Port Au Prince, January 31: U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton urged Haiti’s leaders on Sunday to adopt an internationally backed solution to untangle an election dispute, saying the poor, earthquake-battered country needed a stable government to rebuild.
Clinton held talks in Port-au-Prince with outgoing Haitian President Rene Preval and leading presidential candidates on a visit overshadowed by the unfolding political crisis in Egypt.
She said she delivered the message that Washington wants Haitian authorities to enact recommendations by Organization of American States experts that revise contested preliminary results from chaotic Nov. 28 elections in the Caribbean nation.
OAS experts, citing widespread irregularities in voting tallies from the Nov. 28 poll, have recommended that presidential candidate and popular musician Michel Martelly be included in a second-round runoff vote in March in place of the government-backed candidate, Jude Celestin.
Opposition matriarch Mirlande Manigat is already confirmed through to the runoff.
“We want to see the voices and votes of the Haitian people acknowledged and recognized,” Clinton said on her arrival. She said this would help bolster Haiti’s reconstruction from its devastating 2010 earthquake.
“There needs to be a government and there needs to be stability in that government … for the international community, to really be able to partner, which is why we hope that there will be a resolution of the election soon,” she said in an interview with local Radio Metropole.
She spoke after separate meetings with the front-runner electoral contenders: Manigat, Martelly and Celestin.
As well as the United States, the United Nations and major western donors like France and Britain, along with the European Union, have made clear they also support the OAS recommendation for the Manigat-Martelly line-up in the second round runoff.
Despite the OAS report and international pressure, Celestin, a government technocrat and protege of Preval, has not formally withdrawn from the race despite urging from his own INITE coalition to do so.
Haiti’s Provisional Electoral Council has said it will announce on Wednesday the definitive results from the confused elections. The preliminary results announced last month triggered street riots by Martelly’s supporters, because Celestin was placed narrowly ahead of their candidate.
“ABSOLUTELY COMMITTED” TO HAITI’S RECOVERY
A small group of about 20 protesters at the Port-au-Prince airport carried signs in English reading “Secretary Clinton, Haiti did not have free and fair elections.”
“We are protesting for our right to a good election. We call for a cancellation of the election masquerade,” said one protester, Vanel Louis-Paul, 34.
The electoral council so far has given no clear indication that it will follow the OAS recommendations, which has prolonged uncertainty over the elections in the Western Hemisphere’s poorest country.
The second-round runoff is scheduled to be held on March 20. There have been fears the unrest will plunge Haiti back into political turmoil and put at risk donor aid.
Asked if U.S. aid to Haiti might be reduced if the dispute is not resolved, Clinton ruled this out. “We’re not talking about any of that,” she said.
She acknowledged, however, that the international humanitarian operation in Haiti since the Jan. 12 earthquake last year that killed more than 300,000 people has not been able to deliver all the assistance required.
“It’s been steady but not adequate to the task that we are confronting,” Clinton said. “We want to see it expedited, accelerated.”
She told Radio Metropole her husband, former President Bill Clinton, one of the coordinators of Haiti’s post-quake rebuilding efforts, remained committed to this job.
“The commitment is very strong and I can speak for my husband, he is absolutely committed,” Clinton said.
Haiti’s recovery from the earthquake has been complicated by a cholera epidemic that has killed more than 4,000 people.
Clinton visited a makeshift cholera treatment center run by a U.S.-based medical charity, where she saw patients resting on cots and chatted with health workers.
Preval’s formal mandate ends on Feb. 7, and there has been debate whether he should stay on to hand over to an elected successor or whether a provisional government should take over while the run-off is held.
“There are timing concerns, there are issues of continuing (governance) and how that could be structured and that’s what I’m going to be discussing,” Clinton said before flying back to Washington.
The United States, a big contributor of aid funds for Haiti’s reconstruction, has previously warned this support may be at risk if the OAS recommendation is not heeded. Washington has also revoked the U.S. entry visas of several Haitians linked to INITE and Celestin’s campaign.
——–Agencies