A NEW government will be installed today in Haiti, with the departure of interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph in favour of Ariel Henry.

As prime minister, M Henry will appoint a new executive that will include M Joseph as Minister of Foreign Affairs, according to reports out of Haiti on Monday.

There will be no replacement for assassinated president Jovenel Moise.

The new administration must, as a matter of urgency, convene a general election to fill that void as soon as practicable. The will of the Haitian people must be respected. This is more so in light of the troubling circumstances that have led to today's disorienting transfer of power.

M Joseph's ceding of his position to M Henry came after days-long secret talks, according to Haitian reports.

However, it also came mere hours after the so-called Core Group of powerful nations - including the United Nations, the European Union, the United States, France, Spain, Canada, Germany and Brazil - issued a call for M Joseph to cede power to M Henry.

That call was roundly criticised internationally for highhandedly ignoring the will of Haiti's civil society and for snubbing M Joseph. Locally, TT's Prime Minister loudly complained - on social media - that Caricom had been insulted by not even being mentioned.

The real insult, however, would be not listening to what Haitians have to say about their own destiny.

Despite Dr Rowley's indignation, the Moise regime's claim to power was suspect at best. M Moise repeatedly refused to hold elections, allowed democratic organs to be hollowed out, ruled by decree, oversaw the crumbling of the judiciary, failed to fight brutal gangs and created a special spy agency to target opponents.

As a part of M Moise's government, then, M Joseph's claim to power was never on solid ground.

In fact, M Joseph's term as prime minister ended the very week Moise was assassinated. Among M Moise's last acts was to designate M Henry as the new prime minister. But M Henry had not been formally sworn-in by the morning of M Moise's killing, a potentially destabilising event that created an urgent need for calm and order.

In the hours immediately after the assassination, many countries, including the Core Group, acknowledged M Joseph as leader over M Henry. Why exactly that has since changed is unclear.

Also tenuous is the place of Caricom, of which Haiti is a member. Not speaking with one co-ordinated voice - the current chairman is not Dr Rowley but Antiguan PM Gaston Browne - does not burnish the group in anyone's eyes, however irrelevant or relevant it may be.

But it should be for Haitian authorities to restore their judicial and democratic organs, not outside entities.