28418: (news) Chamberlain: Haiti PM names cabinet, to address prisoner issue

[corbetre@webster.edu]

>From Greg Chamberlain

     By Joseph Guyler Delva

     PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti, June 6 (Reuters) - Haitian Prime Minister
Jacques Edouard Alexis unveiled his cabinet on Tuesday and vowed to deal
with the burning issue of political prisoners.
     Alexis, named prime minister by President Rene Preval last month, went
before the Senate to outline his plan for governing as part of the formal
process of installing a new government, more than two years after former
president Jean-Bertrand Aristide was ousted by a bloody rebellion.
     He named a cabinet that included members of at least five rival
political parties and seven people who served as ministers during Preval's
first presidency, from 1996 to 2001.
     The Senate debated Alexis' program into the night but was expected to
approve both the plan and the ministers. Rejection would be the equivalent
of a no-confidence vote and Preval would have to choose a new prime
minister.
     Preval's election in February was an important step in Haiti's return
to democracy as the Caribbean nation of 8.5 million people -- the poorest
in the Americas -- struggles to shake off decades of dictatorship, military
rule and political upheaval.
     Human rights groups in Haiti and abroad have accused the U.S.-backed
interim government appointed after Aristide's ouster in February 2004 of
jailing hundreds of the former president's supporters without cause.
     Alexis told senators the rights of many prisoners have been denied,
addressing the issue uppermost in the minds of Aristide supporters who were
instrumental in electing Preval.
     "There are too many people in jail now for peccadilloes. We are going
to act," Alexis said.
     "We are going to work immediately with the judicial system on the
cases of people who have been arrested and who were jailed for political
reasons," he said, while promising to respect the independence of the
judiciary.
     Outside Parliament, hundreds of demonstrators demanded Aristide be
returned to Haiti from his South African exile and called for the release
of political prisoners.
     "We want to know if Preval and Alexis' government want to condone the
abuses committed by the interim government," demonstrator Johnny Marsan
said. "We want to know why the political prisoners are still in jail."
     As a result of a deal reached between Preval and Alexis and their
political rivals in parliament, five leading opposition parties are
represented among the 18 ministers named by Alexis. They include the
parties of prominent politicians Paul Denis, Evans Paul, Serge Gilles and
Chavannes Jeune, who all ran against Preval in the presidential campaign.
     Alexis named Daniel Dorsainvil, a close adviser to Preval and former
official with USAID in Haiti, as finance minister.
     Rene Magloire, who served as justice minister during Preval's first
term, was returned to that post and Renald Clerisme, a former member of
Haiti's delegation to the World Trade Organization, was named minister of
foreign affairs.
     Paul Antoine Bien-Aime, who was education minister in Preval's first
term, was named interior minister.

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