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Baby Doc?s return to Haiti seen as play to contain Preval

SANTO DOMINGO.- The unexpected announced return of Jean Claude Duvalier to Haiti could be a play by the Haitian right and the Americans to restrain the push of the candidacy of Renè Preval, head of an important sector of the Party Lavalás Family, according to a report in the newspaper El Nacional today.

Twenty years after being ousted from power after bloody disturbances in the streets of Port Prince, Baby Doc threatens to return to a country where democracy has been incapable to imposing order and peace, since he resigned from the dictatorship.

His announced return takes place while a sector of the Haitian people cries out for a strong hand that straightens the country?s course, lacking stability since Jean Claude fled on February 7, 1986.

Last Sunday Jean Claude?s companion Veronique Roy, a white granddaughter of Paul Magloire, head of the Air Force in the 1950s, headed a gathering with more than 2,000 Duvalier followers attending, in the Haitian capital?s Pacot quarter.

Preval, "marasá" (twin) of Jean Bertrand Aristide, according to the Lavalás propaganda, has not detained his campaign before this announcement.

He was Prime Minister in Aristide?s first government, then took office, and again handed the government back in a chain that set out to maintain Lavalás 20 years in power.

Aristide was forced to resign on February 29, 2004 amidst a revolt that ex- commissar Guy Phillippe headed and which had as political head Paul Arcelín, who already announces new revolts if Preval returns to power.

Preval, who has been the only leader to conclude his presidential term since Baby Doc?s exit, was coaxed from his hacienda in Marmelade, in Haiti?s North, by a group of independent personalities who offered him the presidential candidacy under the motto of "la espwa," the hope of the Haitian people.

An agronomist, in just 8 months the ex- president managed to overcome candidacies that in 2004 seemed invincible and unbeatable such as those of Guy Philippe and Evans Paul.

Not even the campaign that he would have the support of the narcotics sector or the attack on his ethylic weaknesses has been able to prevent his presidential candidacy?s growth. He fixed his world with the industrialists and the Haitian press, two sectors that were antagonist toward him and distrusted him, and approached the diplomatic circles to promote his image.

With an extraordinary propaganda, paid, according to reports, by Taiwan Chinese and French and Canadian friends, Preval has reaffirmed the need for the elections to take place next February 7, after four postponements done by the Government via the Provisory Electoral Council.

An important sector of the right depends on the elections? postponement to buy time and see if a candidate surges who can represent it and arouse the Haitian people?s support.

Jean Claude announced return would be a type of experiment to see how people still accept this leader who governed Haiti as president for life during 15 years. For this, he is wanted to confront the favorite of the surveys, Preval, who has 37% of the electoral possibility in his pockets.

Man of the left and friend of Fidel Castro and of Cuba, where his liver ailments are treated, Preval is above all his opponents.

Not even respectable figures like Gerard Gourges or Leslie Manigat are in a capacity to compete with Aristide?s old twin, who ended up by placing distance between them.

His current battle, which is also the fight of the international community, is to get the elections to be held on February 7.

In Dominican Republic, Preval enjoys a good relationship with president Leonel Fernandez, who received the Haitian leader in the National Palace on two official visits, and was even invited by Fidel Castro to a private dinner which Fernandez hosted.

http://www.dominicantoday.com/app/article.aspx?id=9673