The E-Sylum:  Volume 7, Number 10, March 7, 2004, Article 20

ARISTIDE'S CASH STASH LIKE STILTON CHEESE

  This week the Wall Street Journal reported that like Saddam
  Hussein, Haitian leader Aristide had a hidden stash of U.S.
  notes.  Have any of Saddam's notes found their way into
  collectors' hands?  Will Aristide's?

  "Looters found stacks of rotting U.S. dollars stashed in a
  tunnel beneath former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide's
  mansion, while a rebel leader who helped oust him said his
  men would surrender their weapons.

  The discovery of the cash in a secret basement compartment
  likely will fuel allegations of corruption and arbitrary rule that
  fed the rebellion in Haiti, the poorest country in the Americas.
  The country's annual income works out to $480 a person."

  "The discovery of cash in a safe behind a cinderblock wall
  came when looters were going through Mr. Aristide's house
  -- which was completed in the early 1990s -- after he flew
  into exile. They found five stacks of $100 bills, each about
  three inches high. Part of the money, seen by a Wall Street
  Journal reporter, had the consistency of Stilton cheese,
  crumbling into dust when handled. Local bankers calculated
  by the size of the stacks that the total amount of the find
  would be about $350,000."

  Wayne Homren, Editor

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