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/ 20 September 2004
Tropical Storm Jeanne brought raging floodwaters to Haiti, killing at least 90 people in the battered nation and leaving dozens of Haitian families huddled on rooftops as the storm pushed further out into the open seas, officials said. Floods tore through the north-western coastal town of Gonaives and surrounding areas.
In the four months since the former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide was forced to flee Haiti, only one foreign force has shown the potential to reunite the country — the Brazilian football team. There is no exaggerating the appeal of Brazilian football here.
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Reacting to what it calls ”wild claims” by opposition parties over a shipment of arms for Haiti, the government has issued a statement on behalf of National Conventional Arms Control Committee chairperson Kader Asmal ”to put this matter to rest”.
Special Report: Elections 2004
The DA has requested that the National Prosecuting Authority investigate whether the government has contravened the National Conventional Arms Control Act by shipping arms to Haiti using a South African Air Force aircraft. The DA has dismissed responses from the presidency on the matter as being ”evasive”.
The victory of African slaves over French rule in Haiti in the 1800s should be used by Africans to inspire them to address successfully the challenges facing them across the world, South African President Thabo Mbeki said on Friday. He was spreaking at the Sixth African Renaissance Conference in Durban.
The ousted leader of Haiti, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, urged his followers on Monday to resist the ”occupation” of their homeland peacefully, and said that he still considered himself president. Aristide denounced the rebels as drug dealers and terrorists and repeated the claim that he had been kidnapped by the Americans.
Hundreds of people went on a looting rampage on Monday at an industrial park near Port-au-Prince airport, attacking passing cars and threatening journalists with machetes, witnesses said. The latest unrest came one day after at least six peoplewere killed when gunmen opened fire on an opposition rally in the Haitian capital.
The National Conventional Arms Control Committee (NCACC) on Monday rejected claims made by the Democratic Alliance regarding South African arms sales to Haiti. ”Accusations of impropriety by the DA’s [federal council chairperson] Mr James Selfe, as reported in the press, are simply untrue,” an NCACC statement said.
DA calls for arms shipment details
Partisans of exiled Haitian president Jean-Bertrand Aristide looted a container port on the northern fringe of Port-au-Prince late on Thursday as United States and French patrols sought to enforce an overnight curfew in its fifth consecutive night. Meanwhile, a meeting took place to start the process of naming a new Haitian government.
Defence Minister Mosiuoa Lekota has denied that a South African Air Force (SAAF) aircraft, or one chartered by the SAAF, is in Haiti. Lekota was responding to a letter by the Democratic Alliance’s James Selfe on Thursday, asking him to confirm or deny that the South African National Defence Force currently has aircraft in Haiti.