Wyclef Jean has officially given up his attempt to become the next president of Haiti, so that he can promote a new album, his publicist said today. The former Fugees singer had been exploring legal avenues after being disqualified from the November election but has now thrown in the towel.

Jean was one of 15 proposed candidates disqualified from the race last month. Although no reason was given, the provisional electoral council is believed to have excluded him on the basis that he did not meet Haiti's five-year residency rules.

The singer, who lives in New Jersey, was refused permission to appeal by the council. His legal team said he would "exhaust all options" to get his name on the ballot and there were reports that he would file a complaint to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

When he announced his intention to stand for president, Jean told the Guardian: "Singing is not enough. I'm being drafted. Every year I probably do 200 shows and I have a very comfortable life. But people are saying to me, 'Clef, if you don't put yourself on the ground, in 10 years' time you will look at it and say you could have.' "

Jean, who was born in Haiti but grew up and rose to music fame in the US, began his campaign in a blaze of publicity but within days was said to have gone into hiding because of alleged security concerns and death threats.

His supporters had argued that the residency requirement should not apply to him because, as a UN goodwill ambassador for Haiti, he had been forced recently to travel globally for much of the time.

Jean's high-profile name and well-funded campaign had shaken up the country's dysfunctional politics and unnerved some of Haiti's political establishment. But his detractors said the singer had spent far more of his life in the US than Haiti. They also pointed to scrutiny of the financial affairs of his charity Yéle Haiti, which rose to prominence after this year's earthquake. The singer was also accused of making vague campaign statements and of lacking concrete plans on how to get the country back on its feet.