Food Riots Lead to Haitian Meltdown
By KATHIE KLARREICH Mon Apr 14, 6:10 PM ET
The good news is that there hasn’t been a coup d’etat in Haiti in the wake of violent protests over increased food prices. However Saturday’s vote by 16 of the country’s 27 lawmakers to oust Prime Minister Jacques Edouard Alexis means that the country is in the middle of a severe leadership crisis - and that Haiti’s Head of State, President Rene Preval, is now politically impotent, bereft of his chief executive.
Preval, who called the Senate vote on Alexis unjust, must now present a new candidate to parliament. Meanwhile, the government is in a lame duck position, with all current cabinet ministers, as well as other secretaries of state in appointed positions, reduced to caretakers. It could be some time before the lawmakers approve a new candidate since there is no majority party in the legislature.
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