A prominent Haitian priest insisted Wednesday that he will not seek political office in his home country and said he just wants his religious duties back.Haiti's highest court a month ago dropped the last charges against the Rev. Gerard Jean-Juste stemming from the 2005 killing of Haitian journalist and poet Jacques Roche.
Now Jean-Juste says he wants to see legal reforms in Haiti, but insists he is not the man who will lead the Caribbean government.
"I want to stay a priest, but they keep accusing me of being a candidate," said Jean-Juste, who was in South Florida to continue treatment for leukemia.
His supporters tried to register him as a presidential candidate ahead of Haiti's 2006 elections, but authorities barred him from running because he was in prison.
The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Port-au-Prince prohibited Jean-Juste from officiating at Mass or performing any other official functions as a priest because of his political activities.
On June 9, Haiti's highest court dropped charges that Jean-Juste conspired to illegally import weapons.
The priest was cleared last year of homicide charges related to Roche's death.International human rights groups claimed the charges were politically motivated by the U.S.-backed interim government then in power in Haiti, and Jean-Juste has always denied the allegations.
He was released from jail in January 2006 to be treated in Miami for leukemia.
Jean-Juste said Wednesday he is focused on resuming his duties as a Roman Catholic priest, though he called for the release of other political prisoners jailed in the wake of former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide's ouster from Haiti.
He said he still feels political pressure -- from supporters in Aristide's Lavalas Family party who want him to run in Haiti's next elections, and from critics who fear that he will.He said his church in Port-au-Prince has been vandalized and his radio program was shut down since the charges were dropped last month.
"They took my sound system away," he said.
"They tried to shut me up."
Jean-Juste, 62, is an ally of Aristide. He spoke at a news conference Wednesday seated before a picture of the ousted leader at the storefront office of Veye-Yo, a pro-Aristide political group in Miami's Little Haiti.
In April, Jean-Juste led thousands in the Haitian capital's largest slum in a rally that called for Aristide's return. Some have compared Jean-Juste with Aristide, a former priest, because of his advocacy for the poor.
Jean-Juste said if the Lavalas Family party in Haiti asked him to run in Haiti's next elections, he would consider it, but his religious work was his priority. One member of the crowd gathered at Veye-Yo stood and said, "We are asking you!"
"Mwen pa kandida!" Jean-Juste said forcefully in Haitian Creole. "I am not a candidate!"
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