ARTICLE - VIOLENCE FLARES IN HAITI

ELECTION VIOLENCE FLARES IN HAITI, CLOSING AIRPORT
(New York Times ) - By Deborah Sontag

PORT-AU-PRINCE — Protesters torched the headquarters of the government-backed presidential candidate, burned tires and blocked streets with rubble from earthquake-destroyed buildings on Wednesday morning, hours after the release of preliminary election results set off violence and new questions about vote rigging.

This normally traffic-clogged city was almost empty of cars except for Haitian police patrols, the airport was shut down after American Airlines canceled flights in and out of the country and an eerie quiet reigned, interrupted by the chanting from sporadic marches and by sirens wailing.

By late morning, in the hilly suburb of Pétionville, hundreds demonstrators were massing to march toward the electoral board offices, which they threatened to burn down, Haitian radio reported. United Nations peacekeeping troops, guarding the offices, were shooting in the air to keep the protesters away, the radio said.

Nine days after a turbulent election marred by disorganization, voter intimidation and fraud, the country’s electoral board announced late Tuesday night that Mirlande Manigat, a former Haitian first lady, and Jude Célestin, the governing party’s candidate, had won the first round of voting.

It also said that Michel Martelly, a singer with an impassioned following in the streets of this bedraggled city, had come in third, closely behind Mr. Célestin. This means, if the results stand, that he would not qualify to compete in a January run-off election.

The exclusion of Mr. Martelly and the inclusion of Mr. Célestin, who is considered a hand-picked successor to the increasingly unpopular departing President Rene Preval, incited the protests.

Early Wednesday afternoon, Mr. Préval addressed the country by radio and television, appealing for calm and saying that the election results should be challenged by means of a formal protest to the electoral board. “It is not through disorder that we will find the true results,” Mr. Préval said.

Mr. Martelly had vowed on Monday to contest the results if they did not appear to reflect “the will of the people.”

Reached by telephone on Wednesday morning, Mr. Martelly, who has not spoken publicly since the results were released, declined to comment, saying he needed to confer first with his manager.

On Wednesday morning, Mr. Célestin’s campaign manager, sitting in a parked car behind a windshield freshly shattered by rocks, said that Mr. Célestin was also going to contest the election results.

According to the electoral board, Ms. Manigat garnered 31.4 percent of the vote, with Mr. Célestin getting 22.5 percent and Mr. Martelly getting 21.8 percent. If these results withstood challenges, Ms. Manigat and Mr. Célestin would head into a runoff on Jan. 16.

But Mr. Célestin’s campaign manager, Sen. Joseph Lambert, said that Mr. Célestin believed he won the vote outright, with 52 percent. Mr. Lambert asserted that “the international community” had pressured the electoral board to announce “diplomatically engineered results” because they feared instability.

Mr. Lambert also said that Mr. Celestin was doing his best to keep his supporters in the rough slum called Cité Soleil from pouring into the streets in outrage.

“If we cannot hold them back, prepare yourself for civil war,” he said.

The violence began late Tuesday, after a long, tense day in which Haitians expressed anxiety that the results could ignite unrest. The official announcement at 9 p.m. resulted in rock-throwing, tire-burning and shooting in several urban neighborhoods and outside the capital city.

Toward midnight, smoke curled into the sky above Port-au-Prince and protesters’ chants and drums filled the air.

Haiti had remained calm this year after a devastating earthquake, a slow recovery, a deadly hurricane and a raging cholera epidemic. But the angry reactions to Tuesday night’s announcement raised concerns that a period of volatility could lie ahead.

The United States Embassy put out a statement late Tuesday urging all Haitian political figures to stay calm and urge their followers to do the same. It expressed concern that the preliminary results were “inconsistent” with the findings of an independent Haitian election group that posted thousands of observers throughout the country and anticipated a runoff between Ms. Manigat and Mr. Martelly — as well as with the reports of other observers, including Americans.

“The United States, together with Haiti’s international community partners, stands ready to support efforts to thoroughly review irregularities in support of electoral results that are consistent with the will of the Haitian people expressed in their votes,” the statement said.