Interim leader to step down in wake of killing
PORTAUPRINCE, Haiti — With foreign powers weighing in, Haitian officials announced a new prime minister Monday in an attempt to resolve a caustic leadership struggle in the wake of President Jovenel Moise’s assassination.
Claude Joseph, the prime minister who took control of Haiti’s government immediately after the killing, is stepping down in favor of Ariel Henry, a neurosurgeon who had been appointed to the position by the president before he was killed, the elections minister said Monday.
Since the assassination on July 7, Haitian politicians have been at loggerheads, grappling for control of the government. And the scramble for power is being heavily influenced by foreign countries, including the United States, which has long held enormous sway in the country.
“Haiti has become a baseball being thrown between foreign diplomats,” said Joseph Lambert, president of Haiti’s Senate, adding that pressure from U.S. diplomats was a major factor in the reshuffling of Haiti’s leadership.
The switch in government announced Monday follows a period of intense uncertainty in the wake of the president’s assassination. But the political maneuvering by Haitian officials and international power brokers was met with anger by Haitian activists and democracy advocates, who said it did not consider what the people wanted.
“It’s as if they have replaced the Haitian people. It’s revolting,” Chavannes JeanBaptiste, leader of Seeing Eye To Eye, a civil society group that represents more than 1 million Haitians in the countryside, said of the foreign powers.
Joseph, the nation’s interim prime minister, had been scheduled to be replaced the week of the killing, but the newly appointed prime minister, Henry, had yet to be sworn in. Both declared themselves to be the legitimate prime ministers, creating a power vacuum that threatened to further destabilize a country that had already been gripped by months of street protests over Moise’s rule.
But on Monday, Mathias Pierre, the minister for elections, said in a text message that Joseph would step down in “favor of Ariel Henry.”
On Sunday night, Henry released a prerecorded speech addressing the Haitian people on social media channels. He saluted the maturity of the Haitian people in the face of “what could be called a coup d’état,” and he asked the nation’s political actors to walk along the peaceful path that Haiti’s people have followed.