Haiti protesters call on president to step down

Thousands of people in Haiti have demonstrated in the capital, Port-au-Prince, calling on President Michel Martelly to step down.

According to AP, an estimated 5,000 protesters marched through downtown Port-au-Prince on Thursday. They burned tires and blocked a number of streets before police fired tear gas to disperse them.

The protesters called for Martelly’s resignation over widespread government corruption and his administration’s failure to improve jobs, schools and healthcare. They also demanded that new elections be held.

Turneb Delpe, a former senator and a vocal critic of the government said “We want elections but we are asking that President Martelly and Prime Minister Laurent Lamothe first step down. The people do not trust these leaders to organize honest elections.”

The Haitian government has been facing increasing opposition rallies in recent months. Earlier in March, several thousand Haitians, aligned with opposition parties, rallied in the capital, saying Martelly had not done enough to alleviate hunger in the impoverished Caribbean nation since being sworn in as president in May 2011.

The demonstrators also complained that legislative and local elections are more than two years overdue.