Haiti’s former president René Préval died of a suspected heart attack at the age of 74 on 3 March. Préval will be remembered as a beacon of stability in Haiti. He was the only head of state since the fall of the Duvalier dictatorship in 1986 to complete a full term in office without being toppled in a coup d’état or forced into exile, and to hand over power as scheduled to an elected successor. And he managed it not once but twice (1996-2001 and 2006-2011). In 2011 he became the first president to hand over power peacefully to a member of the opposition, Michel Martelly, who tweeted that Préval had been “a friend and adviser”.
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