PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (CMC):
OVER THREE dozen political parties and presidential candidates and a member of the electoral council in Haiti yesterday expressed doubt that the new schedule set for the presidential and congressional elections could be met.
They raised the concerns against the background of a
current lack of security and persistent technical problems.
The nine-member electoral council and Haiti's interim government have set the first round of the polls for February 7, with a possible run-off on March 19, while the official transfer of power to a new elected leader is scheduled for March 29, which marks the 19th anniversary of the ratification of the country's constitution.
A poll to elect local government officials is also set for April 30.
NEW SCHEDULE PUBLISHED
The government and the electoral council published the new schedule, 24 hours after the U.N. Security Council on Friday passed a resolution calling on Haitian authorities to organise the vote no later than February 7.
"We are heading directly toward an electoral farce," said Paul Denis, a presidential candidate for the People's Struggle Party. There are several problems hampering the holding of the polls. For example, thousands of voters have been assigned to the wrong voting centres while more than half of the voting cards are yet to be distributed. Voters' lists have not yet been published even though electoral regulations say they should be affixed on polling stations' walls one month before the holding of the ballot, for voters to have enough time to identify the place where they are assigned to cast their vote.
"The council won't be able to correct all those problems in time to hold these elections as scheduled," said Dejean Belizaire who heads the national council of political parties' made up of 30 political parties.
Those parties and several others accused the government of wanting to comply at any cost with the U.N. Security Council's resolution, while ignoring the reality in the field.
A member of the electoral council, Patrick Fequiere, also said the council would not have time to solve current technical problems in time to meet the new deadline.
"I am sure this time my colleagues on the council won't have the guts to say they will postpone the elections, but it won't be necessarily because all the serious problems facing the electoral process will have been solved," said Fequiere. "They felt pressured by the government and the Security Council's resolution," said Fequiere, predicting those elections may plunge the country into an even deeper political crisis.
Several parties and candidates also expressed concerns about the security situation and the ongoing violence they believe may hamper efforts to hold peaceful and credible elections in the troubled Caribbean country.
Elections have so far been postponed on four occasions.
