Aristide interview by Amy Goodman

On this Democracy Now! page, you can read the transcript and/or listen to the audio of Amy Goodman's March 8, 2004, interview with Haiti's President Aristide. I would suggest the audio at least with the transcript, because the transcript contains some errors due to Aristide's accent and speech patterns.

Excerpts:

AMY GOODMAN: President Aristide, did you resign the Presidency? PRESIDENT ARISTIDE: No, I did not resign. I exchanged words through conversations, we exchanged notes. I gave a written note before I went to the press at the time. And instead of taking me where they said they were taking me in front of the Haitian press, the foreign press, to talk to the people, to explain what is going on, to call for peace. They used that note as a letter of resignation, and I say, they are lying. AMY GOODMAN: When you went into the car from your house, did you understand you were going to the airport and being flown out? PRESIDENT ARISTIDE: Not at all. Because this is not what they told me. This was our best way to avoid bloodshed. We talked with them somehow in a nice, diplomatic way to avoid bloodshed, we played the best we could in a respectful way, in a legal and diplomatic way. Because they that told me that they were going to have bloodshed. Thousands of people were going to be killed, including myself. As I said, it was not for me, because I never cared about me, my life, my security. First of all, I care about the security and lives of other people. I was elected to protect the life of every single citizen. So, that night I did my best to avoid bloodshed and when they took me, putting me in their plane, that was their plan. My strategy was then all I could [do] to avoid bloodshed. AMY GOODMAN: Are you being held in the Central African Republic against your will? PRESIDENT ARISTIDE: Actually, against my will, exactly. ....AMY GOODMAN: What do you want to happen now? PRESIDENT ARISTIDE: I always call for peace....Peace means for us, in this time, education and investment in health care. In my country, after 200 years of independence -- we are the first black independent country in the world - but we still have only one-point-five Haitian doctors for [each] 11,000 Haitians. We created a university, we founded a university with the faculty of medicine that has 247 students. Once U.S. soldiers arrived in Haiti after the kidnapping, what did they do? They closed the faculty of medicine and they are now in the classrooms. Can you imagine that? This is what they call peace. ...AMY GOODMAN: President Aristide, at least five people were killed in Haiti on Sunday. Opposition leaders say it was pro-Aristide forces that opened fire. Also including journalists - a Spanish journalist based in New York was shot dead. Another was also shot. Your response? PRESIDENT ARISTIDE: First of all, I wasn't there, and I don't have many pieces of this information to comment, but [with] the respect that I have for the truth, I will make some comments but I say it again, I wasn't there. I don't have yet any information so, I cannot go too far in my way to analyze the situation. I do believe, because for the past years, each time drug dealers like Guy Philippe, people already convicted like Chamblain, kill[ed] people, we heard exactly what I just heard. They blame the non-violent people and they blame the poor....So, I think or I suspect they are lying when they talk like that, accusing my followers. ...AMY GOODMAN: What message do you think the United States is sending the people of Haiti and the rest of the world in their actions with you? PRESIDENT ARISTIDE: I think the citizens of the United States supporting democracy in Haiti, the Haitian People, and Haitians in Washington, Brooklyn and Milano, in Boston and elsewhere, calling for my return to Haiti and the constitutional order...are a sending a very strong, critical signal to all of the countries in the world willing to work in a peaceful way for democracy. But those who [kidnapped] me are sending a very wrong signal because if we don't [respect] the result of democratic elections...the signal you are sending is "No to democracy," while you are talking about democracy. So, that's why I wish they would correct [the situation and] have a new approach, which will be protecting the rights of humans in the world. Because in the world, what do we mean, [we mean] peace. What do we mean, [we mean] democracy. What do we mean, we need to invest in human beings. Therefore, to go back, we should not send wrong signals as they did. They went to Iraq. We see how is the situation in Iraq. They went to Haiti. We see how is the situation in Haiti. Pretending they are imposing democracy with people killing people. Why don't they change their approach to let democracy and the constitutional order flourish, slowly but surely? After imposing a criminal embargo on us - being, from the cultural point of view very rich, from a historic point of view very rich, but from an economic point of view very poor, because we are the poorest country in the western hemisphere - after imposing their economic embargo upon us, because the people wanted one man, one vote, and equality among us. Then they use drug dealers, they use people who are already convicted, pretending to lead the rebellion, while they went to Haiti killing people in Gonaives, killing people in Cap Hatian and killing people in Port-au-Prince and elsewhere. And now they continue in the face of the entire world, blessing impunity supporting those killers. My god, I have said it's really ugly that image they project in the face of the world. Now it's time for them to change. [We] respect them, but we will also respect the truth. That's why, respectfully, we are telling them the truth. I said, when someone is wrong, the wrong way to behave is to continue to be wrong. The right way to behave is [to] move from wrong to being right. Now, it's time to move from being wrong on their side to become right by supporting the constitutional order. ...AMY GOODMAN: President Aristide in your news conference, did you say that your country is now in the midst of an unacceptable occupation? PRESIDENT ARISTIDE: It's an occupation, and the last example I just gave says it is an occupation. How you can imagine that you come to me, you want to be in peace, and you close my university and you send out 247 students of medicine in the country where you don't have hospitals and you don't have enough doctors. God, this is an occupation. When you protect killers, when you protect drug dealers like Guy Philippe, like Chamblain, when you protect the citizens of the United States violating the law of the United States...then this is an occupation. AMY GOODMAN: Is true that -- did you say that your security force around -- that protected you in Haiti, from the Steele Foundation--that they were told by the U.S. government they could not send in reinforcements? PRESIDENT ARISTIDE: Yes. As a matter of fact they blocked them, to stop providing security, and twenty-five [more that were to] come the day after, they were prevented to come. So it was a clear strategy to move their way according to their plan. Now, time is gone. Unfortunately I need to stop because they just asked me to leave. ...AMY GOODMAN: What do you think people can do in the United States? PRESIDENT ARISTIDE: I think they can continue to mobilize human resources to help bring peace for Haiti--democracy for Haiti. This is what the Haitian people want: Peace and democracy.

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