HAITI-U.N.: Officials See Rosy Future for Aristide Government

By Farhan Haq Reprint | | Print |

UNITED NATIONS, Oct 2 1995 (IPS) - Haiti is as secure as it has ever been following the near-completion of parliamentary elections, the top U.N. official in that country says.

Lakhdar Brahimi, the special U.N. envoy to Haiti, said here Monday that the security situation in Haiti has improved dramatically since President Jean-Bertrand Aristide was restored to power by a U.S.-led force one year ago.

Despite concern that the political situation remains tense — particularly since a pro-Aristide party took nearly all National Assembly seats when election results were declared last week — the envoy stressed that Haiti remains largely calm. Discontent is “nothing terrible, for the moment, anyway,” he said.

“The situation has improved immensely” in human rights especially, Brahimi told reporters at the United Nations. “No fair-minded person can compare what takes place now with what happened before,” during Haiti’s 1991-94 military regime.

“Definitely, progress is being made, the security situation is improving and … the people feel more secure,” he added.

Brahimi asserted that there are no major threats destabilising the Aristide government or threatening a repeat of the 1991 coup in which the president was ousted and exiled for three years. Nor is any breakdown expected after the U.N. Mission in Haiti (UNMIH) departs the country next February, he said.

Brahimi’s optimism is shared by members and supporters of the Aristide government, as well.

“I think the situation in Haiti is very secure,” Ira Kurzban, general counsel to the Aristide government, told IPS. “If I were a businessman in Haiti, I would invest as fast as I can at this point.”

Some businessmen have already taken up that offer. “A lot of the investors who left the country in the last few years have decided to come back,” said Jocelyn McCalla, executive director of the U.S.-based National Coalition for Haitian Refugees (NCHR).

McCalla told IPS that roughly half the factories in Haiti have re-opened or are re-opening after months in which they had been shut down by the international embargo against the military regime or by businessmen fearful KR(.Z.]Z2YR