Deportations loom in Dominican Republic for Haitian migrants who failed to register

A Haitian man registers for legal residency at the Interior Ministry in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, Tuesday, June 16, 2015. Army Gen. Rubel Paulino says those who havent registered by Thursday will be repatriated, which conflicts with statements by Interior Minister Ramon Fadul that there will be no mass deportations.

A Haitian man registers for legal residency at the Interior Ministry in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, Tuesday, June 16, 2015. Army Gen. Rubel Paulino says those who havent registered by Thursday will be repatriated, which conflicts with statements by Interior Minister Ramon Fadul that there will be no mass deportations. 

Tatiana Fernandez AP

BY JACQUELINE CHARLES jcharles@MiamiHerald.com

Wilson Sentimo was hanging with friends in his northern Dominican rice town when the gun-toting soldiers jumped out of the back of the Daihatsu truck, and demanded to see his papers.

“I told them I was Dominican, but they insisted I was Haitian,” said Sentimo, 25, recalling the day in February when he was rounded up during the military raid, thrown into the truck, and driven to four military posts before being dumped along with 30 others on the northeastern Dajabón-Ouanaminthe border.

Through efforts led by his employer Yspaniola, which contacted local and international human rights groups, Sentimo eventually made it back home the next day. But four months after his first and only visit to Haiti, Sentimo, like countless others in the Dominican Republic, remains in limbo.

“I am not at ease at all,” said Sentimo, who has a Dominican birth certificate but has had difficulty getting a Dominican national identity card because he’s been unable to get a copy of his deceased mother’s Haitian birth certificate. “I still fear being deported.”

That fear heightened after Haitians and other non-citizens scrambled to beat a 7 p.m. Wednesday registration deadline to stay in the country.

As the clock ticked, confusion reigned about what will happen Thursday and in the coming days to the thousands who failed to “regularize” their status and those Dominicans of Haitian descent, like Sentimo, who because of their often dark complexion are deemed Haitian and vulnerable to deportation.

“The situation is terrible,” said Jonathan DiMaio, co-founder and executive director of Yspaniola, 20 minutes from the city of Santa Cruz de Mao where the line of Haitians at the government registration office snaked Wednesday into the barricaded streets.

“Aside from devastating families and lives, the human rights crisis distracts from long-term solutions to include Dominicans of Haitian descent in Dominican society,” DiMaio said.

Dominican authorities have been under enormous pressure from the Caribbean Community, the United States and others in the international community to avoid mass deportations of Haitians, while human rights organizations have called for an extension of Wednesday’s registration deadline.

“The information we have is that there will be no extension of the deadline,” Fabien Sambussy, camp coordination program manager with the International Organization for Migration, said from Port-au-Prince. “We don’t know if the Dominican Republic will unofficially keep registering the people or if they will start deporting the people. We don’t have any information on what they will do.”

U.S. State Department officials who flew to Santo Domingo earlier this year to meet with aid organizations and the foreign ministry are admittedly also confused about what the country will do, making it difficult for even them to assist Haiti and human rights groups with beefed-up contingency planning along the nations’ 233-mile porous border.

Still, Haiti announced this week that it had put plans in place to welcome repatriated nationals, installing four official crossing points around the country.

While calling on Haitians to unite to welcome back their “compatriots,” Haitian Prime Minister Evans Paul on Tuesday denounced what he said were contradictory statements from Santo Domingo. While Dominican Foreign Minister Andres Navarro, for instance, guaranteed there will be no mass deportations, Army Gen. Rubén Darío Paulino announced that the immigration department and military would launch neighborhood patrols Thursday in search of those without documents.

“Faced with the double language of the Dominican government, the Haitian government has made ​​arrangements to welcome our compatriots and other people who are not necessarily of Haitians, but who face the decision of the judgment of the 168-13 Dominican Constitutional Court,” Paul said at a news conference.

The latest chapter in the long-running Haitian-Dominican saga comes nearly two years after the Dominican Republic’s Constitutional Court retroactively stripped citizenship from anyone born after 1929 who doesn’t have one parent of Dominican blood. In response to international criticism, the country soon introduced a path to citizenship, requiring most of the denationalized Dominicans to declare themselves as foreigners to obtain a residency permit in the hope of eventually getting Dominican citizenship. The deadline for that program lapsed on Feb. 1 with only a handful applying, leaving tens of thousands at risk of expulsion.

Now, five months later, comes a new deadline, this one for undocumented immigrants to adjust their status. While an estimated 250,000 — the majority of them Haitians — have started the registration process, the number is still far less than the estimated 500,000 foreign-born migrants who are deemed eligible for the regularization program, according to the Dominican Republic’s Interior Ministry.

“The implementation has been fraught with problems that affect real people who are already extremely vulnerable,” said Angelita Baeyens, program director, Partners for Human Rights Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights. “Only a very small number have received any sort of document that proves they are under the regularization plan.”

On Wednesday, in Santa Cruz de Mao, hundreds of Haitians stood in long lines, hoping to turn in their documents. Late arrivals paid $125 in bribes to soldiers for a spot, while others complained they had spent the night in line. They blamed the last-minute rush on difficulties accessing their Haitian birth certificates to prove their identity, and other documents needed to show that they had been living in the country since Oct. 2011.

Lines were equally long in Santo Domingo, where Haiti’s ambassador to the Dominican Republic, Daniel Supplice, said staffers were working as fast as they could to process paperwork so migrants could register.

“There is a lot of pressure,” Supplice said. “We are doing the best that we can.”

While Supplice reiterated that the agreement between Haiti and the Dominican Republic says “the only people they will put at the border are Haitians who are here on an irregular migration situation,” he conceded that his impoverished nation was ill-equipped to prevent the deportation of Dominicans of Haitian descent along its border, which has more than 140 entry points.

He appealed to nongovernmental and human rights organizations to help screen persons along the border.

“Somebody comes to the border. He’s black, OK. He speaks a little, Creole, OK. He speaks a little Spanish and they say he’s Haitian. But the man says he’s ‘Dominican, I was born in the Dominican Republic.’ How are we going to know that when he doesn’t have any papers to prove that?” Supplice said. “We believe there are a bunch of other factors that someone who knows the Dominican Republic well, can help us decipher.”

Still fear persist on both sides of the border.

“They are coming with their mattresses, beds, suitcases,” said Sen. Jean Baptiste Bien Aimé, who represents northeastern Haiti. “You know every time there is a deportation in the Dominican Republic, the situation turns desperate. People don’t want to get beaten, so they leave.”

Those who haven’t left voluntarily, have been expelled during military raids despite a moratorium on deportations, said Edwin Paraison, a former minister of Haitians living abroad who has long been at the forefront of the Haitian migrant issue in the Dominican Republic.

“Everyday it is happening and no one has protested,” he said. “The Dominican military doesn’t respect the norms or the laws of the Dominican Republic.”

Paraison said the Haitian and Dominican governments have to step up diplomatic efforts to avert a major crisis, especially in an election year in Haiti. He has called on both to set up centers in Haiti to process Dominicans of Haitian descent who do get deported so they can quickly be returned to the Dominican Republic.

Others in Haiti, such as Jean-Robert Argant, are calling on the international community to take a tougher stance with the Dominican Republic and its deportation policy, and for Haitians themselves to protest the decision by reducing trade with the Dominican Republic.

“We don’t have an army, but we have an army of mouths,” Argant said, referring to Haiti’s dependency on food imports from its neighbor. “What’s being done is a violation of human rights and certainly very racist.”

Special Correspondents Gérard Maxineau contributed to this report from Cap-Haitien, Haiti and Alba Reyes from Santa Cruz de Mao, Dominican Republic.

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/haiti/article24820618.html#storylink=cp

Point de presse de Samuel Madistin sur la conjoncture

Mesdames, messieurs de la presse,
Peuple haïtien,

Samuel Madistin

Notre pays vit aujourd’hui dans la perspective d’une opération d’expulsion massive en territoire voisin de citoyens et citoyennes mis en situation d’apatridie en raison d’objectifs inavoués. Cette action condamnable et totalement inacceptable qui défie toutes les règles de civilités qui doivent exister entre deux nations sœurs est un acte inamical rendu possible en raison de la faiblesse de notre Etat. Elle va aussi à l’encontre de tous les accords et conventions internationaux de respect des droits humains que les deux pays ont signés et jurés de respecter.

Nous comprenons bien qu’un pays souverain puisse vouloir contrôler les composantes et variantes de sa population mais en respectant les règles et principes éthiques de savoir-faire et de savoir-vivre qui sous-tendent ce monde que l’on voudrait global aujourd’hui.

Historiquement, les relations haitiano-dominicaines sont marquées par des crises. Et les racines de cette crise sont profondes et nombreuses. La conscience de crise semble être pourtant inégalement partagée au sein de la communauté nationale puisqu’ils ne sont pas nombreux ceux qui reconnaissent qu’il s’agit d’une crise pluridimensionnelle qui englobe, à la fois, des questions d’ordre politique, socio-économique et environnemental. De tous les problèmes qui mettent en péril l’amitié entre les deux peuples, la question migratoire demeure la plus actuelle, la plus complexe et la plus dramatique pour être restée sans solution durable depuis tantôt un siècle.

La gouvernance haïtienne de cette crise à multiples facettes a toujours laissé à désirer depuis le 20ème siècle. Mais on n’a jamais vu autant de laisser-faire de la part des autorités haïtiennes dans la gestion de la crise haïtiano-dominicaine que celui qui nous est offert aujourd’hui depuis la parution de l’arrêt 168/13 de la Cour Suprême de la République dominicaine. L’intégration à long terme dans la société haïtienne de centaines de milliers de rapatriés fait augmenter la vulnérabilité des vaillantes populations de nos sections communales, à un moment où la corruption des grands commis de l’Etat d’hier et d’aujourd’hui vient troubler la sérénité de la campagne électorale en cours et où la dépréciation de la gourde face au dollar américain a fini par ruiner les espoirs des sans-travail et des sans-logis, nos compatriotes ne voient pas très bien comment un gouvernement à bout de souffle puisse redonner la dignité à un peuple qu’il a, lui-même, plongé dans l’indignité la plus abjecte.

La République d’Haïti se retrouve dans une situation où elle serait obligée d’accueillir un nombre indéfini d’expatriés sans papier auxquels on reproche leur ascendance haïtienne. Les valeurs fondatrices de l’Etat Haïtien disent non à cette dérive historique. Malgré les protestations, manifestations et suggestions du peuple haïtien, tantôt en colère, tantôt en rogne, le Gouvernement Haïtien n’a pas fait grand-chose pour défendre l’honneur national et l’héritage de grandeur de nos ancêtres.

Il est urgent de prendre des mesures en vue de déterminer :

1) Qui recevrons-nous ? (haïtiens ? haïtiens d’origine ? afro-caribéens ? professionnels de tous calibres ? travailleurs agricoles ? Mineurs ? étudiants ? femmes séparées de leurs maris et/ou de leurs enfants, enfants séparés de leurs père et mère…) ;

2) Comment les recevoir ? (accueil à court terme – intégration à long terme dans la société haïtienne) ;

Mais que faire ?

Il nous faudra rechercher une solution durable à ce problème par :

- L’internationalisation de la crise (voie diplomatique). Cette question doit être soulevée et débattue au niveau de la CARICOM, du Cariforum, de l’Union africaine, de l’assemblée paritaire ACP/UE, de l’OEA et des Nations-Unies;

- Le renforcement des structures socio-économiques du pays ;

- Le choix d’un Etat fort pour Haïti conformément à l’idéal dessalinien

Sans m’ingérer dans les affaires internes des pays frères, je profite aussi de l’occasion pour déplorer ce grave crime à caractère raciste qui a eu lieu à Charleston en Caroline du Sud aux Etats-Unis d’Amérique qui a causé la mort de neuf (9) personnes dans une Eglise accueillant tous les fidèles, en particulier ceux de la communauté afro-américaine. Je le condamne et le déplore d’autant plus que cela ne constitue pas une première du genre dans ce pays qui a toujours prôné l’égalité de tous devant la loi, le respect des valeurs universelles de justice, de liberté et de démocratie.

Avec un Gouvernement MOPOD, les traités de frontière seront revisités, la Commission Mixte Haïtiano-dominicaine réévaluée, les échanges commerciaux reconsidérés et la dignité nationale revigorée. En avant tous pour un Etat Fort, garant des valeurs démocratiques et des libertés citoyennes dans le respect de l’idéal dessalinien qui a fait la force des Haïtiens d’autrefois et qui fera le bonheur des Haïtiens de demain.

Port-au-Prince, le 19 juin 2015

Me Samuel MADISTIN

Candidat à la Présidence d’Haïti du MOPOD

Quand Martelly se confie

Laurent Lamothe, Sophia et Michel Martelly

De Jean-Bertrand Aristide à Michel Martelly, Le Nouvelliste a rencontré tous les présidents de la République de ces dernières années pour des entretiens. Les démocratiquement élus, comme ceux qui sont arrivés au pouvoir par un accident de l’histoire, ont tous ouvert un jour leur porte aux envoyés du vieux journal de la rue Centre. Michel Martelly, le lundi 15 juin,a lâché des confidences à deux journalistes.

« Depuis décembre 2014, j’avais dit à Laurent Lamothe qu’il ne serait pas mon candidat, qu’il n’était pas souhaitable qu’il soit candidat à la présidence. J’avais dit la même chose à Sophia Martelly, ma femme », nous a déclaré le chef de l’Etat. D'ailleurs Martelly avoue que Joseph Lambert, Youri Latortue, Mario Dupuis ou Sandra Honoré connaissaient tous sa position sur la question.

Continuant sur le ton de la confidence, il a poursuivi : « Le jour où le Conseil électoral a rejeté la candidature de Sophia au Sénat, je ne lui ai dit ni bonjour ni bonsoir. Cela ne veut pas dire que je ne souhaitais pas qu’elle soit élue, mais pour la bonne marche des élections que le président que je suis se doit de réaliser, il n’était pas souhaitable que Laurent ou Sophia soit candidat ».

« L'objectif de Laurent Lamothe, candidat, est de devenir président, le mien est la tenue de bonnes élections ». « Sa k tonbe, yo tonbe. Sa k pase, yo pase », prône le président.

Plus loin, lors de cet entretien réalisé en ses bureaux au palais national, le président est revenu sur deux succès diplomatiques qu’il a portés sur les fonts baptismaux : le rapprochement entre les Etats-Unis et Cuba et le dialogue en cours entre le Venezuela et les USA.

« La rue m’a porté au pouvoir, mais pas pour gérer les affaires de l’Etat dans la rue», a dit d’entrée de jeu Martelly quand on lui pose la question sur son rôle dans ces deux opérations de bons offices.

« Je n’ai jamais parlé de ces dossiers. C’est un sénateur américain qui a dévoilé que j’ai servi d’intermédiaire dans le dossier USA-Cuba et c’est la ministre des Affaires étrangères du Venezuela, puis les officiels américains qui ont fait savoir au monde qu’il y avait eu lieu des négociations en Haïti », précise le président haïtien. 

« Les pourparlers américano-vénézuéliens, je m’y suis impliqué en avertissant à l’avance les deux parties que je le faisais pour aboutir à des résultats et ce fut fait. Dans mes appartements au palais, samedi, il y a eu deux bilatérales et une trilatérale. A la fin, Haïti a pu aider au dialogue entre les USA et le Venezuela et obtenir que les US et le Venezuela coopèrent au service d’Haïti dans les domaines de l’éducation, des élections, de l’agriculture et de l’énergie », a confié l’ancien chanteur, non sans un peu de fierté dans la voix. 

Nous n’avons pas seulement donné un local et des facilités pour les négociations, nous les avons orchestrées », se félicite le président haïtien. Lors de cette entrevue, la huitième accordée au Nouvelliste depuis qu’il s’était porté candidat à la présidence, Michel Martelly a convenu que cela lui a pris trois ans pour devenir président et qu’il se rend compte chaque jour des limites de son pouvoir. L’ancien chanteur a aussi témoigné des difficultés qu’il rencontre pour faire passer ses points de vue, que ce soit pour dire non aux trois aéroports en construction actuellement dans le Sud du pays ou pour faire voter une résolution allouant les fonds PetroCaribe. 

« Cela m’a pris trois mois pour faire adopter la dernière résolution, car à chaque fois me retrouvais en conseil des ministres avec une liste de projets qui n’était pas celle sur laquelle nous nous étions entendus », explique celui qui préfère parler le moins souvent possible ces derniers temps où tout le monde autour de lui cherche un candidat à qui se raccrocher. 

En froid avec Le Nouvelliste depuis l’épisode TV5 en novembre dernier, c’est un président Michel Martelly disposé à se confier que deux journalistes ont pu rencontrer pendant une heure, ce lundi. Un président qui a beaucoup à dire. 

Frantz Duval 

duval@lenouvelliste.com

Rencontres des Musiques du monde à Port-au-Prince

Du 17 au 27 juin 2015, « Tamise » en collaboration avec « Caracoli » proposeront un événement sans précédent en Haïti les « Rencontres des musiques du monde ». Cette manifestation réunira à Port-au-Prince aux côtés des musiciens haïtiens, des artistes en provenance de la Caraïbe, de l'Europe et d'Afrique. Pendant 10 jours : concerts, conférences, rencontres, ateliers et projections se succèderont autour du thème « les musiques traditionnelles et leurs traces dans les musiques actuelles ».

Pendant ces 10 jours, artistes et professionnels des musiques du monde se rencontreront dans différents lieux, partenaires du projet : la FOKAL, l'Institut Français en Haïti, Kay Mizik La et le Yanvalou. Musicologues, producteurs, diffuseurs, artistes régionaux et internationaux échangeront autour des musiques actuelles s'inspirant des rythmes traditionnels.

Parmis les artistes programmés citons : Follow Jah (Haïti), Kareyce Fotso (Cameroun), James Germain (Haïti), Gardy Girault (Haïti), Grupo vocal Desandann (Cuba), Lakou Mizik (Haïti), Emeline Michel (Haïti), T-K-Fe (Haïti), Trio ivoire (Allemagne-Mali-Côte d'Ivoire)

Notez que cet événement bénéficie du soutien du Ministère de la culture, de la Minustah, de l'Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie (OIF), des Ambassades de Suisse et d'Allemagne en Haïti, de Wallonie-Bruxelles International, de Institut Français en Haïti (FH), de la Fondation Connaissance et Liberté (FOKAL), VDH et Air France.

Haiti: Towards undemocratic elections, endless crisis. 3 things to know

by Samuel Maxime 

The most important thing you should know.

A ministerial certificat de décharge, a document which was made cause for the elimination of several heavily-favored candidates from the upcoming elections, has never been issued in the history of Haiti. Ever.

This ministerial-level décharge is required to be passed by a bicameral commission of the Haitian Parliament and the reason it has never, ever been issued is for one of two reasons: either the Parliament was non-existent, “non-functioning” or it was not issued for purely political reasons. For these upcoming 2015 elections, it is a little bit of the former but much more of the latter.

Even as the Haitian Constitution reads in Article 233 that décharges should be issued at the beginning of each regular session of Parliament (twice per year), one has still never been issued. Ever.

These are the candidates eliminated from presidential elections, purely, for this reason:

• Brutus, Duly
• Gauthier, Josefa
• Joazile, Jean-Rodolphe
• Lamothe, Laurent
• Mayard-Paul, Thierry
• Saint Lot, Danielle

The next thing you should know.

A number of candidates approved for elections were required to have a ‘certificat de décharge’ but did not have one.

What is most striking about these citizens approved to continue towards these presidential elections is that they did not need a ministerial-level décharge from Parliament, they only needed one from the Superior Court of Auditiors and Administrative Disputes, which is well-existent and proved to be well-functioning.

These candidates are, perhaps coincidentally, running on the parties of the three former presidents:

Lumarque Jacky, Moïse Jovenel, Narcisse Maryse  (From let to right) - 

• Lumarque, Jacky – Verite of Rene Preval
• Moïse, Jovenel – PHTK of Michel Martelly
• Narcisse, Maryse – Fanmi Lavalas of Jean-Bertrand Aristide
• The third thing you should know.
• Two of the councilors sitting on the nine-member electoral council, one of which is the council’s president, are required to have certificate de décharge to be members of the council but do not have one.
  For CEP member Marie Paul Austin, she needed a ministerial-level décharge for her service as Minister of Education from 2004-06. As stated in the “most important thing you should know”, a ministerial level décharge has never been issued.
  For the CEP President, Pierre Louis Opont, he needed a regular décharge for his service as Director General of the last electoral council in 2010-11. The CSCCA is well and functioning, he has no excuse for having not obtained this document.
  In the interest of full disclosure.
  Former Prime Minister Laurent Lamothe is among those disqualified from elections and I should disclose that he is someone who has been a friend since before the inauguration of President Michel Martelly in May of 2011. None the less, his case is not my motivation. In fact, I have not decided on who I will cast my vote for this fall. I have several I consider friends, already approved for elections. One approved candidate for the presidency helped me build this news agency.
  My motivation is that Haiti ends the endless crisis which has at its root, undemocratic, unfair, exclusive and corrupt elections. It rises illegitimate governments that do not have the true will of the Haitian people. These illegitimate governments are susceptible to blackmail from international institutions, diplomats et al who hold that illegitimacy over their heads.
  The office of the president, unlike any other seat in the state, embodies the will of the people. It must. I am advocating for an election in which all candidates are fairly admitted and political, institutional voids (which are political), do not disenfranchise the Haitian people from voting on who they want to be their leader.
  Article 233: For the purpose of maintaining constant and careful supervision over Government expenditures, a fifteen-ember Parliamentary Committee with nine (9) Deputies and six (6) Senators shall be elected by secret ballot at the beginning of each regular session, to report on the management Ministers, in order to enable the two (2) Assemblies to give them discharge.This Committee may engage the services of specialists to assist it with its monitoring functions.
• Source : Haiti Sentinel

Rubio under fire for jumping into Haiti political fray

BY JACQUELINE CHARLES jcharles@MiamiHerald.com

Republican presidential candidate Sen.
Marco Rubio, Republican Florida.        

Republican presidential candidate and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio isn’t necessarily known for carrying the Haiti agenda in Congress.

But he stepped out on a limb this week as Haitians waited to learn which candidates would make the final cut for the country’s Oct. 25 presidential ballot.

His actions came Tuesday in the form of several Haiti election-related amendments that unanimously passed the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Rubio’s action left some wondering whether the senator was trying to help candidates or if he was trying to bolster his Haiti expertise.

“Sen. Rubio believes that it is important that the Haitian people have the opportunity to freely and fairly choose their leaders,” said Rubio spokeswoman Brooke Sammon. “The Senator is pleased that the State Department will now be required to continue to update Congress on the status of Haiti’s elections to help ensure that the Haitian government is responsive to the needs of its citizens.”

U.S Sen. Marco Rubio meets with Haitian President Michel
Martelly.                                                                               

The Rubio-sponsored amendments conditions the release of U.S. funds to Haiti on the State Department’s reporting of whether the upcoming Haitian elections are free, fair and responsive to the people of Haiti, and on descriptions of “attempts to disqualify candidates” from office for “political reasons.”

It didn’t take long for Haitians to begin discussing whether Rubio’s amendment was meant to save the candidacy of former Prime Minister Laurant Lamothe, whose supporters have lobbied members of Congress.

“Broadly speaking, the United States would not want to be in a position of being perceived to be taking sides in national elections in Haiti or anywhere across the hemisphere,” Eric Farnsworth, vice president of the Council of the Americas and Americas Society, said about the amendment. “The main interest is in ensuring a process which allows Haitians themselves to choose their leadership freely and fairly.”

Damian Merlo, senior adviser to Lamothe, said his camp didn’t lobby Rubio for the language. Still, they welcome it.

“The State Department does not seem to realize the gravity of the situation and we are glad that Sen. Rubio stepped in to ensure the State Department pays the attention to this urgent matter that it deserves,” Merlo said.

U.S Sen. Marco Rubio Rep-Fla meets with  Haiti First Lady
Sophia Martelly.                                                                   

The State Department, Merlo said, “cannot just stand on the sidelines and claim this is a ‘Haitian issue.’ Free and fair elections do not seem to be shaping up in Haiti if Lamothe is left out of race, and U.S. interests are also at stake.”

Roger Noriega, former assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere, who was in the room when the bill was approved, said he’s impressed people on the Hill are paying such close attention to what’s happening in Haiti.

Given the “considerable investment” the U.S. has made in Haiti and “the implications of a political meltdown,” Noriega said, it’s a good thing that Congress is insisting that the State Department ensures the very best elections.

“The predominate impression is that certain candidates are being excluded for political reasons. I’ve had people say, ‘Let everybody run and see how it works out,’ ” he added. “The staffers and the people who follow Haiti closely, they smell a rat and I am sure that’s what’s driving this language.”

Lamothe has said his exclusion from the ballot “is political.” After Haiti’s Provisional Electoral Council (CEP) published the final list of 58 candidates Friday, confirming his disqualification because he lacked proper legal clearance.

Lamothe tweeted: “The Decision of CEP to exclude candidates from ELECTION is undemocratic, ARBITRARY and POLITICALLY MOTIVATED. Main Victim is: DEMOCRACY.”

His 81,000 Twitter followers had mixed reactions.

“Relax! Relax! Relax!,” Carmel Baptiste responded. “It’s just the beginning Laurent … Stay Tune. I will not let them Crucified you ... I’s On!!!”

Another follower, Ceant, responded in Creole that “elections don’t have superstars” then he paid homage to former President René Préval.

Two days earlier, Lamothe and his supporters tweeted the Rubio amendment, with one Haitian journalist going as far as to announce that the U.S. Senate was preparing to “punish the electoral coup in Haiti.”

Jake Johnston, a research associate with the Washington-based Center for Economic and Policy Research, said in general, getting the U.S. to report on whether elections are free, fair and transparent is a great precedent to set in Haiti, which has had fraudulent elections.

“Given past exclusion of not just candidates, but political parties, on dubious grounds, requiring the U.S. to report on such exclusions could be a positive step towards greater accountability,” Johnston said. “That said, ‘political reasons’ is a pretty subjective thing, and my concern would be how that is applied in practice.”

La liste finale des candidats à la présidence

Le Conseil Electoral Provisoire vient de publier la liste définitive des candidats agrées et habilités à participer aux prochaines élections présidentielles. Ils sont au nombre de Cinquante huit (58). Douze (12) autres candidatures ont été rejetées (définitivement). C’est le cas de celle de l’ancien Premier Ministre Laurent Salvador Lamothe et de l’homme d’Affaires Anthony Benneth.

Voici en bas la liste des candidats agréés:

Raoul Lorfils. Jr. a retransmis cette liste à HCN: