Haiti Government

President Rene Preval announced Friday that a second round of elections for Haiti's Parliament will be held July 9, despite protests about dubious results from the earlier balloting. Results from the May 21 vote showed a strong victory for the Lavalas Family party of former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. But three of the nine members of the elections council refused to approve the results--including the council president, who fled the country saying he feared for his life.

Militant supporters of former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide paralyzed Haiti's three biggest cities Monday, blocking streets and setting a fire outside the U.S. Embassy to demand the release of last month's election results. In response, the Elections Council announced the official results--giving Aristide's party control of the Senate. Those results were challenged by the international community and the council president, who fled the country over the weekend.

Former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide's party has won control of Haiti's Senate, according to partial returns from last week's election. The results of the May 21 vote, which was delayed at least four times, suggest strong support for the former priest, who is expected to run for president again this fall. The ballot was widely seen as a last chance for democracy in the impoverished, unstable Caribbean nation of 8 million people.

The ill-starred voyage of the hijacked Gonave en Fleche, which ended Monday where it began two weeks ago for 120 weary passengers and crew, bears witness to a faltering, $2.3-billion U.S.-led effort to rescue Haiti from itself. The 120-foot intercity ferry left the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince, on May 16, just five days before national elections that U.S. officials spent $20 million to finance.

As local election chief Wisner Moise finished counting his town's 19,000 votes, more than a dozen opposition candidates on this isolated island off Haiti's west coast huddled in the Magic Night Club Bar & Restaurant to assess their nation's latest attempt at democracy. "What happened last Sunday was not an election. It was a masquerade," legislative candidate Daniel Bertrand Muebrand said Thursday, as Moise carried out the slow count inside a police station that was off limits to the public.

Braving threats of violence, Haitians lined up by the thousands Sunday for a vote to restore democracy and in the process free half a billion dollars in desperately needed foreign aid. The Haitians' strong determination to vote--not seen since 1990 elections brought Jean-Bertrand Aristide to power in Haiti's first democratic balloting--was frustrated by delays lasting several hours. Hundreds of people were waiting to vote in the legislative and local elections at 5 p.m.

Small groups of protesters blocked traffic and threw rocks at vehicles in parts of Port-au-Prince, in a third day of demonstrations over Haiti's election process. Many store owners refused to open their shops as protesters set up flaming tire barricades at intersections leading to the capital's downtown business district. Some protesters fired shots into the air in a midtown slum, and two cars were set afire on a seaside boulevard.

It was just after sunset when "The Gift of God" mowed down dozens of men and women in this coastal town. Sixteen died on the spot as the passenger bus bearing the name "Le Cadeau de Dieu" barreled onto the roadside with lights dimmed. The driver fled on foot before police arrived. The owner has yet to be held accountable.

More than five years and over $2 billion after President Clinton ordered 20,000 U.S. troops to occupy this Caribbean nation--first to "Restore" and then to "Uphold Democracy," as the U.S. operations were named--chaos and violent death remain facts of life in Haiti. Disturbing signs of disintegration abound.

President Rene Preval appointed a new government by decree Thursday in an attempt to end nearly two years of crisis and regain the confidence of the international community. Haiti's new government, packed with Preval allies, was immediately criticized by his political opponents. Yet it probably will be welcomed by Haiti's business sector and an international community frustrated by Haiti's prolonged political stalemate.