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<font size=3><i>Haiti Action Committee Post-Election Update<br>
<br>
On his long fought for return home, President Jean-Bertrand Aristide
addressed the fundamentally unjust nature of recent U.S./UN-backed
Haitian elections, saying, “The problem is exclusion, and the solution is
inclusion. The exclusion of Fanmi Lavalas [Aristide’s political party] is
the exclusion of the majority … because everybody is a person.” Aristide
recently returned from a seven-year exile in South Africa, where he and
his family lived in forced exile after his democratically-elected
government was ousted in a U.S.-backed coup.<br>
<br>
Both the November 28 elections and the March 20 runoff are sham
elections, referred to by many Haitians as “selections.” In addition to
the exclusion of Fanmi Lavalas, the Nov. 28 elections were fraught with
massive problems – voters were unable to find their names at polling
places; there was chaos and violence at a number of the polls. There was
little effort to allow earthquake survivors living in tent camps to vote.
The Center for Economic and Policy Research condemned the exclusion of
Lavalas, saying, “The second round […] is based on an illegitimate
electoral process and a deeply flawed first round. New, inclusive
elections remain the only way to ascertain the true will of the Haitian
people.”<br>
<br>
The international investment of millions in these sham run-off elections,
which offered up two right-wing candidates sympathetic to former dictator
Baby Doc Duvalier, shows contempt for Haitian sovereignty, and the rights
of its people to determine their own future. Haiti Action Committee
will continue to work on behalf of Haiti’s poor majority, not the few
elites who will benefit from this illegitimate election.<br>
</i> <br>
<i>While mainstream news agencies credit a "landslide" victory
to Martelly, the Center for Economic and Policy Research issued a report
[see below] indicating even lower voter turnout in the run-offs than in
the first round. Martelly won with the support of just 16.7% of the
eligible electorate. For more on Martelly, see
<a href="http://www.haitisolidarity.net/article.php?id=503"><u>Annul the
Elections, Stop the Duvalier Restoration, Return President
Aristide</a></u> by Charlie Hinton.<br>
</i> <br>
The following report was posted by the
<a href="http://www.cepr.net/">Center for Economic and Policy
Research</a> on Tuesday, 05 April 2011:<br>
<br>
<u>MARTELLY'S HISTORICALLY WEAK MANDATE<br>
</u> <br>
Preliminary results announced by the CEP last night showed Michel ³Sweet
Micky² Martelly with 67.6 percent of the vote, while Mirlande Manigat
received 31.5 percent. While news headlines focus on the ³landslide²
victory for Martelly, he actually received the support of only 16.7
percent of registered voters -- far from a strong mandate -- as early
reports show Martelly with just 716,986 votes to Manigat¹s 336,747.
Reports indicate that turnout was even lower than in the first round,
when it was a historically low 22.8 percent, and Martelly¹s percent of
votes (as well as Manigat¹s)<br>
would have been even smaller were it not for the use of new electoral
lists which removed some 400,000 people from the rolls.<br><br>
Nevertheless, media reports have largely ignored the issue of turnout.
AOL¹s Emily Troutman reported last night that, ³Martelly's 67 percent of
the vote is nearly unprecedented in Haiti and a clear mandate for his
leadership². Not only is the 67 percent number misleading in terms of his
overall support, it is also far from unprecedented (as other reporters
have also stated). In 1990 Aristide was elected with 67 percent of the
vote, but with significantly higher turnout. Aristide received over one
million votes in 1990 even though there were over one million fewer
registered voters at the<br>
time. In 1995, Preval was elected with over 87 percent of the vote. In
2000, Aristide received over 3.5 times as many votes as Martelly did in
the runoff elections last month. Even Preval¹s most recent term began
with a greater<br>
mandate than Martelly¹s; in 2006 he received nearly one million votes
with 700,000 fewer registered voters.<br><br>
It is also worth noting that the electoral process has been deeply flawed
from the beginning. Despite an aggressive and expensive get-out-the-vote
campaign from the UN and U.S., the second round suffered from many of the
same problems as the first: low turnout and a high number of
irregularities. The legality of the second round remains in doubt given
that a majority of the CEP¹s members appear never to have verified the
first round results.<br><br>
There were also widespread irregularities in the March 20 elections.
Although the US issued a statement last night saying that irregularities
³were isolated and reduced², some 15 percent of the tally sheets were
quarantined from preliminary results due to fraud or other
irregularities. This is a greater portion excluded than in the first
round, and represents over 100,000 votes.<br><br>
It is clear that a candidate that won only 4.6 percent of the electorate
in the first round and 16.7 percent in the second round does not have a
strong mandate to rule. In such a context, one would hope that
Martelly would seek<br>
to work with civil society and with his political opponents, especially
those that were arbitrarily excluded from the elections, as Fanmi Lavalas
and several other parties were.<br>
Ever since the earthquake, Haitians have reached across political lines
to join each other in the urgent tasks of helping their neighbors to
rebuild their communities, and their nation. The continued political
marginalization<br>
of parties and groups that are supported by a majority of people can only
detract from the critical tasks at hand. <br>
[END CEPR REPORT]<br>
<br>
Sent by Haiti Action Committee<br>
<a href="http://www.haitisolidarity.net/">www.haitisolidarity.net</a> and
on FACEBOOK<br>
<br><br>
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