Members of the EDE (Committed to Development) political party arrive to register the party at the Provisional Electoral Council in the Petion-Ville neighborhood of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Thursday, March 12, 2026. (AP Photo/Odelyn Joseph)
A record 280 political parties and counting had registered by the March 12 deadline to participate in Haiti’s first general election in a decade, although not all will make the cut.
Nonetheless, the newcomers rejoiced, hopeful for a chance to help ease their country’s multiple crises that are largely rooted in gang violence and corruption.
Members of CAHDOA, or Collective of Haitian Actors for Development and Alternative Organization, a political party founded one year ago, approached the headquarters of Haiti’s Provisional Electoral Council with a marching band.
Vuvuzelas blared as the group clapped and chanted, “We are on board!”
Also registering on March 12 was the EDE party, Committed to Development, founded by Claude Joseph, who was prime minister when President Jovenel Moïse was fatally shot at his private residence in July 2021.
Currently, Prime Minister Alix Didier Fils-Aimé is Haiti’s lone ruler, having been appointed by a transitional presidential council that stepped down in early February as ordered by law.
Haitian government officials originally said they expect to hold elections in late August and a runoff in early December, although the prime minister has since said that the first round would be held by year’s end.
Many doubt that will happen given persistent gang violence.
More than 5,900 people were reported killed last year across Haiti and more than 2,700 injured, according to U.N. statistics.
Gang violence also has displaced a record 1.4 million people in the country of nearly 12 million, with armed men controlling an estimated 90 percent of Port-au-Prince, Haiti’s capital.
