International News

PORT-AU-PRINCE,(MILLAT+APP/AFP) – Haitian
police stopped hundreds of demonstrators challenging the presidential election’s outcome on Wednesday, blocking them, clashing with stone-throwers and lobbing tear gas to disperse the crowds.
On Tuesday, sporadic violence broke out in some of Port-au-Prince’s
poorest neighborhoods — carried by Maryse Narcisse’s Fanmi Lavalas Party — against winner Jovenel Moise, the man former president Michel Martelly chose to represent his party.
Early data show that Moise won the election outright, garnering 55.7
percent of the November 20 vote, barring the need for a second round. But he
lacks popularity, with only 21 percent of eligible voters having cast their
ballots.
Demonstrators marching Wednesday ran up against officers with heavy
weapons and riot shields, who blocked them in Petionville, a well-off suburb of the capital.
Marchers lobbed stones at police, who first responded with tear gas
grenades and then water cannons.
Jude Celestin is so far second with 19.52 percent of the vote. Moise
Jean-Charles (11.04 percent), and Maryse Narcisse (8.99 percent) are readying to take their disputes to the electoral authorities.
The electoral council issued a statement on Wednesday reminding
Haitians that the results are only preliminary and urging “parties, political groups and candidates to refrain from declaring themselves elected.”
Haiti is one of the world’s most inequitable countries, according to
the World Bank, with the electoral crisis a further demonstration of the persistent divisions between the poor majority and the wealthy elite.
The election, which took place without major incident, is seen as an
essential step to allow the country to return to the constitutional order after the cancellation of the first round of the presidential election held in October 2015.