A jittery Haiti votes to elect a new president

Haitians vote Sunday for a new president as the poorest country in the Americas seeks to shed chronic political instability and get back on its feet.

Nearly five years after President Michel Martelly came to power, this first round vote is the only one of several recent elections to be staged within the established timetable.

Because of a nagging conflict between the executive branch and the opposition, legislative elections, as well as municipal and local ones, are being held more than three years behind schedule.

Martelly is a pop singer and political novice who assumed office in 2011, the year after a catastrophic earthquake killed more than 220,000 and left upwards of 1.5 million living in the streets.

Damage from the magnitude 7.0 quake that struck on January 12, 2010 was estimated at 120 percent of GDP. Most government and other buildings in the capital Port-au-Prince were flattened, including the presidential palace. The quake weakened a state already ravaged by years of political instability.  
After the end of the 30-year Duvalier dictatorship in 1986, Haiti has endured one crisis after another.  

There have been elections mired by violence from the Tontons Macoutes, the militia of the Duvalier regime.

Military coups have triggered international sanctions.

Disputed elections forced a president into exile.

Haiti made history in 1804 as the only country born from a revolt by slaves, in this case against French colonial rule. But it has hardly found democratic stability.
- 54 candidates for president -
Fifty-four candidates are running for the Caribbean nation's highest office and a chance to lift the destitute nation out of its systemic poverty. But that abundance of hopefuls is not a sign of democratic health.
When Martelly came to power, for many it was perceived as a sign that the job was open to pretty much anyone.  

A dozen or so of the candidates are former lawmakers or leaders of established political parties. But many others are unknowns to the average Haitian. And only a handful of candidates have actually bothered to release a platform outlining what they actually plan to do if elected.  

"The debates were shallow. The candidates only spoke in generalities. None of them showed that they are in a position to manage the situation well," said Haitian economist Kesner Pharel.

"The government made an effort to present the 2015-2016 budget to the candidates. Only a dozen or so answered the invitation and they did not take the opportunity to show their program was serious," Pharel said. "They did not even understand that this budgetary tool is the fundamental element for running the country well."   

Whoever takes over from Martelly on February 7 of next year will face huge challenges and a humanitarian emergency.
- Major challenges -
Six million of Haiti's 10 million people live in extreme poverty, getting by on less than $2.5 a day.

Every year, 100,000 young people graduate and enter the labor market without prospects for finding work.

And five years after the earthquake, more than 85,000 still live in makeshift refugee camps, according to Amnesty International.

The need for national unity is preached by many politicians. But after the quake, attempts at open and inclusive government failed.  

"In Haiti, we do not like to lose. The 53 people who are going to lose the presidential election are going to get together to say there was fraud," said Pharel.

"It is often said that there is strength in numbers. It is written on the flag. But in Haiti people come together to destroy. That is what is scary."
Election day violence is the main worry of the Provisional Electoral Council, which is in charge of overseeing the voting.

On August 9, when first round legislative elections were held, violence in some places was so bad that the council scrapped balloting in nearly a quarter of Haiti's electoral districts.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has appealed to Haitian candidates, parties and political leaders to conclude their campaigning peacefully.

The international community, which wants to avert a repeat of the violence, has provided Haiti with more than $30 million to stage its elections. And the Organization of American States is deploying 125 election observers.

Source: AFP