CSMS Magazine Staff WritersPresident Rene Preval, who was diagnosed with prostate cancer five years earlier, confirmed Sunday that the disease may have come back and that he would soon leave the country for treatment and more tests.Speaking to reporters after returning from a four-day trip to Cuba for medical exams, said blood tests in Havana showed possible signs of cancer. According to The Associated Press, Preval looked fit as he spoke to reporters. The Haitian president said the tests were inconclusive and that he would have to return to Cuba on Dec. 26 for more tests and unspecified treatment. He did not say how long he would be out of the country.”The [doctors] are unable to say right now at what stage this is,” Preval said after arriving at Haiti’s international airport. “I have to go back for more tests. If it continues to grow, that will mean the cancer came back.””The seriousness of it is not known,” Preval added, saying he felt “physically and mentally well.”Preval, 63, was first diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2001, the last year of his first presidential term, and had surgery in Cuba to treat it.He returned unexpectedly to Havana on Wednesday for what his office described as “medical reasons,” setting off rumors in Haiti’s capital that he might be gravely ill.”If you are sick, you should say that you are sick, and I told you at what stage my health is. This is what the doctor told me,” Preval said at the airport Sunday, flanked by his prime minister, Jacques Edouard Alexis, and several Cabinet members.Preval’s health adds to the uncertainty already facing his young coalition government, which has struggled to stabilize the divided and impoverished Caribbean nation nearly three years after a bloody rebellion toppled former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.Already, Frantz Robert Monde, former Raoul Cedras supporter and now a legislator from the opposition FUSION party said Saturday that Preval appeared to be seriously ill and that Alexis may have to go before Parliament to give details on the president’s health. Cedras was the general who staged the coup against Aristide back in 1990.Speaking to private radio broadcaster Caribe FM, Monde said that could help legislators decide whether Preval should temporarily transfer powers to an executive council made up by Cabinet members and led by the prime minister, as outlined in Haiti’s constitution. Discredited politicians always have coup d’etat in their mind. He is already looking for ways “within the law” to do away with Preval.
Haitian President, Rene Preval, said to be diagnosed with prostate cancer
