The new results released by a Gbagbo loyalist on national television directly contradicted those announced Thursday, which were considered credible by the United States, the African Union and the United Nations.
Ivory Coast’s presidential election was meant to restore stability in the West African nation after a 2002-2003 civil war destroyed the economy of one of the most affluent countries on the continent. Instead the poll is now casting a growing shadow. If Gbagbo refuses to step down, many fear the world’s top cocoa producer could spiral into violence again.
The results announced Friday on state television by constitutional council head Paul Yao N’Dre canceled the votes from seven of the country’s 19 voting districts, all opposition strongholds where the ruling party claims the vote was marred by violence and intimidation.
“The irregularities are of such a nature that they invalidate the vote (in those districts),” said N’Dre, who is also a senior member of Gbagbo’s party.
Erasing those districts erased a significant share of opposition leader Alassane Ouattara’s margin, resulting in a victory for Gbagbo.
Gbagbo’s five-year mandate officially expired in 2005. For five years he has repeatedly canceled the date for this election, claiming first that the country was too volatile and that security could not be assured and later over technicalities of the poll.
A 2007 peace deal broke years of political stalemate, leading to the dismantlement of a UN-patrolled buffer zone.
The United States has urged the parties to accept the election commission’s results showing Ouattara had won.
“Credible, accredited electoral observers have characterized the balloting as free and fair, and no party should be allowed to obstruct further the electoral process,” US National Security Council spokesman Mike Hammer said in a statement.
The African Union said that Thursday’s results were satisfactory and asked the country’s leaders to put the interest of Ivory Coast first, also known as Cote d’Ivoire in French.
“Any other approach risks plunging Cote d’Ivoire into a crisis with incalculable consequences for the country, as well as for the region and the continent as a whole,” the AU said in a statement.
The country was placed on lockdown immediately after the commission announced Ouattara’s win on Thursday, with a decree read on state TV saying that the nation’s air, sea and maritime borders had been closed. A second decree announced that all foreign TV and radio broadcasts were being banned.
That means Ivorians are only able to hear the ruling party’s versions of events, but soon after election commission chief Youssouf Bakayoko declared Ouattara the victor, the hotel began replaying the announcement on the speakers in its garden.
The news then spread by SMS, telephone calls and Twitter to tens of thousands of Ouattara backers, who began celebrating in the streets.
“I remind my brother Laurent Gbagbo of our mutual engagement to respect the results proclaimed by the independent electoral commission,” Ouattara said Thursday.
“I’m proud of my country which has resolutely chosen democracy today and I hope this leads to a durable peace in Ivory Coast.” If Ouattara remains the victor of the race, he will become the first Muslim president in this nation whose rulers have always been Christian and whose first president built a basilica considered to be the largest in the world.
A former International Monetary Fund economist, Ouattara became the icon of Ivory Coast’s downtrodden immigrant community in a nation that became a magnet in the region because of its prosperity.
Ouattara, born in the north, had been prevented from running in previous elections after accusations that he was not Ivorian, and that he was of Burkinabe origin.
