Embassy Row: Haiti President, an American?

By James Morrison The Washington Times

The U.S. ambassador to Haiti has been drawn into a controversy over whether President Michel Martelly, a former pop singer in Miami, is a U.S. citizen and ineligible to hold the office he won last year.
Ambassador Kenneth H. Merten insists that Mr. Martelly is not an American citizen and does not have a U.S. passport.
But the Haitian legislature is not satisfied with that explanation.
Mr. Merten, a career diplomat, appeared last week with Mr. Martelly at a news conference where the president released his current Haitian passport and seven expired ones.
“President Martelly is not American. He is Haitian,” Mr. Merten said.
The ambassador also has explained that Mr. Martelly turned in his U.S. residency card to the U.S. Embassy in the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince, before his inauguration in May.
His assurances failed to impress members of a special commission of the Haitian Senate investigating politicians who hold dual citizenship with another country. Three members of Mr. Martelly's government have resigned because they are foreign citizens.
The Haitian constitution prohibits the president from holding dual citizenship and from renouncing his Haitian citizenship, according to news reports from Port-au-Prince.
Sen. Jean-Charles Moise, the commission chairman, called Mr. Martelly’s news conference a “masquerade.”
Sen. Nenel Cassy called on the ambassador to issue a formal statement to the commission on Mr. Martelly’s U.S. immigration status.
A third senator, Anick Francois Joseph, told reporters that he noticed that Mr. Martelly held a U.S. passport when they flew together on an American Airlines flight to Miami from Haiti in November 2007.
The airlines later identified a “Michael Martelly” on the passenger list but no “Michel Martelly.” Haitian news reports said Mr. Martelly often uses “Michael” instead of “Michel” when he travels to the United States.
Before he won the presidency last March, Mr. Martelly was a popular musician in Haiti and Miami. He also owns a house in Palm Beach, Fla.
Source: Washington Times
Embassy Row: Haiti President, an American?
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