Balaguer Sworn In for His 5th Term

Joaquin Balaguer, a conservative historian and poet, was sworn in as president of this Caribbean island republic for the fifth time Saturday with a pledge to fight poverty and official corruption.

Balaguer, who first served as president in the early 1960s by appointment of longtime Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo, accepted the presidential sash again just two weeks short of his 79th birthday, denouncing the Trujillo Era as “30 years of darkness.” Trujillo was assassinated in 1961.

Earlier on Saturday, Balaguer assured Secretary of State George P. Shultz that the Dominican Republic supports Reagan Administration policies in Central America.

Shultz, who led the official U.S. delegation to the ceremony, said that Balaguer assured him during a 45-minute meeting that he supports the U.S. criticism of Nicaragua’s Sandinista government.

“There was no ambiguity in the minds of either the outgoing or incoming president of the Dominican Republic as to the rights and wrongs in Central America,” Shultz told reporters aboard his aircraft on the flight back to the United States. Balaguer succeeds Salvador Jorge Blanco.

On Friday and Saturday, there were several demonstrations in Santo Domingo in favor of Nicaragua and its president, Daniel Ortega, who headed the Nicaraguan delegation at the inauguration here. The city’s port area was papered with pro-Ortega posters and handbills, but Shultz dismissed them as unimportant.

“Naturally we don’t like to be demonstrated against but it isn’t difficult in an open society to drum up a small demonstration,” Shultz said. “I didn’t see these demonstrations but I understand they fizzled.”

No Talks With Ortega

Although Ortega made a high-profile appearance at the inauguration and the social events that surrounded it, he and Shultz did not meet.

During a late night reception Friday, Ortega and Shultz each was surrounded by a circle of well-wishers, but the two groups did not come together.

Ortega and pro-American President Jose Napolean Duarte of El Salvador, dressed in almost identical white suits, did shake hands after they were guided to adjoining seats in the VIP section during the inaugural ceremony.

Shultz later remarked, “I noticed that Duarte went to the (post-inauguration) Mass, but I didn’t see Ortega there. I wonder why he missed it?”

Balaguer was elected in his own right to the first of three straight four-year presidential terms in 1966, a year after U.S. Marines intervened to keep order after a military coup prevented Juan Bosch, a socialist and friend of Cuban President Fidel Castro, from assuming the presidency. Balaguer was reelected in 1970 and 1974 and ran unsuccessfully in 1978 and 1982.

To mark his return after an eight-year absence, Balaguer, now virtually blind, said, “I have come back.”

Balaguer, a leader of the Christian Social Reform Party, revealed little of his program in his inaugural address, but he vowed to root out corruption and promised that, “if necessary, I will take action even against my own party.”

He also said, “Thousands of Dominicans find themselves each day without food,” vowing to “declare war on misery.”

The Dominican Republic maintains full diplomatic relations with Nicaragua and has what U.S. diplomats describe as a “cool but correct” relationship with Cuba in which the nations have diplomatic ties but do not exchange resident ambassadors.

An American official present at Shultz’s meeting with Balaguer said that no change is expected in Dominican relations with either Nicaragua or Cuba.

“Balaguer said he perceives that much of the problem in Central America is Nicaragua’s interference in the affairs of its neighbors,” the official said.

The official added that the Dominican Republic’s relationship with Cuba “does not disturb us.”