Haitian PM installs transition council to prepare for long-awaited elections

Haitian Prime Minister Ariel

Henry on Monday formally installed a transition council whose job will be to prepare for long-overdue elections in the Caribbean country, amid a humanitarian crisis driven by violence from armed gangs.

Haiti, which has been without any elected representatives since early January, last held a presidential vote in 2016.

"This is the beginning of the end of dysfunction in our democratic institutions," Henry said in a speech, adding that the High Transition Council (HCT) unanimously backed his request for an international force to help Police restore order.

Henry took power in July 2021 days after the assassi- nation of President Jovenel Moïse. He has pledged to leave office by February 7, 2024, after postponing elections indefinitely in the wake of a devastating earthquake that affected the Southern Peninsula, along with gang violence.

The Transition Council, composed of three members representing Haiti's political, business and civil sectors, is expected to develop an ambitious road map for the next elections and choose members of a provisional electoral council as well as a committee to revise the country's constitution.

Its members are: Mirlande Manigat, a former presidential candidate; Laurent SaintCyr, President of Haiti's

Chamber of Commerce; and Pastor Calixte Fleuridor, from the country's