Caribbean & Central America - June 2016 (ISSN 1741-4458)

Haiti’s provisional electoral council (CEP) has revealed yet another timeframe for the country’s long overdue elections. Crucially it has incorporated the recommendations of a report presented on 30 May by the verification commission (Cieve), set up by interim president Jocelerme Privert to evaluate the 25 October 2015 first-round presidential election results in the wake of fraud allegations. In line with Cieve’s report, the CEP has scrapped the presidential first round and with it the run-off between Jovenel Moïse of former President Michel Martelly (2011-2016)’s Parti Haïtien Têt Kalé (PHTK) – who the opposition maintains was the chief beneficiary of the fraud – and Jude Célestin of the opposition Ligue Alternative Pour le Progrés et l’Emancipation Haïtienne (Lapeh) party. Instead it has set 9 October and 8 January 2017 as the dates for the new presidential first and second rounds respectively,

The need for the Cieve, which audited 25% of the results, or 3,325 tally sheets from 13,000 polling stations across the country, was clear given another official commission (CEEI) set up at the end of last year by Martelly found 92% of 1,771 tally sheets selected at random contained “serious irregularities” [RC-16-01]. The Cieve similarly found multiple problems with the documents verified (see sidebar).

Announcing the new electoral timeframe on 6 June, CEP president Léopold Berlanger said the presidential race would not be reopened, with the 54 candidates who ran in the October 2015 first round having between 8-23 June to confirm their participation. Yet areas of uncertainty persist. One is what to do about the 42 contested legislative elections, which the Cieve suggested should also be re-examined. The local media cited Berlanger as saying that decisions would be taken after each case had been evaluated by the relevant electoral official.

With the PHTK and its allies now threatening unrest and rejecting the Cieve’s findings and the new electoral calendar, the international community, which is pressing for the electoral process to be completed as soon as possible, has issued a mixed response. In a 6 June statement, the United Nations Special Representative in Haiti, Sandra Honoré, and the so-called ‘Core Group’ – the local ambassadors from Brazil, Canada, France, Spain, the US, the European Union, and the Organization of American States (OAS) – urged “all Haitian actors to… respect the electoral calendar to organise transparent and equitable elections in an impartial manner”. It also expressed “deep concern” that “the decision to rerun the presidential elections will have financial consequences and prolong the electoral process started in 2015”. On 8 June, US State Department spokesperson Mark C. Toner said the US “regrets” the CEP’s decision to “restart the presidential elections from the first round” while the same day, the EU announced it was pulling its observer mission, describing the restaging of elections “unjustified”. On 8 June, however, the OAS issued a statement “welcome[ing] the publication of the Haitian electoral calendar”, noting the “continuation of the presidential, legislative and local elections is a critically important step towards the institutional stability of Haiti”.

New electoral calendar

Under the CEP’s new timeframe, the first-round presidential elections and first-round of elections for a third of the 30-seat senate (whose seats are due to expire) will take place on 9 October, with final results from both contests to be announced on 22 November. If no candidate receives 50%+1 of the vote in this set of elections, run-offs will then take place on 8 January 2017, with definitive results from the presidential contest and senate election to be announced on 30 January 2017 and 24 February 2017, respectively. Delayed partial legislative run-offs will also take place on 9 October, with final results to be announced on 5 December while delayed local elections will take place on 8 January 2017 with definitive results to be announced on 2 April 2017.

• Irregularities

In its report presented on 30 May, the verification commission (Cieve) cited various irregularities. These included the trading of accreditation cards, distributed to party representatives and electoral observers (mandataires), which allowed people to vote multiple times. The Cieve’s report also found that the number of untraceable votes (628,000, or 40% of the valid vote) exceeded the legitimate votes cast in favour of politicians. Other problems included the omission of documents including the partial voting list, all of which, the Cieve noted, made it impossible to determine the validity of the vote and therefore who should be in the run-off elections.