Aristide’s Mixed Messages : Haitian should end double talk on stepping down as the law requires

The constitution of Haiti limits presidents to one term, and for President Jean-Bertrand Aristide that term ends Feb. 7. On that date a new Haitian president, who will be chosen in elections later this month, will be inaugurated. Simple.

It would do a lot of people a lot of good if Aristide enunciated an unequivocal commitment to democracy and stopped delivering contradictory messages that threaten a fragile social order, create political instability and deep-en economic chaos.

Aristide cannot go on telling his followers one day that he may consider staying three more years in the presidency and then tell an emissary from President Clinton that he will step down as the constitution requires and as he agreed when American troops returned him from exile and to the presidency in 1994.

Aristide is facing a number of major problems, among them his failure to press ahead with the privatization program he agreed to pursue in return for U.S. aid. It is understandable that with an election at hand the president would be reluctant to dismantle the existing web of government jobs, but nevertheless he should bite the bullet and immediately down- size the government, Haiti’s No. 1 employer.

Yes, privatization will mean more unemployment in the short run. In a country where the jobless index hovers at 65% it will take guts to eliminate any jobs, but the price of not doing so surely would be much worse. Bureaucrats do little to produce wealth, and an inefficient work force living off the nation’s paltry treasury is bad business.

There is a strong incentive for Haiti to follow through with the promised change: On a recent visit to Haiti, Vice President Al Gore told Aristide that resumption of $1.2 billion in international economic aid is tied to governmental reform. That money could create many productive jobs in the private sector.

The Haitian leader owes a debt to the world in that the United States and the United Nations helped to restore him to power. That debt will be paid if he facilitates the first democratic transition of pow- er in the history of Haiti.