Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, June 26, 1995 TAG: 9506260129
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: PORT-AU-PRINCE, HAITI LENGTH: Medium
Monitors from the Organization of American States reported hundreds of voting stations remained shut for the election, which was designed to shape the troubled Caribbean nation's future.
They and others among the nearly 1,000 international observers said it was too early to say whether the irregularities rendered the election unfair.
In the northeast - the least populated with an estimated 166,301 registered voters - ``the process has virtually come to a standstill,'' an OAS statement said.
It said all deputy candidates were boycotting the process, turnout was poor and voting bureau presidents had been threatened with death.
In the northwest, only 200 of 523 poll stations opened by noon, apparently for lack of voting materials, the statement said.
In the rice-growing Artibonite Valley, a political hot spot, 125 poll stations had not opened. OAS observers estimated 15 percent of a population of more than 500,000 would not be able to vote.
And in rural areas surrounding Port-au-Prince, the capital, ``perhaps up to 20 percent of the population may not be able to vote due to either the late arrival of materials, wrong voters' lists or not enough ballots,'' it said.
Campaigning for the U.N.-supervised vote, held to select 101 national legislators and 2,000 local officials from more than 10,000 candidates, had been largely free of violence.
Supporters of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide were expected to sweep the balloting, as he did in 1990 in Haiti's first democratic elections. The voting Sunday was a prelude to a December presidential election.
Some 10,000 polling stations were set up throughout the country, monitored by 1,000 international observers and U.N. troops and police. Election officials dipped voters' fingers in indelible ink to prevent them from voting twice.
About 3.5 million voters, 90 percent of the estimated electorate, were registered. There were 28 political parties and 100 independent candidates.
Results were not expected for eight to 10 days because ballots must be counted by hand.
In 1990, Aristide was elected in a popular revolt against the dictators whose greed and brutality ruined this Caribbean island nation. Nine months later, an army coup forced him into exile, beginning a three-year reign of terror.
President Clinton threatened to invade in September, frightening the military into surrender. A U.S.-led multinational force disarmed and disbanded the Haitian army and returned Aristide in October.
A successful election would support Clinton's decision to intervene, unpopular with many because it restored a left-leaning leader whose criticism of American policies changed only when they worked in his favor.
by CNB