Manufacturing a president in Cote d’Ivoire

Cote d’Ivoire is in a political impasse after the presidential elections that were supposed to reunite the country. What went wrong?

After the failed coup of 2002 and the ensuing military takeover of the northern part of Cote d’Ivoire by rebel forces, there was a round-table discussion in Linas-Marcoussis, France, during which 10 political groups agreed to create a coalition government and a total disarmament of all the rebel groups and militias.

This would be enacted under the supervision of the French and West African forces in preparation of a free and fair presidential election. A new independent electoral commission was created, composed of representatives of the political parties.

The independent electoral commission during these past elections was composed of a total of 461 members, out of which only 42, that is 9 percent, are pro-Laurent Gbagbo, who is Cote d’Ivoire’s incumbent leader. And 419, that is 91 percent, are pro-Alassane Ouattara and the opposition.

The president of the commission, Youssouf Bakayoko, is pro-Ouattara. To offset this imbalance, it was agreed upon that the commission function by consensus and that ballots should be counted both manually and electronically.

The country’s constitution stipulates that the electoral commission should announce the temporary results consensually agreed upon within 72 hours. The Constitutional Council is the only legal authority that will announce the final results, taking into account all irregularities and complaints. It is important to note that the government did disarm all militias in the southern zone under its control. The rebel forces in the north of Cote d’Ivoire did not disarm.

The current deadlock in Cote d’Ivoire stems from the massive fraud that the electronic tally-ups revealed from the votes in the areas of the country still under the control of the armed rebellion. The voting records submitted from these areas showed that there were more voters than were registered.

And, from the testimonies of African election observers, accredited by the Independent Electoral Commission, voters were intimated, pro-Gbagbo voters were physically attacked (including cases of murder), and ballots were being supervised, stuffed, and carried by rebel forces, contrary to election rules. The tally-up of the Bandama voting district under the control of the rebellion was a textbook showcase of vote rigging and a well-defined example of where the electoral commission was having problems finding a tally consensus.

The opposition candidate appeared to receive the following votes from this particular electoral map: Katiola (38,416); Bouake (42,070); Beoumi (19,058); Dabakala (34,398); Sakassou (15,656); that is, a would-be total of 149,598.

However, Sangare Moussa, the head of the Bandama voting district, reported a total of 244,471 votes, which means there were 94,873 surplus votes in favor of the opposition candidate Ouattara. When the ballots were closed, all observers and those of the two candidates asserted that the voter turnout was 70 percent. Hours later, the electoral commission put it to 81 percent, a jump of 11 points.

Then, out of 20,073 manual tally-ups of the votes submitted to electronic verification, 2,000 were rejected for over-stating the numbers of voters compared to the registered voters in the districts, and, altogether, the overestimated voters were more than 600,000.

Out of the 19 electoral maps, the votes from 15 of them were consolidated, but the commission was having problems consolidating the votes in the remaining four areas under the rebellion’s control, where voting irregularities were observed.

In addition to those tally irregularities, the spokesperson of the Independent Electoral Commission, acting without the consensus of (and in spite of the objections of) the Constitutional Council, unilaterally invalidated all the absentee votes from the 28 districts of France (nominally because of fighting among Ivorians in three voting areas in Paris) in both the initial election and the run-off election.

These votes, as well as the voting irregularities in the northern region of Cote d’Ivoire, where the African election observers had also documented beatings, killings, intimidation, and women being publicly stripped of their clothing, should have been submitted to the Constitutional Council for review.

Because of all these irregularities, and because the Electoral Commission could not constitutionally proclaim, within the constitutionally prescribed deadline period, the provisional results that were to be validated by the Constitutional Council, its mandate was terminated, leaving the Constitutional Council to handle these matters.

But, while that procedure was in progress, the president of the defunct Independent Electoral Commission was ushered to the headquarters of the opposition candidate at the Golf Hotel to illegally proclaim Ouattara the winner before the French state and foreign media and the U.N. representative.

The Constitutional Council stated that the defunct Independent Electoral Commission had no right to declare Ouattara the winner, as constitutional electoral procedures had not been followed.

It deemed illegal the U.N. representative’s ratification of would-be provisional results that were illegally proclaimed. The U.N. representative was to ratify the final results that the Constitutional Council would have certified.

The Constitutional Council then analyzed all irregularities and tallies, partially validated some of them and, after the adjustments were completed, proclaimed Gbagbo the winner. Cote d’Ivoire thus descended into a post-electoral nightmare.

Ekra Miezan, Ph.D., is an assistant professor at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies in Seoul. He can be reached at ekra@hufs.ac.kr.

Rawlings calls for a peaceful approach to the Ivorian crisis

| Monday, December 27, 2010

Former President Jerry John Rawlings has reiterated its call for an extreme restraint in the management of he crisis in Cote d 'Ivoire. In a message released Thursday, three days after he called for restraint and aturity on the part of all actors in the crisis, President Rawlings said the situation in Ivory Coast was not a imple electoral conflict, but a tangle of ethnic and political complexities that must be handled with tact and iplomacy rather than by open allusions to the use of force.

The former president said that the disputed results clearly indicate that the Ivory Coast is sharply divided on ethnic lines, a fact which should be concerned stakeholders such as ECOWAS, the AU and the UN at the time, they exploring options to resolve the impasse. "The two men at the center of the conflict have indicated their willingness to accept a recount or re-verification of results by neutral observers. Is there a hidden reason for not wanting to accept the offer made by both parties? "It is also important that we do not rush into any kind of intervention force. This does not guarantee a final resolution of the crisis and may actually exacerbate an already volatile situation that could result in a complete civil war with disastrous effects on the populations of entire sub-region.

"Attempts to gather support for military intervention were unfounded and instead expose the hypocrisy of the UN, ECOWAS and the AU. "The most outrageous election results took place without intervention. How can we justify an intervention in this case, when the results are so tight and divided along ethnic lines? Let us explore all options available to peace rather than military intervention, which can not reach a peaceful political transition in Côte d'Ivoire. "The situation is certainly an embarrassment to Africa, but equally disturbing is the fact that international media have chosen to overlook many things.

Reports of some major election observers condemned the conduct of elections in several parts of the country have been totally ignored by the international media. "In some regions the number of votes cast is greater than the total number of voters. In one region, there are 159,788 votes to 48,400 votes. This, added to the fact that in some areas, the staff of the electoral commission and some election officials were not allowed to control the process, calls for a proper investigation is urgently conducted. "There are so many crucial questions unanswered. The details of the report of the envoy of the African Union, President Thabo Mbeki, should be made public to help better understand the nature of the situation. "It is also imperative that ECOWAS convened an emergency meeting to urge both sides to the center of the crisis as well as representatives of all the observer missions that have covered the election to present their case. This has been done in the past and this will move us a big step in finding the solution. "We must act with care for the good of the people of Ivory Coast who are the real victims of this tragedy. I urge ECOWAS and other international institutions involved in the crisis to analyze the situation with the utmost attention and do everything in their power to resolve in a peaceful manner, "said President Rawlings

France And The Ivory Coast-The Empire Strikes Back

Currently there is an impasse in the runoff of the Presidential elections in the Ivory Coast. The French-linked and funded electoral commission declared that Allasane Outtara won the election while the Constitutional Court declared incumbent President Gbagbo as the victor.

The ‘international community’ of Western countries, NGOS, UN appeasers, and a variety of Francafrique cowards and bed-wetters support Ouattara even though massive fraud has been demonstrated at the polls in the rebel-held North.

This result should be no surprise to anyone. There has been no effective disarmament of the tinpot rebel warlords of the North and no unification of the country in anticipation of the election. A ‘security’ dividing line between the North and the South has been maintained by the occupying French forces pretending to be U.N. troops. Even so-called peacemakers like Blaise Campaore of Burkina Faso pretend to be neutral. Campaore, an unindicted war criminal with a track record of subversion, arms smuggling and war profiteering in Liberia, Sierra Leone and the Ivory Cost is somehow portrayed as a neutral.

When arms were being shipped to the West African wars by Chirac and Ghadaffi they arrived at their destinations after having passed through the hands of Campaore and Tandja (who both profited on the deliveries), Ouattara, known as the “Father of the Rebellion” in the Ivory Coast was sustained by operating from a safe haven in Burkina Faso when he was not busy maintaining his close personal ties to Sarkozy’s first wife in Paris. There was no mystery about the Ouattara-Campaore joint effort. Several hours of tapes exist which recorded the meetings called by Campaore in Burkina Faso which garnered support for Ouattara among the Northerners and actively plotted with two French military officers sent from Paris to attempt coups against the Gbagbo Government.

Voter fraud and deception was the rule in the North for over seven years. Even when the AU originally appointed Banny as the interim Prime minister ad Thabo Mbeki as the mediator the frauds persisted. President Mbeki visited the Ivory Coast and invited the warring factions to meet with President Gbagbo in Pretoria where two sets of agreements were made. These Pretoria Agreements achieved a resolution of most of the outstanding issues between the two sides, because President Gbagbo made concessions to achieve these ends. The most important point made in Pretoria was that there would be disarmament of the rebels.

This was, indeed, a requisite of the original cease-fire agreement at Linas-Marcoussis , Article 3 (g) “In order to contribute to restoring security of persons and property throughout the national territory, the Government of National Reconciliation will organise the regrouping and subsequent disarming of all forces. It will ensure that no mercenaries remain within the country’s borders.”

Some links showing the protests:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fsgZ75aCr2A

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2rKMEAzpFyc

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zcOmw624suM

Thank you

Is Ivory Coast becoming Frances’ ‘Iraq’?

In the run up to Iraqi invasion US manipulated the UN organs, mobilized her allies into join her quest to attack Iraq and institute regime change. Few nations saw through this ploy or had the courage to register effective protestation. This was in the name of Iraqis and human rights and danger posed to the world. To day we know better! But we are on the precipice of falling into a similar situation Africa with France pulling the UN. Will Côte d'Ivoire fall victim to this syndrome: where for Iraqi oil, lies and conspiracies of "international community" were handy to oust Saddam Hussein? Will the UN again, on behalf of geo-strategy, cover genocide or conceal greed in Côte d'Ivoire?

The UN Security council resolution of 9^th Dec 2010 backed Alassane Ouattara as the winner of Ivory Coast’s disputed Nov. 28 presidential election, bolstering his challenge to incumbent Laurent Gbagbo and besides condemning the position taken by the Gbagbo, the council also said it would impose “targeted measures” against those standing in the way of the peace process or UN efforts in Ivory Coast. Russia took a very clear position on the condemnation of Ivory Coast. The absence of presidential statement in New York, as Susan Rice, who currently chairs the Security Council for the USA, which had been expected was loud. Russia allowed the release of this press communiqué, on principle, but did not agree and maintained her stance regarding the sovereignty of Côte d’Ivoire – saying that the Unites Nations are not commissioned to state results of presidential elections of a sovereign country. The Chinese government also released a communiqué saying that the law has to prevail, institutions should be respected and that the political dialog should take place.

The media though is awash with the notion that the whole world has isolated Gbagbo’s government, yet divergent views like that of China, Russia and even South Africa and also Angola, and Libya are not being heard for not chorusing the ECOWAS’ nor the African Union’s opinion…The media buzz: to make people believe, via the media, that President Gbagbo is isolated has failed to cause a revolt in the country . There was a general expectation that the population will pour into the streets, demanding that Laurent Gbagbo step down that he had lost according to the provisionary results. On the contrary most of the people in the south divide of the country voiced support for Gbagbo vowing to die to the last man should the country be attacked. The street demonstrations are needed to raise the temperature which saw the calls to match at take over the Ivorian national Radio and Television Station headquarters. This met a rock hard response from Ivorian forces and has now led to rearming of supporters of Mr. Alassane Ouattara, whom the international community overwhelmingly recognises as the legitimate president.

The question that begs an answer is this; Why UN and US through the French forces are arming the rebels? The reason for Gbagbo to order UN and French forces to leave the country was precisely this. According to the Ivorian government sources foreign dispatch, No. 0026 of 21/12/10, "the U.S. government brought in mercenaries in Bouake, via Algiers through Ouagadougou with sophisticated equipment for endangering the lives of legal authorities "of Côte d'Ivoire. UN forces have been reported on RTI giving catches to rebels.

How will the UN achieve its goals if it undermines the very principles of its mission? Might it be the problem of global governance? Where permanent member states of the Security Council, with very important responsibilities, to bring back peace in the world would, on the contrary use the United Nations for their own benefit and serve their agendas. The start of the Côte d’Ivoire crisis in 2002 coincided with the challenge of Iraq. The United Nations was tasked with solving the problem in Côte d’Ivoire and instead of bringing peace in Côte d’Ivoire, France, following the Marcoussis Agreemments, had the Agreement endorsed by the United Nations and has continuously attempted to eject President Gbagbo instead of solving the problem of peace and reconciliation in Côte d’Ivoire.

The United Nation, through France and the United-States, applied pressure for these elections saying that President Gbagbo does not wish to hold them. It was France the author of the Côte d’Ivoire resolution project that would not yield to President Gbagbo objection, that elections be held after the disarmament of the North and the reunification. The Ouagadougou Agreements (APO) pointed out that Ivoirians be mobilized by the help of President Compaoré and that: the elections were to be held two month after the disarmament and reunification.

Why would they ignore the institutions that Cote d’Ivoire has established leave alone her sovereignty? It will not be easy to just remove Gbagbo from power without shedding blood. Who should be responsible for plunging Ivoirians to blood bath? We must expose stand against the bias shown in this case if by it the crisis in Ivory coast could be solved.

Canon Francis Omondi

Anglican Church of Kenya.