27521: (news) Chamberlain: Vote problems anger, worry Haiti's poorest voters (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

     By Kieran Murray

     PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti, Feb 7 (Reuters) - Lucia Destimus has seen
decades of dictatorship and military coups. Struggling to vote for Haiti's
president on Tuesday, she said the rich have found a peaceful new way to
steal democracy from the poor.
     Crushed in a huge crowd at a polling center in the Haitian capital,
the reed-thin 69-year-old looked around and said she believed long waits
and teeming crowds on election day were designed to stop the poor from
voting.
     "They don't want us to have a say in this country," said Destimus, a
resident of the teeming Cite Soleil slum.
     "They want to keep us from voting. They are abusing us," she said,
hungry in the midday heat after getting up well before dawn and walking
about 3 miles (5 km) to vote. "I've never seen an election like this, and I
don't like it."
     The leading candidate was Rene Preval, a former president and protege
of Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the fiery champion of the poor ousted in 2004.
Some critics of Aristide, whom some Haiti experts say was undermined by
Washington before he was driven from power, have worried that a Preval
victory could pave the way for Aristide's return.
     If the poor cannot vote, it would hurt the chances for Preval, who
draws his strongest support from the slums.
     Election officials acknowledged long delays but put them them down
simply to logistic problems and said the election was a success because
there was no violence.
     Many of Haiti's poor, however, had suspected foul play before Tuesday,
and the delays fueled their anger as well as conspiracy theories and talk
of violence.
     Outside many voting stations in the capital Port-au-Prince, voters
endured lines that ran far down the streets. Inside, voting began hours
late.
     Overwhelmed workers tried to keep thousands of voters at bay as they
prepared ballot boxes but in the swarm, voting slips were handed back and
forth and some fell to the ground.
     "The rich are trying to steal the elections. We will not let them. If
they do, we will fight them," said Jean Biemaime, a young resident of
another shantytown.
     Aristide was twice elected president but failed to serve a full term.
He was toppled once by a military coup and then two years ago in the
rebellion backed by former army officers.
     Aristide's supporters believe the rich elite will always oppose
democracy because, in a country where the vast majority are poor, it would
force them to share their wealth.
     The election was held exactly 20 years after the ouster of dictator
Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier, but crushing poverty, rampant crime and
deep distrust between rich and poor show how far Haiti still must go to set
up a stable democracy.
     Like many others, Destimus says she is much worse off now than under
the Duvalier family dictatorship.
     "We had no freedom and we didn't like them but we had food," she said,
adding that Aristide did more than any other leader to try to improve the
lives of the poor. "He was a good president. That is why they took him
away."