Maryse Narcisse Registers as the Presidential Candidate of the Lavalas Family Party

by Daniel Tercier (Haiti Liberte)

With great fanfare, on May 19, Dr. Maryse Narcisse, the coordinator of the Lavalas Family Political Organization (FL), registered as that party’s candidate for presidential elections scheduled for October and December.

            With over 150 motorcycles, 10 school buses, and 40 private cars, thousands of FL partisans clogged the streets of Tabarre in anticipation of the event. Dr. Narcisse arrived at the Aristide Foundation for Democracy around 9:30 a.m.. After a rally there, she drove through the multitude to the home of former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, about a half mile away. After about 15 minutes, two vehicles with tinted windows emerged. The crowd went wild, thinking that Dr. Aristide was in one of the vehicles. But when the cars arrived at the West Department’s Electoral Bureau (BED), it turned out Dr. Narcisse was accompanied by Mildred Trouillot Aristide, the former president’s wife.

            The FL has been excluded from all Haitian elections for over a decade, since the U.S.-backed coup d’état against Aristide in February 2004.