CNN
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A transition council tasked with choosing Haiti’s next leaders has been created after weeks of uncertainty, according to a decree published in Haiti’s official journal.
The move comes a month after Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry announced he would resign once the council is inaugurated and named a new prime minister and cabinet.
The council, made up of seven voting members and two non-voting observers, is responsible for choosing and appointing a new prime minister as well as an “impartial” electoral council, the decree states.
He will exercise certain presidential powers until the inauguration of a new president-elect, which must take place no later than February 7, 2026.
The council’s mandate will end on this date and cannot be extended, specifies the decree.
The members of the council are Fritz Alphonse Jean, Louis Gérald Gilles, Edgard Leblanc Fils, Emmanuel Vertilaire, Smith Augustin, Lesly Voltaire, Laurent Saint Cyr, Frinel Joseph and Régine Abraham, according to a council press release.
The Caribbean Community and Common Market (CARICOM) welcomed the news in a statement released on Friday.
“The creation of a broad-based and politically inclusive nine-member Council signals the possibility of a new beginning for Haiti,” the statement said.
According to CARICOM, one of the first priorities of the newly installed council will be to urgently address the security situation in the region.
CARICOM, which worked with Haiti last month to develop a framework for the transition council, said there were still challenges ahead but would support Haiti in determining its future.
Since February, attacks by an alliance of insurgent gangs in the capital Port-au-Prince have rendered the city’s international airport and seaport non-functional, severing vital supply lines for food and aid and triggering an exodus of evacuation flights for foreign nationals.
Cut off from the world, more and more Haitians are now suffering from hunger, aid workers warn. Nearly 5 million people in Haiti are suffering from acute food insecurity, according to the United Nations, in what World Food Program country director Jean-Martin Bauer has described as the worst humanitarian crisis to hit the Caribbean country since the 2010 earthquake.
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