PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti: Haiti’s transitional governing council on Tuesday named a new prime minister to lead the violence-plagued Caribbean nation, council members said, choosing Garry Conille, who served briefly in the role from 2011 to 2012.
The move comes as Haiti desperately awaits the deployment of a Kenyan-led multinational force tasked with wresting back control from powerful and violent gangs that control parts of the capital.
According to a council member, Conille was chosen by a 6-1 vote on Tuesday afternoon. Council President Edgard Leblanc and member Fritz Alphonse Jean also announced Conille’s selection on social media.
The UN-backed security mission – for which the United States provides logistical support but not boots on the ground – is intended to help Haiti’s weak police force defeat gangs.
Armed groups control much of the capital, Port-au-Prince, as well as large parts of the countryside, and have long terrorized ordinary Haitians with random shootings, kidnappings and sexual violence.
This country has been plagued by poverty, natural disasters, political instability and violence for decades. Since the assassination of Jovenel Moyes in 2021, there has been no president or parliament.
The transitional council came to power last month when unpopular and unelected Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry tendered his formal resignation after armed gangs rose up and demanded his ouster.
The last elections were held in 2016 and a transitional council was struggling to assert its authority, food was running out, tens of thousands of people were fleeing their homes and the health care system was on the verge of collapse.
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