Haiti Presidential Runoff Will Be Postponed

Thousands of protesters took to the streets of Haiti’s capital Saturday, January 23, setting tires ablaze and demanding the resignation of outgoing President Michel Martelly following the postponement of a runoff to pick his replacement.

The Caribbean nation was due to hold a runoff vote on Sunday (January 24), but the two-man race was postponed indefinitely after opposition candidate Jude Celestin refused to participate and anti-government protests and violence spread nationally.

Pierre Louis Opont, president of Haiti’s electoral council, said the vote scheduled for Sunday was being postponed for security reasons and did not name a new date.

Sandra Honoré, Special Representative of the Secretary-General in Haiti, said that the United Nations and its partners maintained their “full support to the efforts aimed at identifying consensual and constructive solutions to the current challenges of governance of Haiti through elections and dialogue between stakeholders”, according to the UN News Center. And there is no final decisions yet as to whether an interim government will take over of the presidential runoff after February 7 – when President Michel Martelly is required to leave office as per the Constitution states.

Government opponents have insisted that the first round of presidential balloting October 25 was marred by massive fraud in favor of the president’s hand-picked successor, businessman Jovenel Moise.

And to political chaos and gang violence has been added the fury of nature, with first the 2010 quake and then a cholera epidemic ravaging the population. Independent observer organizations had called for the election to be rescheduled amid suspicions that the first vote was rigged and after the main opposition candidate threatened to withdraw.

The move to cancel the election came after Opont reported attacks on the communal electoral bureau in Limbe as well as the private residence of an elections official in Pignon.

The demonstrations became violent as protesters burnt cars, barricaded roads and hurled rocks.

Eyewitnesses said the incidents occurred in Petionville, considered the safest area of Greater Port-au-Prince.

Haiti has been mired in a deep political crisis since a year ago, which forced Prime Minister Laurent Lamothe to resign and left Parliament in limbo after parliamentary elections were delayed.

This is the second time the presidential runoff has been suspended.

Celstin recently told The Associated Press that Haiti was “moving toward a selection, not an election”.

He said the USA and other foreign governments that monitor Haiti were complicit for supporting flawed elections.