By James Orji
President Jovenel Moïse of Haiti has been assassinated. He was killed by some gun men who stormed his private home on the outskirts of the capital, Port-au-Prince, according to the country’s prime minister Calude Joseph.
The president’s wife, Martine Moïse, was also shot in the attack, and her present condition is not immediately clear.
According to the Prime Minister “A group of unidentified individuals, some of them speaking Spanish, attacked the private residence of the president of the republic and thus fatally wounded the head of state,” the prime minister said.
“The country’s security situation is under the control of the Haitian police and the armed forces of Haiti,” he added, saying that all measures were being taken to protect the nation.
The news of the death of the country’s president has sent shock waves into the Caribbean island which has a long history of dictatorships and coups, and democracy has never fully taken root.
The country has been rocked recently by protests against the president’s rule, and has also has seen a surge in gang activity.
Didier le Bret, the former French ambassador to Haiti, told France 24 that an already volatile political situation threatened to spin further out of control. A new prime minister, Dr. Ariel Henry, was scheduled to be sworn into office on Wednesday. Because that had not happened, it was not clear who was running the country, he said.
“It is a big question mark,” he said, warning that the situation could lead to wider violence.
Moïse had been struggling to quell growing public anger over his attempt to hold onto power despite the opposition’s insistence that his term had expired.
He has been ruling by decree for more than a year. Many, including jurists, contend that his term ended in February.
The opposition said that Mr. Moïse’s five-year term should have ended on Feb. 7, five years to the day since his predecessor, Michel Martelly, stepped down. When Moïse refused to leave office, thousands of Haitians took to the streets, setting trash and tires on fire as they demanded his resignation.
