Remarks of President Martelly on the political crisis

In an interview broadcasted last Monday on the television of Radio Canada, the President Martelly gave an update on the current political crisis, among other : the absence of Prime Minister, of a government, free education, the state of relations between the Executive and Legislative, the Constitution… We reproduce the more important extracts of this interview.

“Be qualify as a statesman or a serious man, this is not my concern. My concern is simple: relaunch the Haitian economy, enable access to education to the children of Haiti who are still in the streets in 2011, to address the issue of reconstruction so that the reconstruction be real, finally and especially the issue of agricultural recovery. […] The challenges are numerous and great, but Grasp all, lose all, that’s why I campaigned and i fixed a certain number of points. I think that for Haiti out of this misery, it is imperative that we move through education […]”

Regarding the absence of the Prime Minister and of a Government :
“…The fact of not having a government, killing us, because it’s like having a head, but the hands cut. However, even with the hands cut we can still build things, and that’s what we do, we do not expect to have a government. While we work to have a government, we work in parallel to make our education policy a success […] We have identified nearly 146.000 new students who will go for the first time in their lives at school this years, it was not easy […] we have the money, that means that anything is possible and today we are at the stage of the inscriptions […] Therefore, we have no Government, but this does not really prevent us to act at the level of education.”

Regarding the possibility to work with the Parliament
“I already work with them, as I sat over a month to work with them to the ratification of Prime Minister-designate. The first Prime Minister was rejected. I sat down again with the Deputies and Senators to work for the ratification of the Second Prime Minister-designate, may be that this has not been successful, because at a certain moment, the interests diverge… For me, it’s just Haiti, but perhaps for others, there was, in the case of Mr. Gousse, a small problem since there was a conflict between some parliamentarians and the Prime Minister designate in the past years, perhaps it is the reason why Mr. Gousse was not ratified.”

Regarding the willingness of parliamentarians to work with the President
“…There, I wonder ? […] what they say now, is not necessarily what they will say tomorrow… It is there, that there is a slight problem, but I am ready to work with them […] the Constitution provides that the President will choose its Prime Minister in consultation with the presidents of both chambers, so it’s imperative that I work with them, I am decided. But the Constitution also says that the President will choose and as long it is not free to choose, this means that the Constitution is not respected. The Constitution does not say that the President is forced to choose a Prime Minister adored by the parliament or proposed by the parliamentarians, it says that the President will choose its Prime Minister, so I will continue to choose. I sincerely hope that everyone, understand that the time is urgent… we must think to the people, because ultimately, it is the latter who suffers […] Once that the parties […] the Executive that I represent and the legislative branches will understand the necessity to think to these people, I think that the things will go faster.”

Regarding the possibility to govern Haiti
“Yes, Haiti is a governable country, except that there is work to do. Well before the earthquake, there was no development plan on 25, 30 years. Initially, Port-au-Prince was built for 200,000 inhabitants, today it houses 3 million… who knows ? The interests of the population have never been a priority, clean water remains a luxury…”

Concerning the option to govern by decree and the Constitution
“All the options are there, I must say that I don’t think to them today, because I continue to work, I my case I advance well […] one of the document that prevents us to progress is the Constitution, a Constitution that was voted in 1987, when we finally came out of the dictatorship of the Executive. By wanting to avoid the possibility that this situation appening again, we’re going a little too far on the other side… and today, we see that we are experiencing simply a legislative dictatorship.”