Most Haitians, in Blow to Regime, Fail to Vote : Turnout Put at Less Than 25%; Military Pressure Seen at Polls

A substantial majority of Haitians silently expressed opposition to their army-led government by staying away from the polls Sunday in a controlled presidential election that was characterized by widespread voting irregularities and charges of army pressure favoring one of the 11 candidates.

The government’s handpicked Electoral Council, responsible for organizing the nationwide vote after the suspension of a bloody election attempt last November, gave no indication of voting trends or official count of the number who voted during the 12 hours the often-deserted polls were open.

Estimates as Low as 1%

But observers throughout the country estimated that fewer than 25% of eligible voters went to the polls. In the southern provincial capital of Jeremie, influential Roman Catholic Bishop Willy Romelus, an outspoken government opponent, said he would be surprised if the final total in his area exceeds 1%.

Just hours before the polls opened and again at midday, one of the top four presidential candidates, Gregoire Eugene, charged that military and police commanders in some provinces were improperly “directing” voters to favor another front-runner, Leslie F. Manigat. Alphonse Lahens, a minor candidate also accused the military of favoring Manigat, while a third front-runner, Gerard Philippe Auguste, said that he, too, will protest voting irregularities, although he did not name Manigat.

Manigat, a political scientist viewed as the most skillful and politically astute of the 11 men in the race, denied in an election-day radio broadcast that he benefitted from irregularities or military favoritism. He said that soldiers have the same right as other citizens to “tell a friend to vote for Mr. X.”

Both the percentage of Haitians who cast votes and the relative fairness of the voting procedures have been cited by officials of the United States and other concerned governments as gauges of the credibility of Sunday’s election to replace the provisional military-led government with a civilian administration.

Participation by more than 30% of eligible voters has been suggested by Haitian officials as sufficient to convince skeptical foreign governments that the results of the election, which may not be officially announced until next Sunday, are acceptable.

Slipshod election procedures that had been mandated by the Electoral Council led to irregularities in every one of dozens of polling places in 13 cities and towns visited by a score of American and European journalists who, as the only independent observers permitted to enter the polls, pooled their observations.

Five U.S. reporters who surveyed 20-odd voting stations in the capital city of Port-au-Prince said that only one appeared crowded. Several of the voters waiting in a line of 100 people at the City Hall station explained that each had been given a Manigat ballot with a $1 bill attached.

Underage youths were seen voting in many of the polling places throughout the country, and some people were observed voting more than once or casting several presidential ballots at a time. Officials at many voting stations did not bother recording voters’ names or marking their fingers with the indelible ink that had been provided to prevent double voting.

Few ballot boxes were locked and sealed. One election station official in St. Marc, a major seacoast town north of Port-au-Prince, explained that “we will put the locks on after the voting.”

There was no voting secrecy. Representatives of the candidates, clustered in front of each voting station, handed out pre-printed ballots bearing their candidate’s name and photo for the voters to cast. Poll officials then read and, in some cases, tallied each person’s choice before dropping the ballot into the box. At one polling station in Jeremie, it was the election officials themselves who handed out the pre-printed ballots to illiterate voters who had to take it on faith that they were not being deceived.

A Manigat campaign worker named Serge Mofiston in the northern seaport of Cap-Haitien told reporters: “The problem is that they don’t read, so anybody can fool them by saying that this is the ballot for president they asked for. So when they ask for a ballot for Eugene, I say, ‘Okay, here’s Eugene,’ and they go in with a Manigat ballot.”

Few people were on the streets in any of the towns that reporters visited, in contrast to the crowds that thronged to the polls early last Nov. 29, when the election was abruptly suspended after only a few hours following the massacre of at least 34 voters in Port-au-Prince. Many who did venture out Sunday said they did not plan to vote.

“I don’t really feel like voting today,” said Jean Romel, 27, who was standing near a deserted polling station in Jeremie. “When I see a candidate I can rely on, then I’ll vote. But today I only came out here to buy a banana.”

“Every poll is empty,” said a government worker who asked to remain anonymous for fear of losing his job. “Here in Jeremie it is total opposition.”

Bishop Romelus said that Sunday’s voter boycott means that Haitians generally will oppose whatever new government emerges from the election. “We foresee the opposition of the people in the fact that they are staying home today,” he said.