ARTICLE - MAYOR P-A- P - RESISTANCE

MAYOR OF PORT-AU-PRINCE RALLIES FOR "RESISTANCE" FROM A "COUP"
(Defend Haiti) -

PORT-AU-PRINCE - The mayor of Port-au-Prince denounced a February 23rd presidential decree nominating "a municipal commission of three members to administer the municipality of Port-au-Prince until the next elections."

"The crises-specialists in the central government cause trouble by announcing in a press release that they just committed a coup against the city government of Port-au-Prince with the consent of an elected official, President Martelly,". This is how Muscadin Jean-Yves Jason considers the dismissal of his cartel mayor of the capital, reports AlterPresse.

Ms Hyacinthe Gabrielle, Mrs Jean Marie and Junior Gerald Descorbett Estime", are the persons chosen by the president to form a new cartel.

Since the president's decision to move unilaterally the national carnival to Les Cayes (200km from the capital), from 19 to 21 February, without any consideration for the festivities in Port-au-Prince, tensions escalated between the mayor of the capital and the Ministry of Interior, Local Authorities and National Defense.

"The central government wants to intimidate Mayors when he pretends dismissing them", said the dismissed mayor from Port-au-Prince, in reference to the appointment by presidential decree - dated January 18, of 13 municipal committees.

Also, in his capacity as special advisor to the National Federation of Haitian Mayors (Fenamh), Jason asks "municipal councils supposedly revoked to stay or return to their positions until elections in 2012", because only elected representatives should replace them.

In a phone interview last week with AlterPresse, the spokesman of the presidency, Lucien Jura, noted the attachment of Martelly of the principle that "an elected replaces another elected." He explained that municipal councils elected in 2006 should have been dismissed because of "anomalies, and malpractices, signals characteristic of dysfunction," among others.

The deposed mayor Jean Yves Jason invites elected officials in the West to "join him to address the coup," shouting "resistance."