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Cote d’Ivoire: The View From France

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December 31, 2010

Penelope Chester

Security | , , ,

I’m spending the holidays at home, in France, where the national media is covering the crisis in Côte d’Ivoire quite closely. With 14,000 expats and over 600 commercial interests in the country, it’s not surprising that the French – the former colonial power -  are following the events unfolding in Côte d’Ivoire. Diplomatic relations between the two countries have been tense for years now. France played a significant role in negotiating peace accords between North and South in 2003, and the country has been involved militarily in Côte d’Ivoire since 2002 through Operation Unicorn, whose mandate is to support the UN peacekeeping mission, and to act as a rapid reaction force and/or protect French interests in the country if necessary.

Post-colonial relations between the two countries are complex. While Laurent Gbagbo is describing French involvement in the current crisis as foreign interference in the affairs of a sovereign country, Ivoirian nationals living in France are accusing Sarkozy of supporting Gbagbo’s illegitimate government: a recent protest in front of the Ivoirian embassy in Paris was quelled by police, and supporters of Alassane Ouattara were outraged that the French were interfering in this way. Even though a large majority of French politicians are echoing the international community’s call for Gbagbo to step down, other French political and legal figures have been supporting him.

Two prominent – and infamous – French lawyers, Jacques Vergès and Roland Dumas traveled this week to Côte d’Ivoire to advise Gbagbo. Both men have held positions of power in France: Foreign Ministry, presidency of the Constitutional Council, but are especially known for their shady dealings. Verges is notorious for having been on the defense team of some odious characters: Slobodan Milosevic, Klaus Barbie, or Tarek Aziz, a member of Saddam Hussein’s administration. As for Roland Dumas, he has been involved in some of France’s most massive politico-financial scandals in the 90s, and is also known for supporting 9/11 conspiracy theories.

Vergès and Dumas are supporting Gbagbo’s claim that he won the election. Vergès even goes as far as to say that the current crisis is an electoral coup orchestrated by French and American diplomats in Côte d’Ivoire (“Il s’agit d’un coup d’Etat électoral organisé par le représentant de la France et le représentant des Etats-Unis en Côte d’Ivoire, qui ont pris par la main le responsable de la Commission électorale indépendante (CEI) [qui donne Ouattara vainqueur depuis le 3 décembre, ndlr] et l’ont conduit tout droit à l’hôtel du Golf [le quartier général d'Alassane Ouattara].”) This discourse is helping to legitimize Gbagbo’s position, and is contributing to his continued intransigence.

The specter of an armed intervention – most likely led by ECOWAS – doesn’t seem to break Gbagbo’s resolve. He’s in fact probably strengthened by the fact that not every West African leader is fully supporting a military intervention. Cape Verde’s president, Pedro Pires, – who was one of the three high-level negotiators sent by the regional organization to Côte d’Ivoire to meet Gbagbo – has been a dissenting voice in ECOWAS, arguing against a military intervention and quietly supporting the position of the Ivoirian strongman. In addition, Ghana – one of the region’s best trained military – has already indicated it would not send troops. Nevertheless, preparations for a military intervention are moving forward, with a meeting of defense ministers in Nigeria earlier this week, and another meeting scheduled for mid-January.

ECOWAS and the international community are still hoping that dialogue and negotiations will help avoid this solution of last resort, though amid increasing partisan and ethnic violence, and the threat of civil war, the urgency of finding a way out of the crisis cannot be understated. As Mark mentioned in a recent post, Côte d’Ivoire is a critically important country in the region, and the political resolution – or lack thereof – of this crisis will have a deep impact on West Africa.

Gbagbo supporters are now threatening to seize Ouattara’s headquarters on New Year’s day, which some analysts believe to be an empty threat. But if the high levels of violence in recent weeks is any indication, I think it’s hard to believe that this will not at least lead to further bouts of intimidation and violence, making the prospect of civil war that much more likely. Côte d’Ivoire already had over 600,000 internally displaced people prior to the crisis, and more than 18,000 refugees have fled to neighboring Liberia, 62% of which are under 18 according to the UNHCR, who is planning on opening a new camp near the border between the two countries.

In France, daily media reports are grim and less than hopeful. A civil war in Côte d’Ivoire is something the French are hoping will be avoided, as their military involvement – at least in the short term – will be difficult to avoid yet politically very dangerous, both diplomatically and domestically. France has renewed its call for expatriates – especially those with children – to leave the country.

Here’s to hoping that the New Year will bring a swift resolution to the crisis and peace for the people of Côte d’Ivoire.


  • Alcelt ngom

    We need peace not only for people of Cote d’Ivoire but for all people through the world and particularly in Africa. As you will see, I am not an Ivorian, I am from Congo people’s Republic. I think all Africans that are concerned by real democracy in their countries and economic liberation from colonial power have to follow passionately what is happening in Cote d’Ivoire. This is time to say no to all forms of external dominations or imperialism. This crisis is not just about electoral results. We know that the global militaro industrial power so called international community is trying to secure the control of Ivorian ressource like oil and gas.

  • Patience Kabamba

    Why is the idea of resolving this dispute by an International Court is no being contemplated? Since in matter of elections in Cote d’Ivoire it is the Constitutional Counsel that has the last word and not the UN, and since the country has been divided for the last 8 years, division which makes the election far from being transparent, why shouldn’t we examine what really happened. The word of M. Choi is an opinion among others. We shouldn’t go to war on the basis of what he said overstating his mandate.Since there is a doubt on a winner, as there was in 2000 election disputes between Al Gore and G.W. Bush, why shouldn’t a court review the matter and decide who really won the elections. The war seems a short cut which will only fuel divisions and provoke human losses. Nowhere a war has resolved a problem, it is the opposite, it creates more conflicts than it resolves. A more neutral UN position could have helped negotiate the creation of such a tribunal where the Cote d’Ivoire post-electoral disputes could be resolved. When Sarkozi calls the Nigerian leader many times and when the US promises to help ECOWAS with equipment for war, we can talk about a war waged by proxis. Should they have been left alone, African leaders would have chosen other means than a military confrontation with no end in sight. Negotiation is the wise move because nobody knows really who won the elections in this divided country where the rebels were in control of half of the country.

    • Penelope Chester

      My sense is that there is no international court mandated to handle election claims such as these – though of course it’s always possible to create the political will to have this handled through judicial channels internationally, I don’t think the time frame would have worked, given that this is a “hot” crisis. Also, it would have been difficult to find a court that Gbagbo and Ouattara would agree on as legitimate – and it may not solve the problem if it has legitimacy issues.
      It’s true that a more neutral UN position could have helped diffuse tensions, but at the same time, the facts are there to support its position: Ouattara won the election, so why would they adopt a nuanced position? Just to coddle Gbagbo?
      Negotiations are currently the main strategy used to resolve the crisis, and hopefully will help avoid a costly military operation. I would hope that a military operation would be minimal, and would consist of physically removing Gbagbo from his seat of power.

      • Patience Kabamba

        Dear Penelope,
        I think that the facts are not supporting the UN position. An electronic counting of the votes which rejected all result above 100% and on which the Constitutional court based its decision has given Gbagbo as the winner with 51%. Now it seems that the International community is pushing for something unseen in Africa, to make us believe that Ouattara won the elections. AU international observers in the north dismissed the elections as being free and transparent in the North.
        An ad hoc tribunal could solve all these contentious, but some people are scared of the truth and are pushing for actions immediately. But remember Penelope, if we waited a little bit for the inspectors in Irak to do their work and to discover that there were no weapons of mass destruction, we couldn’t have gone to war. Truth is stubborn and it will come out eventually.

  • Paulstannack

    This much is undeniable about the Ivory Coast : 4 million of the 21 million people now living in Ivory Coast are illegal Muslim immigrants from the poorer, entirely Muslim countries of Burkina Faso, Mali and Guinea to the north of the country. They have swamped the country and changed the electoral balance entirely. The country has shifted from a narrow Christian majority 25 years ago to a Muslim majority today—and it has done so almost entirely through illegal immigration from the much poorer, Muslim countries to the north : Burkina Faso, Mali, and Guinea. Exactly like the Muslim North has done in Nigeria, their kith-and-kin from neighbouring Muslim countries are invited to come and register and vote during elections to secure an easy win. In truth and in fact, Gbagbo won the election. For many white people, yes, Ouattara, with a white wife, looks more acceptable. Kofi Annan too, got better prospects when he rid himself of his Nigerian wife and married a white woman.
    The prosperous cocoa-producing regions of the Christian south know that a northern-led government will divert the all-important cocoa income to the north and completely destroy the economy. Something they have watched happen in Nigeria, for instance, with oil revenues, for 50 years.
    Alassane Ouattara, reputedly a non-citizen of Ivory Coast, is merely the faux-democratic facade of a Muslim takeover that began with the mutiny of Muslim soldiers in 2002. Therein is a salutary lesson in illegal immigration for all countries.
    People who cannot live together should be helped to live apart : whether it is in Ivory Coast, Sudan, Nigeria, Yougoslavia/Serbia/Bosnia/Kosovo, Indonesia/East Timor, Egypt or Israel. Imagine if divorce were impossible and couples who have fallen out of love and have come to hopelessly distrust and hate each other were forced to live together under the same roof. Almost certainly, the result will be needless harm.
    The brazen hypocrisy and oblique racism with which Gbagbo is being treated is appalling. Though Gbagbo is clearly a democrat who cherishes the Rule of Law and Mugabe clearly is not, Gbagbo should now adopt Mugabe’s solution, sign security agreements with Russia or China and have thousands of Chinese soldiers flown in for security, just as Mugabe has done. Contrary to the new U.N. sing-song, there are no mass graves to unearth in the Ivory Coast. Ban Ki Moon, like those before him, is being manipulated by the anti-Christian, anti-Jewish mafia that has now entrenched itself in the U.N. bureaucracy. They are implacably determined to start a shooting war in the Ivory Coast before the problem can be widely understood. An example of how clueless the Korean is was obvious in Nigeria. He dispatched Nigerian diplomat, Ibrahim Gambari, beloved of Nigeria’s Northern-Muslim military dictators and prime example of what is wrong with Nigeria, to go and mediate in Nigeria’s Niger Delta. The local people, incredulous, howled him down and sent him away. The mass graves are in Sudan, in Dafur, in the lands from which the Zaghawa, the Masalit and Fur are being driven out. 2 million people now dead and not a single mass grave found. Good work. It is obviously more important to the U.N. that nothing should be done to offend the National Islamic government of Sudan.

    • Penelope Chester

      Your comment raises some interesting points, but I will stick to responding to just a few of them as they relate to Cote d’Ivoire.
      The presidential election was deemed free and fair by international and national observers – the only group that continues to claim that there were enough irregularities to change the final results are Gbagbo and his supporters. You claim that Gbagbo is “clearly a democrat who cherishes the rule of law.” Considering how Gbagbo came to power controversially in 2000, and his continued attempts to hold on to power by delaying this election, it’s a very hard claim to support. What evidence do you offer to support the fact that Gbagbo “cherishes the rule of law”?
      As for the immigration debate, it is true that the demographics have evolved in Cote d’Ivoire. But at the same time, you should consider the following: 1. “illegal” immigrants have no status because of how impossibly difficult it is for them to obtain it. The introduction of the concept of “ivoirianness” (“ivoirité”) was meant to close the door to many people who had been living, working and belonging to Ivoirian society for a long time – including people like Ouattara, who was shut out of previous elections because of his origins. It’s a reactionary tactic. As for whether the country should be split along ethnic or religious lines, the referendum in South Sudan is the first attempt to divide a country in Africa since the independences. As you know, there is a tacit agreement not to reconsider national borders – as imperfect as they are – in order to avoid the carving up and atomization of the continent. I don’t think that splitting Cote d’Ivoire in two countries would solve the problem; in fact, I don’t think many Ivoirians would like to see their country divided permanently.
      What it boils down to, though, is that Ouattara has been deemed the legitimate winner of the election, and that Gbagbo’s reaction in the aftermath has been nothing short of ridiculous. If he wanted to challenge the results, he should have done so through appropriate channels, instead of auto-proclaiming himself president and fomenting hatred and violence. Someone who “cherishes the rule of law” does not employ such tactics.

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