Report: Banker named as new Haiti PM

Soaring food prices led ouster of impoverished island's No. 2 leader

	Supporters of ousted Haiti's President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, holding his picture, march through the streets of Port-au-Prince during a demonstration to demand his return, Saturday, April 26, 2008. The demonstrators were also commemorating the killing of seven protesters on April 26, 1986, when army troops fired into a crowd outside the Fort Dimanche prison.(AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)
Ariana Cubillos / AP

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By EVENS SANON

Associated Press Writer

updated 7:22 p.m. ET April 27, 2008

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti - President Rene Preval on Sunday chose an international banking official to be the troubled country's next prime minister, Haitian radio reported.

Radio Metropole said that Preval has designated Ericq Pierre, a senior official with the Inter-American Development Bank, to succeed ousted Prime Minister Jacques Edouard Alexis.

The report could not be independently confirmed immediately.

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The Haitian Parliament must approve the nomination to the country's No. 2 political post. It was not immediately known when lawmakers would take up the matter.

Alexis was ousted following riots over food prices and shortages earlier this month that left seven people dead. Haitian lawmakers fired the prime minister for failing to boost food production.

"It's very good that the president picked a new prime minister," said Stephen Benoit, a member of Preval's Lespwa party in the lower house of Parliament. "I don't have a problem with his choice."

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Opposition lawmakers and U.S. Embassy officials could not be reached immediately for comment.

The lower house, then comprising different lawmakers, rejected Pierre in 1997, when Preval selected him as premier-designate following the resignation of Prime Minister Rosny Smarth.

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