Hti: That vision thing

A former Haitian foreign minister and popular South Florida television talk-show host was selected Tuesday to become Haiti's next prime minister.

Gerard Latortue, a critic of exiled President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, was chosen after two days of painstaking deliberations by a U.S.-backed ''council of sages'' to fill the power vacuum created Feb. 29 when Aristide resigned. Latortue will lead a transitional government that will pave the way for presidential elections early next year.
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Latortue, 69, was one of three finalists for prime minister nominated by a council charged with replacing the government of the exiled Aristide. The council grilled Latortue by telephone for 2 ½ hours Monday afternoon as he sat in his Boca Raton home.

''I can facilitate the national reconciliation,'' Latortue said. "It is the most important thing today in Haiti after all the divisions we had in Aristide.''

Council members announced their decision at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday. No one notified Latortue directly that the job was his.

''The interview is really what brought most [of the council members] to his side,'' said Claude Mancuso, a close friend, "because he was able to give them a vision of what was to be done.''
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The decision-making confounded the seven members on the council, who had to decide whether Haiti needed someone with a business or military background, or someone who represented a new beginning.

He can talk, but can he govern? Govern as opposed to rule, that is. One would imagine that, given Haiti's pathologies, the choice of prime minister would have been a no-brainer. Let's see what Latoture does.