Lawmaker: Banker to be next Haiti PM

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)

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

Preval has designated Ericq Pierre, a senior official with the Inter-American Development Bank, to succeed ousted Prime Minister Jacques Edouard Alexis, said Stephen Benoit, a member of Preval's Lespwa party in the lower house of Parliament.

Haiti's Radio Metropole also reported that Preval had chosen Pierre.

"It's very good that the president picked a new prime minister," Benoit said. "I don't have a problem with his choice."

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

A spokesman for the U.N. mission in Haiti, David Wimhurst, said the mission will support whoever becomes the next prime minister.

The Haitian Parliament must approve the nomination to the country's No. 2 political post. It was not 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.

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.