
He became Haiti's first freely elected president in 1991 but spent much of his first five-year term in exile after a military coup. Elected again in 2000, his second term was soured by economic instability and gang and drug-related violence. He was finally ousted in a 2004 rebellion led by former soldiers. Aristide says Washington orchestrated it.
Haiti's outgoing government, under intense international pressure to keep shaky U.N.-backed elections on track, has said it cannot keep a citizen from returning and has issued a diplomatic passport for Aristide.
But the possibility that he could return before the March run-off has led the United States, the United Nations and other major western donors to signal they would view such a move as, at best, unhelpful, and at worst, potentially dangerous.
(upi.com)
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti -- Haitian election officials say providing help for voters and better-educated poll workers will ensure fairness in the upcoming presidential runoff election.
Presidential candidates Mirlande Manigat and Michel "Sweet Micky" Martelly, the top vote-getters in the preliminary round, will square off March 20, along with the two top candidates in legislative districts where no one got 50 percent of the vote, The Miami Herald reported.
The Provisional Electoral Council has set up a call center that provides 24-hour assistance for voters. In addition, all poll workers will be required to have a high school education and workers at the polling stations where fraud was most noticeable have been dismissed.
Gaillot Dorsinville, the council's president, told candidates the body is "prepared to make all of the corrections necessary to better the second round.''
The Organization of American States has also increased its delegation of observers from 120 to 200 for the runoff.
Haitian observers are dubious about the changes. Pierre Esperance heads a group that reported massive fraud in the preliminary voting.
"I have no confidence in the electoral machine," he said.
---------
UN plans to reinforce police for presidential run-off elections
(un.org)
The 3,500-strong United Nations police force in Haiti is planning to reinforce its support of national police for the presidential run-off election on 20 March, although it does not expect trouble, according to the head of the contingent.
“I don’t see any major risk for this second round,” Marc Tardif, head of the police component in the UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH), told the UN News Centre in an interview.
“Clearly it’s going to be a tense period but I don’t think we will have big trouble. We have a good working relationship with the national police and our robust presence will deter anybody wanting to create problems,” he said, noting that in the first round in November the two forces worked together, and despite some incidents, the poll took place in much greater calm than previous elections.
“Still, we’re going to reinforce our positions at those places that were unstable during the first round,” he added.
Trouble broke out after the announcement of provisional results in December from the first round, with thousands of protesters rampaging through the streets of Port-au-Prince, the capital, accusing the ruling coalition of rigging the polls, after tallies put former first lady Mirlande Manigat and outgoing President Rene Préval’s party candidate Jude Celestin in first and second place, thus qualifying for the run-off.
Popular musician Michel Martelly was less than one percentage point behind in third place, but thus excluded from the run-off, and his supporters set up burning barricades of timber, boulders and flaming tires.
After a re-examination of the ballots, the Provisional Electoral Council last month announced that Mr. Martelly had come in second and would thus face Ms. Manigat in the run-off.
Apart from its police component, MINUSTAH, which has been on the ground in Haiti since mid-2004 after then president Jean-Bertrand Aristide went into exile amid violent unrest, fields some 8,500 peacekeeping troops in the impoverished country.
---------
Haitian candidate wary of Aristide's planned return
(reuters.com)
MIAMI - A candidate in Haiti's decisive presidential run-off said on Thursday she hoped popular former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide would delay his planned return to the country until after the election later this month.
"Personally, as a citizen, I would prefer that he comes back after the elections," former first lady Mirlande Manigat said in a news conference at Miami's International Airport.
"We are waiting for elections and the situation has been particularly agitated," she added.
Manigat, 70, faces musician Michel "Sweet Mickey" Martelly in the March 20 run-off. She emerged as a front-runner in the November 28 election in the volatile, earthquake-ravaged Caribbean country. The poll was widely criticized as chaotic and fraudulent.
The election also drew controversy over the fact that Aristide's Fanmi Lavalas political party was barred from running a candidate in the poll.
The run-off comes against the backdrop of Aristide's recent announcement that he is planning to return home, ending his prolonged exile in South Africa. He has kept everyone guessing about the timing.
"I think what we need now is more peace," Manigat said, The return of Aristide, a fire-brand left-wing populist, only threatened more "agitation" ahead of the election, she said.
Manigat did not elaborate on her comments suggesting possible unrest. But Aristide, a charismatic former Catholic priest, is loved by many of Haiti's poor and loathed by business leaders and the wealthy elite.
He became Haiti's first freely elected president in 1991 but spent much of his first five-year term in exile after a military coup. Elected again in 2000, his second term was soured by economic instability and gang and drug-related violence. He was finally ousted in a 2004 rebellion led by former soldiers. Aristide says Washington orchestrated it.
Haiti's outgoing government, under intense international pressure to keep shaky U.N.-backed elections on track, has said it cannot keep a citizen from returning and has issued a diplomatic passport for Aristide.
But the possibility that he could return before the March run-off has led the United States, the United Nations and other major western donors to signal they would view such a move as, at best, unhelpful, and at worst, potentially dangerous.
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