ABIDJAN, 9 July 2004 — Ivory Coast should be far down the road to peace by now, its civil war a memory as former foes share power before elections next year. The good news is that the frontline is relatively quiet, which explains why the world’s biggest cocoa producer is no longer considered news in the Anglophone press.
The bad news is that the country remains cut in two — rebels in the north, government forces in the south — and that the peace process is crumbling. Power sharing, disarmament, demobilization, and reconciliation — none of it is happening.
An African Union summit in Ethiopia this week will follow up efforts by the French and the UN to avert a new conflict. It is not too late, but it is the eleventh hour. If fighting resumes, the tragedy would be not just Ivory Coast’s but west Africa’s: Civil wars here have a knack of flaring across borders.
For a decade Liberia sponsored insurgents to destabilize Sierra Leone, Guinea and Ivory Coast, only for the favor to be returned when rebellion flared in Liberia.
Thanks to stable new governments in Sierra Leone and Liberia, the region now enjoys a relative lull — which could be the basis for lasting peace in the region.
Ivory Coast threatens that opportunity, which is why leadership and compromise are needed from the rebels and the government. The problem is, both sides dislike each other more than ever.
A UN Security Council mission, led by Britain’s UN ambassador Emyr Jones Parry, recently threatened sanctions against those who blocked peace. Gabon is also trying to put pressure on the two sides. But both sides are still trading insults and warning of an all-out war.
In the commercial capital, Abidjan, police, army and pro- government militias menace ethnic groups suspected of disloyalty. More than 100 people died when security forces opened fire on a peaceful opposition rally in March.
President Laurent Gbagbo has expelled former rebels from the Cabinet seats they were given under the Linas-Marcoussis accords, signed in France last year, and has sidelined the prime minister, Seydou Diarra, a moderate respected by both sides. A popular northern politician, Alassane Dramane Ouattara, has not been allowed to run for the presidency.
For their part, the rebels have kept their guns, consolidated territorial control of the north, talked up the possibility of secession and demanded the president’s resignation.
When the UN set up demobilization camps, nobody showed up. Complicating matters is the splintering of the rebel leadership, resulting in firefights between rival factions.
The killing of a French journalist and the abduction of another has prompted an exodus of foreign media to Dakar in Senegal. From this climate of fear and loathing, mediators hope to conjure up a government of national unity and shepherd the former French colony to free and fair elections in October 2005.
They could just pull it off. Heated rhetoric can belie flexibility. When soldiers first rebelled in September 2002 and their forces swept south, both sides ruled out a peaceful resolution — only to acquiesce when French troops intervened and coaxed leaders into negotiations.
Though there are parallels with Rwanda on the eve of genocide — a divided country, a radicalized ruling party, militias mobilized — Ivory Coast has no history of systematic slaughter. Ethnically fueled clashes between cocoa farmers have killed hundreds, but they remain local affairs, and in some cases, expelled communities have returned.
The UN has some leverage that could tilt both sides toward compromise: 20,000 peacekeepers in the region, the threat of travel sanctions and perhaps war crimes indictments against senior players, plus the aid carrot.
However, two reasons for pessimism exist. First, France is no longer considered a benevolent big brother. Despite having checked the rebel blitz in 2002, Paris is accused by Gbagbo of legitimizing the insurgency and blocking reunification.
The French and their perceived lackey, the UN, are reviled. Having saved the Ivorian president and cajoled him into a peace deal, Paris finds itself impotent as he shreds it.
Second, the accord the diplomats want to restore does not resolve the conflict’s causes. It bought breathing space for such a resolution through the ballot box next year, but, now that the deal has foundered, the fraught issues of land and citizenship are back on the table.
All roads lead to Gbagbo. A former university academic elected in a flawed poll, he has promoted his Bete ethnic group and alienated northerners and immigrants.
For decades Ivory Coast thrived by welcoming migrant laborers who turned bushlands into cocoa and coffee plantations. But as land ran out and prices fell, southerners began resenting the visitors.
The founding president, Felix Houphouet-Boigny, was no angel but held things together until his death in 1993.
His successors have played the ethnic card, culminating in Gbagbo’s plan for an identity-card scheme that discriminated against northerners and immigrants. He also implemented a law abolishing the right of foreigners to own land.
The peace accord was supposed to kick this and other issues into touch until the election, but the collapse of power sharing and skepticism about the election being held has created pressure for the issues to be resolved now, violently if necessary.
