ARTICLE - VOTE RESULTS TO BE REVIEWED

HAITIAN VOTE RESULTS TO BE REVIEWED
(New York Times) - By Deborah Sontag

PORT-AU-PRINCE — Citing the “manifest dissatisfaction of numerous voters,” Haiti’s electoral council announced Thursday that it would rapidly recount the preliminary election results that set off violent protests, shutting down the country.

The council said that the top three vote-getters, as well as national and international election observers, would be invited to oversee a re-examination of the vote count sheets at the official tabulation center.

While the process is underway, candidates should urge their followers to stay calm — and the Haitian national police should guard lives and property, the council said in a communiqué.

Whether the council’s capitulation to local and international pressure would calm the population remained to be seen. A cool, steady rain had already dampened much of the protest activity that rocked the nation on Wednesday, although the country remained shuttered, fires still burned, streets were still barricaded and protests continued to flare in pockets throughout this city.

Haiti had remained calm this year despite a devastating earthquake, a slow recovery, a deadly hurricane and a raging cholera epidemic. But the angry reactions to the release of the election results late Tuesday raised concerns that a period of volatility could lie ahead.

On Wednesday, protesters set fire to the party headquarters of President Rene Preval’s chosen successor, and many hundreds marched on the electoral council offices, where United Nations peacekeeping troops repelled them with tear gas, rubber bullets and flash-bang grenades.

Protesters barricaded streets with heaps of earthquake rubble and burned hundreds of tires, sending plumes of black smoke into the air. The marches and clashes flared episodically, interrupting an otherwise eerie stillness with chanting, drums, gunfire and sirens. Haitian radio reported that four protesters had been killed.

The unrest was provoked by the national electoral council’s announcement that Mr. Préval’s protégé — a former state construction company executive named Jude Célestin — had edged out a popular singer, Michel Martelly, for a spot in a January runoff against Mirlande Manigat, a former first lady.

On Wednesday afternoon, Mr. Préval, whose leadership since the earthquake has been disparaged as ineffective, appealed for calm as the crisis showed no sign of abating. Mr. Préval, who is finishing his second term and ineligible for a third, said the election should be challenged through legal means, not in the streets. ”It is not through disorder that we will find the true results,” he said.

The election results showed Ms. Manigat, a university administrator admired for her intellect, with 31.4 percent of the vote, Mr. Célestin with 22.5 percent, and Mr. Martelly, seen as an anti-establishment candidate, with 21.8 percent.

If the results withstood challenges, Ms. Manigat and Mr. Célestin would head into a runoff on Jan. 16. (A candidate needed 50 percent of the vote to win in the first round.)