South Africa gives Aristide a temporary home
by Jean-Jacques Cornish
Friday, May 14, 2004
PRETORIA, South Africa (AFP): South Africa
said Thursday it was ready to give former Haitian president Jean-Bertrand
Aristide a temporary home, nearly three months after an armed revolt forced
him to flee his poor Caribbean country.
Aristide, 50, is currently in Jamaica, where he arrived on March 15 from the
Central African Republic, his first destination following his resignation in
late February under pressure from the United States and France.
"This is a temporary arrangement until the Haitian situation stabilises and
Aristide and his family can return," government spokesman Joel Netshithenzhe
said. No date has been set for Aristide's
arrival in South Africa but ThisDay newspaper reported that he was expected
here next week with his wife, two children and two bodyguards.
The former priest who was first elected in 1990, ousted in a coup in 1991 only
to return to power with US military backing in 1994, had said from the outset
that he wanted to come to South Africa.
But the government had let it be known that
it did not want to agree to the controversial move ahead of April 14
elections, which President Thabo Mbeki's African National Congress (ANC) won
by a landslide. "South Africa accepts
financial responsibility for his residence and upkeep in South Africa,"
Netshithenzhe added. Local reports said Aristide would take up residence in
the capital Pretoria under tight security.
The government also said that it supported
calls for an investigation into the circumstances surrounding Aristide's
departure from Port-au-Prince after the former leader claimed that he was
forced to resign by the United States and France.
"We oppose the concept of regime change and no country, however powerful, has
the right to remove a democratically elected leader," said the government
spokesman. Elections are expected to be held
in Haiti next year and South African officials signalled that Aristide's fate
hinged on the outcome of the vote in which his Lavalas party is to field
candidates. Mbeki's ANC party said in a
statement that the decision to take in Aristide would help resolve the crisis
in Haiti, which it suggested was caused by outside interference.
"It is important to note that Aristide was the legitimately elected head of a
sovereign country who was forcefully and unconstitutionally removed from
power," said a ANC statement. South Africa
discussed its decision to welcome Aristide with US and French leaders who
agreed "that we should offer a temporary home to president Aristide," Minister
in the Presidency Essop Pahad told SABC radio news.
The main opposition party, Democratic Alliance, spoke out against allowing
Aristide into South Africa, casting doubt over his democratic credentials and
arguing that taxpayers should not have to foot the bill to support him.
It also said that France and the United States should take him in if they
forced him to step down. "The governments
that are responsible for removing him from power should take responsibility
for looking after him in exile. France and the United States were very
prominent in this regard -- why not send him to Paris?" said Douglas Gibson,
foreign affairs spokesman for the party.
Gibson was quoted by the SAPA news agency as saying that Aristide's 2000
re-election was marred by fraud and that Aristide had ordered his security
forces to carry out political killings. "He
is personally responsible for a great deal of human suffering, and his record
is an affront to the principles of good governance," said Gibson.
But supporters of the move point to Haiti's history as the world's first black
republic, created when slaves rose up against French rule in 1804, as a moral
reason for helping out one of its former leaders.
"This is the first slave revolt that was successful in 1804, the first one,"
said Kader Asmal, chairman of the parliamentary international affairs
committee. "Secondly, it was the revolt of
blacks against colonialism. We can't forget that," said Asmal, quoted in The
Star newspaper.
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