Haiti pop singer vows to challenge ‘rigged’ election
A pop singer has vowed to mount a legal challenge to election results that knocked him out of Haiti's presidential race as his supporters rioted on the streets.
Michel "Sweet Micky" Martelly urged his backers to protest peacefully against the outcome of the poll. They responded by building barricades, starting fires and throwing rocks at UN peace-keepers.
Local radio said that at least four demonstrators were killed, three in Les Cayes, about 120 miles west of the capital Port-au-Prince, and one in the northern city of Cap-Haitien.
Martelly, a carnival singer, lost to Jude Celestin, who is seen as a continuation of President René Préval's regime. His supporters carried pink signs with Martelly's smiling face and bald head.
One, James Becimus, 32, said outside the US embassy in Port-au-Prince: "We want Martelly. The whole world wants Martelly. Today we set fires, tomorrow we bring weapons."
"Demonstrating without violence is the right of the people," Martelly said. "I will be with you until the bald-head victory."
Outside the headquarters of the Provisional Electoral Council, young men wearing their shirts as masks attacked UN troops. The soldiers, Indians and Pakistanis, fought back with canisters of tear gas that washed over a camp for refugees from the massive earthquake on January 12, sending mothers running with their crying, coughing children.
Protesters set fire to the headquarters of Mr Préval's Unity party and shut down the country's international airport as aid agencies fought a cholera epidemic that has killed more than 2,000 people.
Mr Préval acknowledged there had been fraud in the poll but said it was typical of elections around the world. "This is not how the country is supposed to work," he said on radio. "People are suffering because of all this damage."
The US embassy criticised the election results, saying Haitian, US and other international monitors had predicted that Mr Celestin was likely to be eliminated in the first round.
Mr Preval shot back: "The American embassy is not the electoral council."
