Intervening time prime minister in Haiti appointed, transitional council sworn in

A new transitional Council has was sworn in in Haiti Thursday formalizing the resignation of prime minister Ariel HRI they take on the daunting task though of restoring order in the country amid escalating gang violence and political unrest hadi's Finance Minister will serve as interim prime minister until a new one is appointed so I want to bring.

In Robert feton to talk more about what's going on in Haiti he's a professor of government and Foreign Affairs at the University of Virginia thank you so much for joining us so let's talk about this transitional Council it's a tall order and as I understand it they already had to move their swearing in ceremony to another.

Location because there were concerns for their safety um what is it that they are being tasked to do and who's part of this Council well you essentially have nine members and you have seven voting members the seven voting members represent different coalitions of political parties and Civic associ a and.

You have two non-voting members who are essentially part of Civil Society now that the council has been installed they have indeed a Monumental task in the first place they need to pick a president and the president has to be picked from the seven voting members and then they need to take another vote to pick a new prime minister after that.

Obviously you need to for from a cabinet and then the really difficult task starts they have to reestablish order they've promised that they will do so they promise also a Truth and Reconciliation Commission to try to deal with criminal activities and financial crimes they have also the hard task of picking a new electoral Council which.

Will be uh indeed engaged in the organization of Elections before February 7 to 25 uh uh 26 so you have a very long and complicated Road and the other problems are obviously what do you do with the gangs what do you do with those armed men what do you do about the economy what do you do about the displaced people something like 300,000.

People have been displaced in PA PR because of the violence there's a food crisis so it is really a Monumental uh task and you have divisions within that presidential Council and some of the members of the presidential Council were members of past governments so some people do ask.

Why how can we expect a different result if the very same people are part of the government now in an optimistic note it looks like the presidential council is United and I hope that we will see in fact an easy transition into the formation of a new cabinet uh the election of a new president and obviously a new prime minister um and as.

I understand it as you point out I mean the members of this Council they run the gamut in terms of political leanings from the very very left to the very very right people who don't always see eye to eye but then there are the gangs what are we hearing from The Gangs I had heard a report that at least one gang leader wanted to be involved in these.

Conversations what I mean it is there a place for for gangs in the middle of this whole thing well it's going to be a complicated business because you can't ignore the gangs on the other hand they've committed atrocities so the question is how do you reintegrate at least the youngsters who are part of the gangs and.

What do you do with the leaders now the gangs have said that they will continue to attack the institutions of the country in other words uh they are prepared to fight supposedly uh the the foreign Mission which is allegedly coming in the next few weeks so you may have more violence uh on the other hand the gangs seem to have overextended.

Their power and that may mean that the police and the Army in Haiti can maybe retake the initiative but that will require significant more training more weapons Etc and then you have the mission the international Mission which is supposed to be headed by a thousand officers from Kenya some officers also from B and some from Jamaica so we'll.

Have to wait and see but the situation at the moment is quite critical so you brought me to s of the last question I was going to ask you about is there still a desire to have outside forces come into Haiti to help to stabilize things in pter Prince well the presidential Council has signed on the idea of a foreign contingent of officers.

Many Asians are worried about another International intervention because in the past those interventions have essentially failed and they have led to the current crisis so there is some uh apprehension about a new intervention on the other hand the conditions are so bad for the vast majority of people in po in particular the very poor that they may.

Welcome that new intervention but if the intervention doesn't solve the problems in a rather short period of time I think this may engender another form of opposition to the international forces well let's hope that this is is a move in the positive direction for Haiti and its people it is it's been far too long that they have been suffering um Robert.

Uh fat hopefully the next time we talk it'll be even more positive uh news let's hope so yeah thank you very much

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