5951: REUTER's FWD - Haiti on edge awaiting Sunday's presidential vote (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Racine125@aol.com

Haiti on edge awaiting Sunday's presidential vote
  
November 24, 2000
Web posted at: 8:21 PM EST (0121 GMT)

PORT AU PRINCE, Haiti (Reuters) -- Violence kept Haiti's capital on edge on 
Friday, two days before an election expected to return Jean-Bertrand 
Aristide, the first freely elected Haitian leader, to the presidency of the 
poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. 

A 14-year-old boy and a 6-year-old girl died in a series of street bombings 
across Port-au-Prince on Wednesday and Thursday. The bombings sent people in 
the teeming city scurrying for cover. Later, angry residents burned tires in 
the streets to protest against the children's deaths. 

Traffic was much lighter than usual on Friday, and public and private schools 
were closed, as were some businesses. 

After staying silent for much of the election campaign, Aristide took to the 
airwaves to urge Haitians to vote. "Together with the Haitian police force, 
we will vote on Sunday in order, discipline, security and peace," he said in 
an address broadcast on local television and radio. 

"People of Haiti, don't be afraid. Don't be afraid to make peace. Vote, and 
vote en masse for us to have a Haiti at peace," he said. 

Aristide is a former Roman Catholic priest who emerged from Haiti's slums to 
win the presidency in 1990, only to be ousted in a military coup seven months 
later and then restored to power by a U.S.-led invasion force after three 
years in exile. Haiti's most popular politician, he is widely expected to win 
the election easily. 

The vote is being boycotted by opposition parties, leaving the presidential 
contest to Aristide and six relative unknowns who challenged him. 

Although their names remain on the ballot, three of those candidates have, in 
fact, dropped out of the race because of the pre-election violence. 
Aristide's Lavalas Family party has accused the opposition of fomenting 
unrest to reduce voter turnout and taint Aristide's mandate. 

The election was considered another crucial step along Haiti's tortured path 
to a stable democracy after decades of dictatorship and military rule. 

But with opposition parties and the international community shunning the 
vote, political analysts said it was uncertain what Aristide would be able to 
accomplish for his country. 

Election officials said nearly 12,000 polling stations across this Caribbean 
nation of 7.8 million people were ready for voters on Sunday. Some 4 million 
voters were registered, but authorities declined to guess at the possible 
turnout. 

"Everything is ready now," said Samuel Louis-Jean, a spokesman for Haiti's 
Provisional Electoral Council, the body that organized the election. "Haitian 
people will say what they have to say on Sunday." 

"I think they will come despite the intimidation," he added. 

With drive-by shootings and other kinds of street violence escalating, 
observers were uncertain what kind of security Haiti could provide at the 
polls. 

Haiti's 6,000-member civilian police force, established after Aristide 
disbanded the dreaded army, was expected to be out in force in the streets on 
Sunday. But Justice Minister Camille Leblanc, one of the top national 
security officials, was visiting relatives in Paris and had not returned by 
Friday. 

The United States, Canada and the European Union all declined to send teams 
of observers after protesting against parliamentary elections in May. The 
international community declared them tainted after observers said that 
officials had miscalculated the winning vote percentages of 10 Lavalas Family 
candidates for the Senate, giving them outright victories when they should 
have been forced into runoffs. 

Electioneering, at a minimum for weeks, was stepped up on Friday. A small 
plane dropped a cloud of blue-and-red Aristide pamphlets over the city, and 
his supporters held a rally in the neighborhood of Bel-Air, honking car horns 
and waving posters and Haitian flags. 

"Aristide is the best for Haiti. He is love. He loves everybody and Haitians 
love him," said Frantz Laurore, 30, an automobile mechanic. 

In his address, Aristide mourned the two children killed in the explosions, 
saying they had "disappeared under the flames of violence." 

"It is with much sadness in my hear that I bow before these innocent lives, 
while we wipe the tears from the eyes of their parents with a handkerchief of 
peace," he said. 

Tension was evident in the city. American Airlines canceled flights to and 
from Port-au-Prince on Sunday and Monday. 

Delmas, one of the city's busiest streets, normally choked with cars, trucks 
and the colorful open taxis known as "tap-taps," was sparsely traveled. 
People outside were reluctant to talk about the election. 

"Too dangerous. I stay out of politics," said a man walking near the National 
Palace, an imposing white building with sprawling green lawns that stands in 
stark contrast to the poverty in which most Haitians live. 

With per capita annual income of about $400, Haiti is one of the poorest 
nations in the world. A recent U.N. report said that 62 percent of its 
population was undernourished, putting it ahead of only Somalia and 
Afghanistan.