Haiti’s tycoon denies to Moise murder plot

Bloomberg

Just a few weeks ago, Reginald Boulos, a prominent Haitian businessman, was planning his first presidential run in one of the hemisphere’s most chaotic and troubled nations.
Those plans ended July 7 with the brazen murder of President Jovenel Moise and subsequent allegations that Boulos, 65, might have helped finance the country’s first presidential assassination in a century. Speaking from an undisclosed location outside of Haiti, Boulos said the accusations and rumors are keeping him from returning home and seem designed to sideline him politically.
“I had nothing, absolutely nothing, to do with Jovenel’s death,” he said in a telephone interview. “Nobody could have imagined this would happen except the people who planned it, financed it and did it.”
Moise’s murder is still being investigated and more than 40 people are in custody. But Prime Minister Ariel Henry and other top officials have said that the true criminal masterminds are likely at large. And they’ve insinuated that only a few rich Haitians, including Boulos, have the financial resources to organise the broad conspiracy that involved hiring more than a dozen former Colombian soldiers.
Moise’s widow, Martine, told the New York Times that Boulos had much to gain from her husband’s death, citing his presidential aspirations, his ongoing legal troubles and the government’s decision to freeze his bank accounts.
Boulos says he doesn’t know any of the people who have been arrested or are being sought and has never “provided any funds directly or indirectly” to any of them.
The frozen bank accounts Moise mentioned contained about $30,000, a modest sum compared to the $18 million he says that he and his companies pay, on average, in taxes to the Haitian government every year.