News from the Caribbean as of
Haitian Supreme Court judges dismissed PORT AU PRINCE, Haiti: The Haitian provisional government decided Friday to retire five judges of the Haitian Supreme Court ("Cour de Cassation"). In an official press release Monday, the cabinet of provisional president Boniface Alexandre justified this decision by the necessity of renewing the executive and to allow better working of the institution. The Haitian president invoked a decree of August 22, 1995 dealing with the organization and the operation of the judicial power, which stipulates in article 20: "The judges of the Court and Tribunals may be retired starting from sixty years of age".
Observers note, however, that this governmental step occurred twenty-four hours after the Supreme Court asked, for the second time, for the rehabilitation of Dumarsais Siméus' name in the list of the candidates approved to take part in next presidential elections. The candidature of this wealthy Haitian-American businessman had previously been rejected because of his dual nationality. This new twist in the Siméus affair caused various reactions. Some political leaders consider the current situation in Haiti as a judicial and political deadlock. Siméus' lawyer described the retirement of the judges of the Supreme Court as an absurdity, stressing that such a decision should incite all the lawyers to think seriously about the practice of their profession in Haiti. Guerdy Lissade points out that "article 177 does not allow the dismissal of the judges (who are named for ten years) and retirement of a judge (of the Supreme Court) can be made only at his own request".
"The governmental decision is not linked to the electoral process. The majority of the judges were very old and were not unfortunately as efficient as they were before," declared the Chief of Cabinet of the Haitian provisional president, at the same time rejecting a possible return by Siméus to the electoral race. A Gallup Poll carried out from 1st to 10th November 2005, on behalf of the USAID, shows that Dumarsais Siméus is the most popular candidate in the opinion poll after former president Rene Préval.
This survey credits Siméus with 25% of voting intentions, topped by former president Rene Préval with 32%. Former president Leslie François Manigat comes in third position with 5%. Back... Most popular articles: viewed, printed and e-mailed Printable version E-mail this story to a friend: Your e-mail:
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Provisional president Boniface Alexandre decided on Monday to dismisses 5 Haitian Supreme Court justices, saying that the move is in an effort to allow better working relationships between the executive and judicial branches.

The move comes just days after the court ruled that Dumarsais Siméus should be on the ballot for president in the upcoming elections in Haiti. Siméus is a U.S. citizen and is argued by members of the government and others that his candidacy would violate the Haitian constitution which doesn't allow presidents who have not resided in the country for a period of 5 years prior to the election.    However the court ruled that Siméus did not renounce his citizenship in Haiti, and that dual-citizenship is not a violation of the constitution. Lawyers for Siméus see this dismissal as related to the ruling.

However the Chief of Cabinet of the Haitian provisional president says that the dismissal of these judges is unrelated to the case involving Siméus and will not have an effect on how that case is handled.

A recent Gallup poll showed that Siméus is one of the most popular candidates in the race.