Jubilant Haitians Swear In 1st Freely Elected President : Democracy: The capital city resembles a festive ballroom. The new leader is a former slum priest. He announces a reform of the military.

Father Jean Bertrand Aristide, a slum priest who became Haiti’s first democratically elected president, was sworn into office Thursday. He immediately announced a wholesale reorganization of the once-dominant army that has been blamed for most of the impoverished country’s violence and bloodshed in recent years.

In a rousing inaugural address combining inspirational pulpit sermon and political campaign speech, the 37-year-old president said that he is retiring six of the army’s eight generals and the Port-au-Prince police chief, a colonel whose men have often turned their backs on killings in the streets.

Professing love for the Army’s mild-mannered current commander-in-chief, Gen. Herard Abraham, and for his common soldiers, the slight, bespectacled Aristide asked the top general to remain in command and enjoined the people to be kind to his troops.

Abraham has been credited with bringing the undisciplined army under control and leading it to a pivotal peaceful role in protecting the democratic process during the political campaign and election that brought Aristide to power with a landslide 66% of the vote last Dec. 16.

“Like Christ washed the feet of his disciples, if I could I would get down and wash the feet of all of you soldiers because from now on your feet will not be bathed in blood,” said Aristide as a crowd of hundreds of thousands cheered from the plaza in front of Haiti’s massive white presidential palace.

The capital city resembled a gaily decorated but vastly overcrowded outdoor ballroom as most of its 2 million residents emerged from years of fearfulness to celebrate the inauguration of the man they lovingly call “Titid” (Little Aristide).

It also was a day of reconciliation with another powerful Haitian institution, the heirarchy of the Roman Catholic Church, whose bishops have been at odds with the fiery priest since he began preaching radical change in the country five years ago.

At a half-festive, half-solemn thanksgiving mass in the capital city’s austere cathedral, all but the archbishop of Port-au-Prince, a Duvalier dynasty favorite who fled the country a month ago, embraced Aristide.

“President Aristide, your duty is very heavy. Dear Father Aristide, I ask God to bless you,” said a beaming Msgr. Leonard Laroche, Bishop of Inche and head of the Episcopal Conference of Haiti.

Aristide has vowed to step down from the priesthood, as he must under papal edict and canon law, but he has insisted that he will not do so until the Haitian bishops formally and publicly ask him.

Former President Jimmy Carter, who played a major part in getting teams of United Nations and other observers to monitor and ensure the security of the December elections, was among many foreign dignitaries who appeared visibly moved by the Mass, which started late and lasted longer than scheduled.

Although he avoided specifics concerning his policies or legislative plans, Aristide ran through a list of foreign countries that have pledged aid to Haiti totaling about $200 million over the next four years.

Perhaps significantly he did not mention the United States.

Aristide and U.S. officials here say that their relations are good. But for years as a populist priest the new president excoriated American support of Haiti’s past governments, including the Duvaliers and the five mostly military regimes that followed the end of the family dynasty exactly five years before his inauguration.