Voting complication may cause low turnout in Haiti election

By Joseph Guyler Delva From Haitian-Caribbean News Network

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (HCNN) — The multitude of candidates and political parties and other technical problems, involved with Haiti’s upcoming elections, are likely to trigger a very low turnout during the balloting that is crucial for the Caribbean country’s democratic future.

Voters will have to elect 119 deputies (members of the Lower Chamber) out of 1,622 candidates and 232 competitors are running to fill 20 senate seats during the first round of the long-overdue legislative elections which is scheduled to take place on August 9.

There are nearly 200 political parties, of which 120 were authorized to present candidates at different levels.

“People are going to have a lot of difficulty to choose from all those candidates and this situation will cause a very low turnout,” Sociologist Fritz Dorviliers told the Haitian-Caribbean News Network (HCNN).

“You imagine a ballot with 25, 35 or 55 candidates and voters will have in their hands several ballots with that many candidates to choose from,” Dorviliers said. “This is crazy!” he exclaimed.

Nearly 6 million of the more than 10 million Haitians have registered to cast a ballot in 13,725 voting booths throughout the country while some 12,000 police officers will be mobilized on election day.

However, many have been complaining that at less than 48 hours from Sunday’s election they have not been able to identify the location of their voting booth.

The electoral council, tasked with organizing the vote, failed to publish and post voting lists on the walls of electoral facilities 30 days before the election, as required by the decree governing the organization of the ballot.

Election authorities informed that voters may go on the electoral council’s website or they could dial a toll-free telephone number to find information about their voting location. However, many say the service often works poorly.

“One can predict the frustration voters will have when they will go to an electoral bureau and be told their names are not on the list,” said Dorviliers who has a doctorate in Sociology.

“I believe there will be a chaotic situation in the voting booths that are usually exiguous and where tens of observers, party delegates, electoral staff and voters are expected to cohabitate,” said Dorviliers predicting serious logistical problems. “This may give birth to an explosive situation,” he said.

Besides the legislative race, a presidential ballot is scheduled to take place on October 25, to elect Michel Martelly’s successor who should take office in Feb. 2016. 55 candidates have approved to be on the presidential ballot.

The runoff election for the legislative race will take place at the same time as the first round of the presidential ballot, while the runoff for the presidential (if need be) is set for December this year.

Analysts believe the low illiteracy rate and the complication of the vote will certainly hurt voters’ turnout. “Imagine an analphabet holding ballots with so many names and pictures of candidates and emblems of political parties,” said Meschak Joseph, a university academic. “He (or she) is going to take an eternity to vote,” Joseph explained.

However, elections and government authorities have launched an aggressive civic education campaign to inform people about the electoral process and incite them to turn out to vote.

“We are doing all we can to ensure the holding of free, fair, inclusive and democratic elections,” said the president of the electoral council, Pierre Louis Opont. “We are motivating the population and everything is ready,” he stated.

Voting booths will open at 6 AM on Sunday and will close at 4 in the afternoon.

IMAGE: President of the Haitian Electoral Council, Pierre Louis Opont

For more on this story go to: http://hcnn.ht/en/2015_05/politics/465/Voting-complication-may-cause-low-turnout-in-Haiti-election.htm

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Human rights groups fear eruption of violence in Haiti election

By Joseph Guyler C. Delva From Haitian-Caribbean News Network

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (HCNN) — Human rights groups in Haiti have expressed fear of violence during legislative elections set for Sunday in the Caribbean country where violent incidents, related with the electoral campaign, have already left several people killed and several dozen others wounded.

Activists from the National Network to defend Human Rights (known as RNDDH) and the head of the Platform of Haitian human rights organizations (POHDH) said on Friday that violence is likely to erupt in several parts of the country given the ongoing infighting among rival candidates and their violent supporters.

According to the human rights organizations, at least 5 people have been gunned down in different incidents in several parts of the country between supporters of rival candidates, and human rights watchdogs say the violence is increasing as election day nears.

“We are very preoccupied by the violence that is going on, and we are calling on police authorities to take all necessary measures to stop the violence and prevent the worst,” Pierre Esperance, the head of RNDDH told HCNN on Friday.

Esperance also criticized election authorities he accused of taking abusive measures to expel certain candidates from the race, which, he said, may trigger violence during the elections.

Several political actors have denounced the distribution of illegal weapons in several regions of the country in order to disrupt the vote which is taking place on Sunday from 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. to elect 20 senators and 119 members of the Lower Chamber. A runoff for the legislative ballot is scheduled to take place on October 25.

“There were already a lot of illegal weapons in circulation in Haiti, but more weapons have been distributed to supporters of candidates and political parties to be used during the elections,” said Marie Yolene Gilles, a spokesperson for the human rights group RNDDH. “The violence is increasing,” he said.

The leader of Fusion Party, Edmonde Beauzile, said several candidates running under the banner of her party have been attacked or threatened by armed groups acting on behalf of rival candidates. Beauzile also accused a number of police officers in the Northern and Central Plateau regions involved in partisan political activities.

“There many people with weapons who are plotting to disrupt the election and I warned police and election authorities that we may face a bloodbath in the Central Plateau if necessary measures are not taken,” said political leader and presidential candidate Edmonde Beauzile.

Haitian Prime minister, Evans Paul, stated that the police have received very clear instructions to arrest anybody who would be involved with electoral violence regardless of their political affiliation.

“We don’t need to know whether violators are close to the government or not, they should simply be arrested and presented to a judge for legal proceedings,” said Paul. “The instruction is zero tolerance for violence in the election,” he said.

Police authorities have guaranteed that all the necessary measures have been taken to secure the election.

“The police will guard against all eventualities because there have been a number of precedents regarding violence during elections in Haiti,” said the spokesman for the Haitian police, Frantz Lerebours. “You always have people who want to stir electoral violence,” he explained.

Lerebours said the police will try to use deterrence and preventive measures, but “we are ready to use repressive force against violators if necessary,” he assured.

Thousands of police officers, supported by remaining UN peacekeepers, will be deployed throughout the country to secure the election, according to Lerebours.

A presidential ballot is also scheduled for October this year to elect the successor of president Martelly who will leave office in February 2016

IMAGE: Human rights activist Pierre Esperance holding a Haitian flag during a march to denounce immigration discriminatory measures from the neighboring Dominican Republic

For more on this story go to: http://hcnn.ht/en/2015_05/politics/466/Human-rights-groups-fear-eruption-of-violence-in-Haiti-election.htm

Suriname bank with half billion dollars in assets acquired by Trinidad’s Republic Bank

From CARIBBEAN360

PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad – Republic Bank Limited has welcomed a new territory into the fold of the expanding financial group, with the acquisition of a Surinamese bank with just over half billion US dollars in assets.

Republic Bank (Suriname) N.V. will begin operations tomorrow, following the Trinidad and Tobago financial institution’s acquisition of RBC Royal Bank (Suriname) N.V. from RBC Financial (Caribbean) Limited, through the purchase of Royal Overseas Holdings (St. Lucia) Limited. The transaction closed last Friday.

The Suriname bank has a network of five branches in the capital of Paramaribo and one in Nickerie, and assets of approximately US$525 million, as at October 31, 2014.

“We’re very excited about the opportunity to be part of the future development of Suriname and intend to hold true to our tradition of adding value to the countries in which we operate, both on a commercial and community level,” Managing Director of Republic Bank, David Dulal-Whiteway said.

“Undoubtedly, at our core is a culture of providing excellent, innovative customer service. We believe in organic growth and have a well-established institutional track record of successfully entering new territories, ensuring compliance and integrity, while investing in technology and the development of the country’s human resource capabilities.”

This latest acquisition brings the Republic Bank Group’s strategic expansion to nine territories. The others are Barbados, Cayman Islands, Cuba, St Lucia, Trinidad and Tobago, Grenada, Guyana and, more recently, Ghana.

IMAGE: RBC ROYAL BANK (SURINAME) N.V. HAS BEEN ACQUIRED BY REPUBLIC BANK LIMITED. (PHOTO: WATERKANT.NET)

For more on this story go to: http://www.caribbean360.com/business/suriname-bank-with-half-billion-dollars-in-assets-acquired-by-trinidads-republic-bank#ixzz3i3kGC5R9