15 vie for Haiti presidency on new dates

Friday, August 19, 2005

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AFP): At least 15 candidates have launched campaigns for Haiti's presidency, and a source said Thursday the election commission would announce new voting dates.

The first round of legislative and presidential elections will take place November 6, with a second round on December 18, according to a source at the Provisional Electoral Commission.

"New constraints oblige us to change the dates," the source said on condition of anonymity.

"We will submit an amended calendar to the political parties," the source said.

The previous dates were October 9 and November 11.

The first elected president to follow deposed president Jean Bertrand Aristide will be installed on February 7. Aristide was forced from office on February 29, 2004.

The commission also said that Dumarsais Simeus, a rich industrialist who has lived in the United States for 40 years, had declared his candidacy.

Another businessman, Charles Henri Baker, member of the group of "184," which took the lead in ousting Aristide, joined those running for the top job.

Leslie Manigat, Haiti's president from February to June 1988, has also thrown his hat in the ring, along with former legislator Paul Denis.

Meanwhile, unknown persons in the neighboring Dominican Republic wounded and burned four Haitians living there, firefighters said Thursday. Three of the Haitians remain in serious condition in a hospital burn unit.

The attacks are only the most recent against Haitians in Haina, west of Santo Domingo, fire chief Rolando Cuello Segura said.

The assailants beat the Haitians, aged 19-22 and doused them with a flammable liquid before setting them ablaze late Tuesday, he said. The fourth man escaped.

The Dominican Republic shares the Caribbean island of Hispaniola with Haiti.

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