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Voting struggles to start in cholera-hit Haiti
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By Joseph Guyler Delva and Pascal Fletcher
PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) - Polling stations struggled to open in Haiti's capital on Sunday as voting got off to a slow and confused start in elections roiled by a cholera epidemic, political tensions and...
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A man double checks his choice before casting his ballot at a voting station in Croix des Bouquets, just outside Port-au-Prince, November 28, 2010.
Credit: Reuters/UN/MINUSTAH/Logan Abassi/Handout
By Joseph Guyler Delva and Pascal Fletcher
PORT-AU-PRINCE |
Sun Nov 28, 2010 9:01am EST
PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) - Polling stations struggled to open in Haiti's capital on Sunday as voting got off to a slow and confused start in elections roiled by a cholera epidemic, political tensions and voter uncertainty.
Haitians are going to the polls to select a new president and parliament and a third of the Senate to guide the impoverished Caribbean country's recovery from a devastating January earthquake that killed more than 250,000 people.
At the Alexandre Petion high school in Port-au-Prince, electoral workers were still arranging the desks and urns half an hour after polls were officially due to open at 6 a.m. (1100 GMT). The voters list and ballot papers had not yet arrived, the workers said.
At another station without electricity guarded by Brazilian U.N. peacekeepers beside the Champs de Mars earthquake survivors' camp in the city center, poll officials had used their mobile phone lights as they rushed to prepare the center in the early morning darkness.
Long past the official opening time, a small group of young voters waited patiently outside, far outnumbered by electoral officials, party observers and U.N. troops.
"I wanted to come and vote because I wanted a change, a change that will help the people," said a waiting voter, Cherenfant Descius, who works as a builder.
There were reports of other centers failing to open on time in a shaky start to elections the international community hopes can create a stable, legitimate government capable of administering billions of dollars of reconstruction aid.
Representing this world support, blue-helmeted U.N. peacekeepers were helping Haiti's police guard more than 11,000 polling stations set up in schools, prefabricated wooden huts and even in tents in crowded quake survivors' camps.
There were early signs of some voters becoming frustrated.
At the La Pista tent camp housing more than 50,000 quake survivors, Harold Clerg complained that he and many others had been unable to pick up new national identity cards to vote.
"They (the government) are spending a lot of money on campaigning and flying planes in the air (to drop election leaflets) and we are living in garbage, in misery, in hunger," he told Reuters.
With political tensions flaring, and rebuilding after the devastating January earthquake seemingly paralyzed by the advancing deadly cholera epidemic, many fear a contentious turbulent election may just drive Haiti deeper into turmoil.
VARIED FIELD OF PRESIDENTIAL CONTENDERS
A clutch of front-runners -- a Sorbonne-educated opposition matriarch, a government technocrat who is a protege of outgoing President Rene Preval, and a charismatic entertainer and musician -- lead a varied field of 18 presidential candidates.
Although opinion polls have put 70-year-old former first lady Mirlande Manigat ahead, the lack of a clear favorite has increased the likelihood of the contest going to a deciding January 16 runoff between the two top vote-winners.
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