Celestin lays out conditions to participate in Haiti presidential runoff

Jude Celestin, one of the two candidates named by the Provisional Electoral Council (CEP) in Haiti - to contest the second round of the presidential elections on December 27 is insisting on “credible” measures to be adopted before he agrees to contest the race.

In a December 14 letter to the CEP president Pierre-Louis Opont,  Celestin also explained why he boycotted a meeting with the CEP on the issue.

“We are now at a crossroads: as you, as an institution responsible for organizing credible elections, that I, presidential candidate, we have a duty to steer the country in the right direction, choose the right path by taking difficult and most courageous decisions.”

He said if the country is to have a president by February 7 next year “the credibility of the process to achieve this goal is essential to our young and fragile democracy”.

He said that a credible second round would imply “that the two candidates that face (the electorate) have indeed enjoyed the confidence of the population in the first round.”

The first round of the presidential election on October 25 was marred by acts of violence, allegations of voter irregularities and the CEP said none of the candidates reached the benchmark of 50 per cent plus one of the votes, nor a lead of 25 per cent or more, as required by Haiti’s Constitution and Electoral Decree to win the presidency thereby requiring a run-off election.

The CEP announced that the government backed candidate Jovenel Moise and Célestin had emerged as the top contenders in the first round of the presidential election.

The election, which included balloting for parliament and mayors, attracted 54 presidential candidates,
Of the 5.8 million registered voters, over 1.5 million votes were cast in the election, of those 120,066 were invalidated for fraud and other irregularities.