Ivory Coast: Troubles Far From Over

By Elizabeth Kendal


As recent mutinies demonstrate, Ivory Coast’s troubles are anything but over.

That Ivory Coast’s troubles have roots in the ethnic (indigene/“Ivorite” versus migrant/settler) and religious (secular and Christian versus Muslim and Islamist) tensions caused by decades of mass migration, is self evident.

However, while racial and religious tensions do pose serious challenges, nothing compares to the challenge of FrançAfrique.

Mutinies Reveal Volatility

At around 2am on the morning of 6 January 2017, mutinying soldiers took control of Bouaké, Ivory Coast’s second largest city. Perched atop Ivory Coast’s volatile ethnic-religious “fault-line”, Bouaké has long been the “rebel” front-line.

click on map to enlarge

As the mutiny spread to other major urban centres, President Alassane Ouattara announced that he had agreed to consider the mutineers’ demands. To that end he ordered his defence minister and military chiefs to hold urgent talks with members of the security forces.

Violence erupted again in Bouaké on Friday 13 January as the government met with the mutineers to iron out the details of an agreement. The agreement forged will see some 8,500 mutinying soldiers paid 12 million CFA francs (US$19,400) each – a significant amount given that many Ivorians earn about $160 a month.

Unsurprisingly, copy-cat mutinies subsequently erupted in other cities as other former rebels demanded similar payments. In some cities, disgruntled civil servants also went on strike. Four people died when tensions spilled over into violence in the political capital Yamoussoukro.

Then, on 7 February, an elite Special Forces unit directly involved in providing close security to the president mutinied in the south-eastern coastal town of Adiaké, just 90 km east of the port city of Abidjan, Ivory Coast’s commercial capital.

While order has been restored, it is not clear that any agreement has been reached. According to one report, a representative of the Special Forces’ mutineers told TV5 that they are seeking 17 million CFA francs (US$27,500) and promotions, warning that if the government refuses, then “the country will suffer” for they are “really ready” to fight to the death.

Reporting for Ventures Africa, Franck Kie commented (8 Feb): “A month after these events [in Bouaké] happened, the situation appears to be back to normal, but there are still serious questions about Cote d’Ivoire’s future and stability. In 2014, a similar mutiny took place and according to many sources, the military men which were protesting early 2017 had already been paid back then. Since their requests have always been approved, and they are the ones with weapons, for how long will Cote d’Ivoire be held hostage by these men?

“The next few months will definitely tell us where the country is heading in the future. Also, the brief [Special Forces] mutiny on February 7th confirms that the calm was very fragile and that pandora’s box has been opened, with anybody holding a gun able to take the whole country hostage.”

Who are “these men”?
        Who are the mutineers?

The mutineers are former rebel fighters, most of whom fought with Guillaume Soro’s rebel army known as the New Forces during the troubles of 2002 to 2011. Most are northern Muslims, including Muslim settlers from Mali, Burkina Faso and Guinea. Despite having terrorised Ivory Coast for years, these former rebels were absorbed into the Ivorian military in 2011, following the violent coup d’état that brought Alassane Ouattara to power. The mutineers claim not to have received the compensation they were promised for the part they played in the violent ouster of Laurent Gbagbo.

Many suspect the 6 January mutiny in Bouaké  – which does appear to have been orchestrated – is part of a power play by former rebel leader Guillaume Soro. Surely it was no coincidence that the mutiny erupted in the early hours of the day Soro would be re-elected as President (speaker) of the National Assembly.

As President of the National Assembly, Soro had been the legal successor to the president – that is, until President Ouattara oversaw changes to the constitution. Passed in a referendum in October 2016 and signed into law on 8 November, the new constitution establishes the office of vice president, and designates the vice president as president’s legal successor.

As such, the constitutional reforms pose a threat to Guillaume Soro’s presidential ambitions. Consequently, many analysts believe that the 6 January mutiny in Bouaké was but a show of strength from Guillaume Soro, who still commands the allegiance of the bulk of former rebel fighters.

On Tuesday 10 January, President Ouattara (75) named former prime minister Daniel Kablan Duncan (73) as his vice president. Duncan was finance minister under Ouattara when Ouattara was prime minister in the early 1990s. A long-time Ouattara ally, Duncan is also a leading figure in moves to expand Islamic finance and Islamic investment in Ivory Coast.

Observers believe Ouattara is paving the way for Duncan to succeed him in 2020 – but that Soro might have other ideas.

The volatility is unnerving investors.

A Stratfor Global Intelligence report published on 22 February forecasts problems ahead for Ivory Coast.

The Hidden Threat to Africa's Most Promising Economy
FEBRUARY 22, 2017 | 09:30 GMT (subscription)

“Forecast
 Despite years of impressive economic growth, Ivory Coast will need to enact sweeping reforms within its military to prevent its burgeoning democracy from backsliding.
 But these reforms will be exceedingly difficult for the government to make, constrained as it is by its historical reliance on the country's powerful former rebel commanders.
 In the absence of the much-needed overhaul, Ivory Coast's next presidential election in 2020 could become an outlet for greater unrest.”

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It must be noted however, that if conflict does return to Ivory Coast, then everyone – but especially Christians – will have more to worry about than the price of chocolate.

The Stakes have been Raised

Much has changed since Alassane Ouattara was inaugurated in May 2011.

In August 2011, US-French-NATO forces aided al-Qaeda-linked jihadists in the ouster of Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, who, as an ally in the “War on Terror”, had kept Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) hamstrung for years.

In October 2011, Gaddafi was barbarically lynched by a mob of “bearded ones” (as he derisively and contemptuously called them) to cries of Allahu Akbar. Libya’s numerous weapons caches were raided, the weapons making their way into the hands Islamic jihadists throughout West and North Africa, Syria and the wider Middle East.

Re-equipped and finally off the leash, AQIM exploded back onto the scene.

By mid April 2012, AQIM affiliate Ansar al-Dine had seized control of much of northern Mali, securing more weapons, leading a local security expert to lament that AQIM “is today more armed than the combined armies of Mali and Burkina Faso”.

On 15 January 2016, Ansar al-Dine kidnapped Swiss Christian missionary Beatrice Stockly from her home in Timbuktu, Mali. Also on 15 Jan 2016, AQIM affiliate al-Murabitoon – formerly known as MUJAO (Movement for Unity and Jihad in West Africa) – attacked Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso, killing 29 civilians, including seven foreign Christian workers in what it called “a message . . .  to the slaves of the cross”.  Also on 15 Jan 2016, Ansar al-Dine crossed from Mali into Burkina Faso and kidnapped Australian missionaries Dr Ken Elliot (81) and his wife Jocelyn from their home in Baraboule [see RLPB 341 (27 Jan 2016)]. Beatrice Stockly and Dr Ken Elliot remain in AQIM captivity to this day.

On 16 March 2016, al-Murabitoon gunned down 14 civilians and two soldiers in Grand-Bassam, a beach resort town in south-eastern Ivory Coast [see RLPB 348 (16 March 2016)] midway between Abidjan (the commercial capital) and Adiaké (the site of the 7 Feb 2017 Special Forces mutiny). On 14 October 2016, al-Murabitoon abducted US-missionary Jeff Woodke (55) from his home in northern Niger. Nigerian authorities tracked his captors to Mali, where al-Murabitoon is based. Woodke’s situation is dire [see RLPB 396 (1 March 2017)].

According to data compiled by the Foundation for Defense of Democracies’ Long War Journal, “al Qaeda and its many allies and affiliates launched at least 257 attacks in Mali and the wider West Africa region in 2016, nearly a staggering 150 percent uptick from the group’s 106 assaults in the 2015 calendar year.” Further to this, “Three separate attacks, two in Burkina Faso and one in Niger, have been claimed by the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara.”

The rise of AQIM and the presence of Islamic State in the Greater Sahara raises the stakes in Ivory Coast. For if there is anything transnational Islamic jihadists do cherish, it is chaos, insecurity and a cause that can be exploited.

FrançAfrique

“FrançAfrique,” explains Richard Li, “a term coined by former Ivorian President Félix Houphouët-Boigny in 1955, was originally meant to describe the good relationship between France and Africa. However, it has come to symbolise everything that went wrong with the French neocolonial relationship that meant keeping its former colonies in Africa on a tight leash, shown in political interference and protecting France’s political and economic interests: organised coups to remove African leaders who attempted to go rogue; covert military interventions to secure natural resources; and corruption and illicit outflows.”

FrançAfrique is rooted in the colonial pact brokered between France and its former colonies in the 1960s; a pact still in operation today. The colonial pact mandates that 65 percent of the foreign currency reserves of former French colonies in Africa go into the French Treasury, while a further 20 percent of reserves go to cover “financial liabilities”. This means Africa’s fourteen former French colonies only ever have access to 15 percent of their own money; if they need more they have to borrow their own money back from France at commercial rates.

FrancAfrique - political cartoon - March 2015

Further to this, the colonial pact perpetuates French control over strategic raw materials. It also gives France the right to station troops in the country with the right of free passage and mandates that all military equipment be acquired from France. It requires that French businesses be allowed to maintain monopoly enterprises in key areas such as water, electricity, ports, transport and energy. To this day, France’s African policy remains the personal fiefdom of the President’s office.

To remain in power in francophone Africa, one must be prepared to act as a vassal of neo-colonial France. This was something the nationalist government of President Laurent Gbagbo (a historian, former political dissident, and a southern Christian) and Mamadou Koulibaly (a professor of economics, finance minister, president/speaker of the Parliament, and northern Muslim) was not prepared to do.

On the other hand, presidential aspirant Alassane Ouattara was not only prepared to perpetuate FrançAfrique, he was also prepared to play the race and religion cards for political and personal gain. Worse still, he was willing to take power by force if necessary.

FrançAfrique is why Alassane Ouatarra is today threatened with a divided and volatile military. That said, FrançAfrique is also why Alassane Ouatarra – as France’s man in Yamoussoukro – would doubtless retire comfortably in France if all hell was to break loose.

FrançAfrique (as distinct from “war crimes”) is precisely why former president Laurent Gbagbo and Young Patriots leader Ble Goude are today standing trial at the International Criminal Court in The Hague while current president Alassane Ouattara and New Forces leader Guillaume Soro are not.

Poverty-perpetuating, exploitative FrançAfrique is an enduring injustice and Ivory Coast’s greatest challenge. And as long as French and Islamic interests converge in Ivory Coast, then FrançAfrique will continue to pose an existential threat to the Ivorian Church.

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BACKGROUND

2002: Civil War leads to Polarisation

Civil war erupted in September 2002 after the mostly northern Muslim rebel fighters led by Guillaume Soro attempted to seize control of the state. The coup, which was launched in Bouaké, failed and the government remained in control, albeit over a divided country: a largely ethnical-religious cleansed and increasingly lawless, rebel-controlled north, and a government-controlled south, with a perpetually volatile middle belt.  

Cote d’Ivoire: Tearing Apart, 17 October 2002
By Elizabeth Kendal for World Evangelical Alliance Religious Liberty Commission.

While the rebel coup d’état failed, the peace deal imposed on Ivory Coast by former colonial power France, was, in the words of Parliamentary Speaker Mamadou Koulibaly, “a constitutional coup”.

Cote d'Ivoire: Peace accord “opens Pandora’s box”, 31 January 2003
By Elizabeth Kendal for World Evangelical Alliance Religious Liberty Commission.

2010: Violent Coup Sows the Seeds of Future Troubles 

Elections were held on 28 November 2010, despite the fact the conditions mandated for elections – in particular the disarmament of the rebel-held north – had not been met. Under such conditions, polling in the north was never going to be free and fair. [See "US Senator: Obama Administration 'Wrong' on Ivory Coast", VOA, 5 April 2011]

The election result was hotly contested. Immediately following the vote, the strongly pro-Ouattara Independent Electoral Commission proclaimed Mr. Ouattara the winner. But Mr Gbagbo challenged the result, forcing the strongly pro-Gbagbo Constitutional Council to open and investigation, as mandated by Ivory Coast’s constitution.

Before the Constitutional Council could announce its ruling, pro-Ouattara elements broadcast, via French TV from Ouattara’s headquarters, that Alassane Ouattara had won the election. The illegal and pre-emptive announcement was met favourably in the West on the grounds that a Ouattara presidency would better serve French and US economic interests. When the Constitutional Council subsequently declared Gbagbo the winner the opposition cried foul. Both men claimed victory; tensions soared.

On 10 Dec 2010 the UN Security Council renewed the mandate of the “UN Operation in Cote d’Ivoire (UNOCI) and of the French forces which support it”. On 24 Dec 2010 the UN General Assembly recognised Ouattara as the winner of Ivory Coast’s elections. Russia objected, saying the UN should not be interfering in the electoral processes of a sovereign state.

Despite the fact that this was a political crisis requiring a political solution, Alassane Ouattara – assured of Western backing – moved to seize power by force. It was a classic case of asymmetric conflict. Up against the mighty and loyal army of the Ivorian State, the pro-Ouattara rebels were by far the weaker force. The violent coup d’état was only successful because the mostly northern Muslim rebels were aided by UN and French troops, tanks and helicopter gunships.

While the UN and France-backed coup did empower Alassane Ouattara, it also sowed the seeds of today’s troubles, by leaving Ouattara indebted not to his foreign backers, but to many thousands of former rebel fighters.

IVORY COAST: where Islamic and Western interests converge
By Elizabeth Kendal, Religious Liberty Monitoring, 7 April 2011

Ivory Coast: church attacked; refugees suffering; lawyers refused; Mbeki speaks.
By Elizabeth Kendal, Religious Liberty Monitoring, 11 May 2011

The above posting quotes a detailed Foreign Policy article entitled, What the World Got Wrong in Cote D'Ivoire, by former South African president Thabo Mbeki. After correcting the record, Mbeki asks: "Why is the United Nations entrenching former colonial powers on our continent?" [If you are not subscribed to Foreign Policy magazine, you can read the article here.]

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Elizabeth Kendal is international religious liberty analyst and advocate. She serves as Director of Advocacy at Canberra-based Christian Faith and Freedom (CFF), and is an Adjunct Research Fellow at the Arthur Jeffery Centre for the Study of Islam at Melbourne School of Theology.

She has authored two books: Turn Back the Battle: Isaiah Speaks to Christians Today (Deror Books, Melbourne, Australia, Dec 2012) which offers a Biblical response to persecution and existential threat; and, After Saturday Comes Sunday: Understanding the Christian Crisis in the Middle East (Wipf and Stock, Eugene, OR, USA, June 2016).

See www.ElizabethKendal.com

Ivory Coast: racial and religious hatred empowered and unleashed

The legacy of French and NATO intervention in Ivory Coast -- where the West intervened on behalf of Islamists in order to advance their own economic interests -- is that Ivory Coast 's predominantly Christian southern tribes must now live with serious insecurity in an increasingly militarised yet lawless state where Muslim soldiers may abuse them at will and with impunity.  This is racial and religious hatred empowered and unleashed.

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Brief background

Ivory Coast held elections in December 2010, despite the fact that pre-conditions had not been met. For starters, northern-Muslim rebel forces loyal to Muslim presidential candidate Alassane Ouattara refused to disarm; a fact that meant the electoral process in the north could hardly be free and fair.  (How ironic that Bafétigué Ouattera (Côte d’Ivoire) has just been elected as a Vice-Chair of the UN's Disarmament Commission.) 

After the Constitutional Council investigated all reported irregularities (as mandated by the constitution) it ruled that the incumbent, Laurent Gbagbo -- a southerner and observant Christian -- was the victor. However, before it could even announce its ruling, pro-Ouattara elements pre-empted the constitutional council's decision and broadcast via French TV from Ouattara's headquarters that Ouattara had won the election. The illegal announcement was met favourably in the West as a Ouattara presidency would serve French and US economic interests.

Confident of Western backing, Ouattara then moved to seize power through military violence. Up against the mighty army of the Ivorian secular State, the pro-Ouattara ethnic and Islamic rebels were the weaker force. The violent coup d'état coup was only successful due to NATO air-strikes and military assistance from France.

Having seized power through violence and with foreign assistance, it is no surprise to learn that Ouattara's hold on power is dependent on violence and terror.

For further background and analysis on Ivory Coast: see Religious Liberty Monitoring.

Death in Abidjan

On Monday 6 August, gunmen -- presumed to be Gbagbo loyalists -- killed six soldiers in a pre-dawn attack on the Akouédo military base in Abidjan. A day earlier, gunmen attacked a police station in Yopougon neighbourhood, on the other side of Abidjan, killing four soldiers. Gbagbo's political party, the Ivorian Popular Front (FPI), issued a statement condemning "with the utmost vigour this wave of deadly violence", while also calling on the government to capture the attackers.

Response

In response, President Alassane Ouattara ordered the Republican Forces (FRCI: the new Ivorian Army, incorporating the former Forces Nouvelles rebels) to "fight without mercy" those attempting to create a feeling of insecurity in Ivory Coast. Consequently, there has been a surge in appalling human rights abuses targeting "perceived Gbagbo loyalists": i.e. predominantly Christian southerners, mostly ethnic Bété, Guéré, Ebrié, Oubi and Adioukrou. The abuses involve mass arrests, extortion and extreme violence, including torture.

See: Ivory Coast: Ex-detainees describe torture by military following roundup after attacks
By Robbie Corey-Boulet, The Associated Press, 4 October 2012

Excerpts:

The soldiers lined up the detainees in a row on the grass in the middle of the night and beat them with sticks. Other times, soldiers struck the prisoners with belts and rifles so hard the welts lasted for weeks.

Cedric Bao, a 33-year-old who was held for two weeks in August on suspicion of hiding weapons, said soldiers also attached wires to detainees and administered electrical shocks as they writhed on the ground.

"When that happened, the wires would produce a lot of noise, and the lights would flicker, and it would smell like burning. We could hear the people shouting," Bao said. "I was always praying to God not to be brought downstairs."

. . . While torture allegations have been documented at multiple military facilities, the U.N. officials said that some of the worst came from detainees at the San Pedro camp, including credible reports of electrical shocks.

Few detainees in the city had spoken up about their experiences at the camp because of threats they received before being released, said Serges Dagbo, San Pedro representative for the Ivorian Human Rights League.

But in recent interviews with The Associated Press, four former detainees described harsh conditions marked by cramped quarters, minimal food and the frequent use of violence to extract confessions. . .

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On 19 November, Human Rights Watch released a report exposing the gross human rights abuses being committed by the Republican Forces (FRCI), including: arbitrary arrests, illegal detentions, extortion, inhuman treatment and torture.

See: Ivory Coast military accused of torture during 'reprisal' crackdown
Hope of reconciliation after civil war fades amid claims of inhuman treatment of perceived Gbagbo loyalists
By David Smith, Africa correspondent, The Guardian, 19 Nov 2012.

Excerpts:

In August, members of the government's Republican Forces carried out mass arrests of perceived Gbagbo supporters almost daily in the Abidjan neighbourhood of Yopougon, Human Rights Watch said. "Without arrest warrants or individualised evidence, soldiers arbitrarily arrested young men in their homes, at neighbourhood restaurants, at bars, in taxis and buses, as they walked home from church, and at traditional community celebrations.

"Soldiers often arrived in neighbourhoods in military cargo trucks and forced 20 or more perceived pro-Gbagbo youth to board. Hundreds of young men appear to have been rounded up and detained, largely on the basis of their ethnicity and place of residence. Those arrested were often brought to military camps, which are not lawful detention sites for civilians under Ivorian law."

. . . In August and September, the commander in charge of one detainment camp was Ousmane Coulibaly, better known as "Bin Laden", Human Rights Watch said. In a previous report on the post-election violence, it had named him as one of the Republican Forces commanders whose soldiers committed acts of torture and dozens of summary executions during the final [France and NATO-backed] battle for Abidjan in April and May 2011.

HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH REPORT
A Long Way from Reconciliation
Abusive Military Crackdown in Response to Security Threats in Côte d’Ivoire
19 November 2012  (79 pages)

Excerpts:

Human Rights Watch interviewed eight former detainees at the [Adjamé] military police camp, five of whom provided detailed evidence suggesting that they had been victims of torture. . . with the purpose of demanding answers to questions about the location of guns or alleged suspects, or in order to pressure the detainee to sign a confession of involvement in an attack against state security. (p25)

They also described seeing other detainees come back to the cell with bruised faces, severe swelling, and open wounds. Detainees at the military police camp also described suffering grossly inadequate detention conditions, including severe overcrowding, near complete denial of food and water, and humiliating practices like being placed in a room filled with excrement. (p26)

The former detainees interviewed by Human Rights Watch were all young men from ethnic groups perceived to support Laurent Gbagbo. They described their detention rooms as being full with people from the same ethnic groups, including the Bété, Guéré, Ebrié, Oubi, and Adioukrou. . .  many young men were picked up during mass arrests in areas with a concentration of perceived Gbagbo supporters. (p26)

In the cases documented by Human Rights Watch, severe physical pain appeared to be inflicted by state agents, namely military personnel, in order to pressure people into a confession or to divulge information about the location of weapons. Torture did not appear to be systematic, as other detainees described only minimal physical abuse. However, the cases documented by Human Rights Watch raise concerns about the total number of potential victims. (p29)

In addition, Human Rights Watch received credible information about recent cases of torture against detainees held in a Republican Forces military base in San Pedro, a town in southwestern Côte d’Ivoire about 350 kilometers from Abidjan.  On October 4, the Associated Press reported [see above] that soldiers at the San Pedro military camp had subjected at least four civilian detainees to electric shock, finding that “long wires were attached to their feet, midsections and necks before electrical shocks were administered.” (p34)

Human Rights Watch describes the crackdown as "unlike any since the end of the post-election crisis". (p37)

A diplomat from a key partner to Côte d’Ivoire told Human Rights Watch that there were deep concerns about how Ivorian authorities had framed the issue: “The language they use is very concerning: ‘eradication,’ ‘terrorism,’ ‘clean the country up’. (p 37)

Youths rounded up en masse in Yopougon report being separated according to their ethnic group. On a daily basis, masses of youths belonging to southern (normally pro-Gbagbo) tribes were trucked to the BAE (Brigade anti-émeute, or anti-riot unit) police camp where they were punished mercilessly and extorted. (see page 39)

A Ouattara supporter who lives near the BAE camp told Human Rights Watch, “You wouldn’t believe the things we see there each day. [There are] always youth being trucked in, being beaten. They don’t even hide [the abuses]; it’s often in plain view. [The FRCI there] aren’t afraid of any consequences.” An Ivorian civil society leader agreed: “[The soldiers implicated in abuses] are at ease. They don’t fear anything, and that’s the most dangerous thing: the complete impunity.” (p 40-41)

Human Rights Watch interviewed Yopougon residents who were arrested in their homes, while eating at a maquis, with friends at a bar, when walking home from church, when in a taxi or a bus, and when attending a funeral. (p 41)

Nearly all of those interviewed described the widespread commission of criminal acts by members of the FRCI in Yopougon. These crimes were perpetrated first during the process of neighborhood sweeps and mass arrests, when soldiers stole cash and valuables such as cell phones, computers, and jewelry from people’s homes and off people being arrested; and second, by demanding money in order to secure a detainee’s release. The mass arrests appear to have been a financial boon for members of the Republican Forces based at the BAE camp, and a crippling hardship to those who were swept up because of their age and perceived political affiliation. (p 46)

Since the end of the post-election crisis, the Republican Forces and armed “volunteers” [including dozos: see here and here] loyal to them have unlawfully taken over many functions that the police and gendarmes are legally mandated to do . . . (p 56)

Several victims of arbitrary arrest or detention told Human Rights Watch that police officers or gendarmes tried to intervene on their behalf and stop abuses. . .  A youth arrested while walking home from a church function on August 25 described how police kept him from being detained and upbraided soldiers who had stolen dozens of cell phones from those arrested (p 57) "God thankfully made that there was a police officer nearby," he said (p 58)

The HRW report also notes that after being arbitrarily arrested and beaten senseless for a week, men are then extorted, forced to pay in order to be released rather than killed. Towards the end of the report there are testimonies from women who testify to being arbitrarily arrested and then told that their male relatives will released if they (the women) have sex with the soldiers.

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In an unrelated article, Associated Press reports on the Internal Displacement Monitoring Center's findings, that continuing conflicts over land have caused at least another 24,000 Ivorians to become displaced so far this year (i.e. by Nov 2012).
[for an example, see Ivory Coast: Thousands displaced in renewed terror
Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin (RLPB) 172, Wed 15 Aug 2012]

That figure is in addition to the 40,000 to 80,000 who remain displaced from the March-April 2011 hostilities.

According to the report, "armed men have prevented displaced persons from accessing their land, sometimes imposing 'arbitrary taxes on those wishing to return'."

Are these "arbitrary taxes" simple criminal extortion, or jizya (Islamic, sacralised extortion of the dhimmi, as mandated by the Qur'an in Sura 9:29)? And why is it being allowed? The fact is, lawless Ivory Coast is awash with illegal weapons.

On 5 Dec, UN Watch issued a statement entitled, Despite Military Atrocities, Ivory Coast Elected as UN Disarmament Commission Vice-Chair, in which it called for the move to be reversed.

Farmer reportedly crucified in Ivory Coast

On 30 May 2011, Ivorian.net published a piece by César Etou who reports that on Saturday 28 May, pro-Ouattara gunmen crucified a farmer in Ivory Coast village of Binkro, Oumé Subprefecture, Central-western Ivory Coast.

The militants reportedly nailed the poor peasant's hands and feet to a plank in the form of cross as "the example of Christ". According to sources, UN forces called to the rescue arrived too late to save the man.

Représailles contre les populations Un paysan crucifié à Oumé
Notre Voie-30 May 2011

UPDATE: Christian advocacy group Barnabas Fund (BF) reported on 8 June that actually two men had been crucified -- peasant brothers Raphael Aka Kouame and Kouassi Privat Kacou. Both men were accused of hiding weapons and savagely beaten before being crudely nail to crosses with steel spikes despite their pleas of innocence.

According to the BF report, Ouattara’s men subsequently conducted an extensive search of Binkro but found only a store of medical equipment and supplies, which they looted. Despite there being no evidence of weapons, the seriously wounded pair were then taken to prison in Oumé, where Raphael died in the night.

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If this seems unbelievable, I recommend the Human Rights Watch report:

Côte d’Ivoire: Gbagbo Supporters Tortured, Killed in Abidjan
Rampant Reprisals by Pro-Ouattara Forces Mar New Presidency
2 June 2011

This report details numerous gross human rights abuses committed by pro-Ouattara militia: ethnic cleansing, torture, rapes, summary executions, mass graves . . .

Human Rights Watch is calling for Pres. Ouattara to end the impunity.

Ivory Coast: Darkness & terror; Freemasonry link; Watching Ghana.

Darkness and terror

Below are a few youtube clips that reveal something of the nature of the pro-Ouattara forces that have seized control of Ivory Coast.

1) This footage dates back to 2002. It shows pro-Ouattara, northern New Forces rebels at their base in Bouake. Though they had failed to capture all of Ivory Coast, they celebrate their seizure of the north with the ritual slaughter of an Ivorian constable, in the presence of French troops.

Sources report that when the rebels were confronted with this footage, they acknowledged that the constable was indeed ritually slaughtered. However they claimed to have later used their occult powers to resuscitate him.

2) This excellent, highly informative site has been set up to provide information on Ivory Coast's Presidential Conflict.

In the CBN film clip dated 8 April 2011, Gary Lane interviews missions Pastor Ted Jensen. This film clip contains truly horrific footage of civilians (allegedly members of predominantly Christian tribes that support Laurent Gbagbo) being kicked and shoved into a fiery mass grave where they can be seen burning to death.
UPDATE/CORRECTION: it is been pointed out that while pro-Gbagbo supporters have been burned alive in Ivory Coast, this footage is not from Ivory Coast March-April 2011. While people can be heard crying 'Allahu Akhbar' in the background, the footage is also on the internet as witch-burning in Kisii Nyamataro, Kenya, 2009.

In the CNN film clip dated 14 April 2011, Laurent Gbagbo's step daughter, US-based lawyer Marie-Antoinette Singleton, defends Gbagbo, explains the election fraud and talks about the terror gripping native and non-Muslim Ivorians.

The speeches and press conferences by U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe, are excellent value.

The Freemasonry link

The following article -- written to explain why so many francophone African presidents are supporting neo-colonial France vis-a-vis African nationalist Laurent Gbagbo -- exposes the role Freemasonry plays in the perpetuation of exploitative and criminal neo-colonialism in Africa.

According to the author, "It is impossible to understand how Françafrique works without reference to the Masons."

West African Leaders On The Square Against Gbagbo
By Dr. Gary K. Busch, for ocnus.net 5 Jan 2011

Busch writes: "The French Masons represent the elite of French business and politics. [. . .] Freemason lodges maintain a formidable, covert influence within the French judicial and police structures. [. . .]

"Just as in France, Freemasonry is ubiquitous at the very top in many African states. Denis Sassou Nguesso, the Congolese president, is Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Congo Brazzaville linked to the National Grand Lodge of France; President Mamadou Tanja of Niger; Chad's Idriss Deby and Francois Bozize of the Central African Republic are among at least twelve African presidents linked to the Masons. In November 2009 Ali Bongo, the new Gabonese President was ordained as the grand master of the Grand Lodge of Gabon (GLB) and the Grand Equatorial Rite, the two predominant Freemason orders in Gabon.

"In Congo-Brazzaville, both the current president, Denis Sassou Nguesso, and the former president, Pascal Lissouba, are freemasons, although they belong to different chapters of the order. Mr Lissouba is an initiate of the Grand Orient of France while Mr Sassou Nguesso belongs to a Senegalese lodge affiliated to the French Grand National Lodge. Most of these African presidents, but not exclusively, are francophone: Paul Biya, president of Cameroon , Blaise Campaore, president of Burkina Faso; Robert Guei, former head of Cote d'Ivoire; John Kuffuor, former president of Ghana, to name but a few. There are scores more at Cabinet level and who are staffing African regional organisations and banks.

"The Masons have always provided the leaders and the staff of French colonialism. . ."

Busch protests the Colonial Pact by which means France maintains control over the economies of the African states. "It took possession of their foreign currency reserves; it controlled the strategic raw materials of the country; it stationed troops in the country with the right of free passage; it demanded that all military equipment be acquired from France; it took over the training of the police and army; it required that French businesses be allowed to maintain monopoly enterprises in key areas (water, electricity, ports, transport, energy, etc.). France not only set limits on the imports of a range of items from outside the franc zone but also set minimum quantities of imports from France. These treaties are still in force and operational."

According to Busch, this immoral, exploitative Colonial Pact endures because, "Unlike in ordinary democracies, the French version of democracy is a special case. By tradition in France, foreign affairs are the French president's private domain. The foreign affairs minister only applies his policies. France is the only Western country where foreign policy is not a debating topic in the national legislative bodies. The sovereignty of the French people does not count for anything even if it has elected the president directly. The Parliament has no checking powers and is quietly relegated to domestic matters."

Watching Ghana

While both President Ouattara and Prime Minister Soro have cleared Ghana of providing military aid to pro-Gbagbo forces during the conflict, PM Soro is now accusing Ghana of providing refuge to pro-Gbagbo subversives.

However, Ghana President John Evans Atta Mills "has assured the international community that Ghana will not allow any group of persons who have wicked intentions to use the country as a base to cause mayhem in Cote d'Ivoire".
See: Ghana can't be used to destabilize Cote d'Ivoire - Mills
Ghanaweb 17 May 2011

Soro's New Forces warn Ghana
The Statesman, 18/05/2011

"In spite of assurances this week from President JEA Mills to the outgoing pro-Gbagbo Ivorian ambassador to Ghana, Emmanuel Auguste Ackah, that Ghana 'will not tolerate any group of persons to use Ghana as a base to create trouble for our neighbours,' les Forces Nouvelles de Côte d'Ivoire (the New Forces), the main military force in the Republican Forces which led the recent military action to overthrow Laurent Gbagbo has accused Ghana of hosting pro-Gbagbo men who are allegedly planning to destabilize Cote d'Ivoire.

"President Mills' denial of rebel activities in Ghana was in direct response to a report in pro-Ouattara newspaper, Le Patriote, last week. But, this subsequent accusation from the feared New Forces raises serious regional security issues for Ghana and Cote d'Ivoire."

[NOTE: Guillaume Soro is Ivory Coast's Prime Minister, Defence Minister and head of the Republican Forces army which overthrew Gbagbo. He also controls the "feared" New Forces rebel coalition that fought against the south in the 2002 Civil War. The New Forces have recently been incorporated into the Republican Forces under Soro's command.]

According to Soro, pro-Gbagbo forces sheltering in Ghana are preparing a counter-coup. While daring them to imagine themselves overthrowing Pres. Ouattara, he warns that should any attempt be made to destabilise Ouattara's government they will meet "their worst nightmare", adding that it would also be "suicidal for any nation that supports this path".

"The New Forces warn that Ghana would 'inevitably get its fingers burnt,' if it continues to fail to act against the alleged subversive activities."

Ivory Coast: church attacked; refugees suffering; lawyers refused; Mbeki speaks.

On Wednesday 4 May 2011, after weeks of fighting, Yopougon district -- Abidjan's last pro-Gbagbo stronghold -- fell to Alassane Ouattara's Republican Forces of Ivory Coast (FRCI) .

It appears however, that the FRCI may have perpetrated a massacre in Yopougon at a Baptist Church which has been sheltering more than 2,500 refugees. The UN is investigating.

Background: Ivory Coast's churches filling up -- with refugees
By Elizabeth Kendal, for Religious Liberty Monitoring, 24 April 2011,

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reports: "On 3 May, the Baptist Church where 2500 Internally Displaced Persons [IDPs] have sought refuge in Yopougon neighbourhood was attacked by armed men [reportedly FRCI]. 54 persons were said to have been taken away toward the Shell petrol station not far from Institute of the Blind in Yopougon. Thev[church's] offices including emergency medicines supplied to MSF [Doctors without Borders] were looted.

The OCHA was able to report that: "2500 IDPs currently sheltered at the Baptist Church in Yopougon are being assisted by MSF CH and UNICEF with medical treatment, medicines, child delivery kits, antibiotics and water treatment tablets kits, emergency medicines, antibiotics and water treatment tablets."

The OCHA report also notes that the 27,000 refugees still holed up in the Catholic mission in Duékoué have finally received food from the WFP (World Food Program) after a delay of two weeks. However, the 895 refugees currently staying at the UEESO (Fellowship of Evangelical Churches) church in Duékoué have not received WFP food assistance since the end of March. Fortunately the International Rescue Committee (IRC) has been able to distribute 750 kg of rice, 10 cartons of sardines, 68 litres of cooking oil, and 5 kg of salt to the UEESO church.

According to the OCHA report, refugees sheltering in St. Bernard's Church Abidjan face eviction "this week" (i.e. first week of May); but the report does not say who is evicting them or why.

Clearly the humanitarian and security situation for Ivory Coast's Christian remains dire.

VICTOR'S JUSTICE

In Abidjan on Friday 6 May, Alassane Ouattara was sworn in as President of Ivory Coast.

Meanwhile, deposed president Laurent Gbagbo is being held under house arrest in the far-northern town of Korhogo nearly 600 kilometres (370 miles) due north of Abidjan. His wife, Simone, is being detained at a separate location, in Odienné in the far northwest.

Also on Friday 6 May, two prominent Paris-based lawyers -- Jacques Verges and Marcel Ceccaldi -- arrived to represent Laurent Gbagbo at his hearing in the northern city of Korhogo. They did not get far however, as they were forced to return to France after their visas were refused at Abidjan airport. A third lawyer, the Franco-Cameroonian lawyer Lucie Bourthoumieux, was able to pass through passport control as she had rights of residency. However, she elected to return to Paris with her colleagues. According to the statement issued by Paris law firm Bourthoumieux on behalf of the three lawyers, "The three lawyers were turned away in circumstances that resembled a trap."

Jacques Verges regards this as evidence that the authorities in Ivory Coast did not want the former president to receive a proper defence. "I am very pessimistic about the future of a regime which treats lawyers in such a way," he said.

Marcel Ceccaldi added: "If Laurent Gbagbo does not want to be heard without the presence of his lawyers, there cannot be any hearing according to Ivorian law."

See: Gbagbo grilled over Ivory Coast unrest, 6 May 2011

On Saturday 7 May, Ivory Coast's state prosecutor, Simplice Kouadio Koffi, began the formal questioning of Gbagbo, despite the absence of his lawyers.

"Laurent Gbagbo has been questioned in the presence of his personal doctor," Koffi told AFP. "I will travel to Odienné Sunday to begin questioning Simone Gbagbo," he added.

"So this is why they wanted to stop us coming," French lawyer Marcel Ceccaldi said Saturday from Paris. "On the one hand, they announce they are setting up a Truth and Reconciliation Committee and on the other they start proceedings against the president. That is going to accentuate the faultlines inside the country." (AFP)

Ceccaldi plans to take up the matter with the United Nations Commission on Human Rights.

Meanwhile, Marie-Antoinette Singleton -- Laurent and Simone Gbagbo's US-based lawyer-daughter -- is concerned that her parents have been "kidnapped as war booty, without any legal mandate". She has written a letter to French president Nicolas Sarkozy in which she laments that her family has had no news of her parents and Alassane Ouattara has not responded to her request to be allowed to visit her father.

None of this should not surprise anyone, as the stated goal of Ouattara's rebellion was always control of Ivory Coast, not justice. Guillaume Soro, former leader of the northern rebel forces Forces Nouvelles (New Forces), now Prime Minister of Ivory Coast, was quite unambiguous in May 2004 when he declared the rebels' intentions: "Why should we content ourselves with Bouake? We want all of Ivory Coast!"

See: Cote d'Ivoire: "We want all of Ivory Coast" (rebels).
By Elizabeth Kendal for WEA RLC, Friday 11 June 2004

MBEKI SPEAKSIn an article entitled, What the World Got Wrong in Cote D'Ivoire, published in Foreign Policy magazine on 29 April 2011, Thabo Mbeki asks the most important question of all: "Why is the United Nations entrenching former colonial powers on our continent?"

Mbeki's article is an immensely important one for anyone who still needs convincing that only things ignoble -- such as betrayal, megalomania, greed and abuse of power -- lay behind the profound crisis gripping Ivory Coast; a crisis that will not easily be resolved.

Mbeki wonders why the "international community" (i.e. the UN and the West) insisted that Ivory Coast hold presidential elections when the conditions simply did not exist to conduct free and fair polling. According to signed agreements, the country should first have been unified and the rebels disarmed. Neither of these conditions had been met. Despite concerns, Gbagbo was pressured into holding elections that could never have been free and fair (particularly in the rebel-held north) and could only ever have consolidated the crisis.

As Mbeki notes, the very people who were insisting on rule of law as fundamental to democracy, acted illegally to recognise the electoral commission's provisional results, despite the fact that the Constitutional Council, which had been investigation numerous election irregularities (mostly in the rebel-controlled north), is the only body constitutionally empowered to announce results.

Mbeki notes that as both Gbagbo and Ouattara laid claim to the presidency, Gbagbo proposed that in order to resolve the matter, an international commission should be established to verify the election results, with the important pre-condition that both he and Ouattara should accept the determination of the commission.

"This proposal was rejected by the international community," laments Mbeki, "despite the fact that it would have resolved the electoral dispute without resort to war . . .

". . . Clearly the independent international commission proposed by Laurent Gbagbo could have been established and empowered to make a definitive and binding determination about what had happened. Time will tell why this was not done!"

Furthermore, notes Mbeki, the UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General then chose to "exceed his mandate" and declare Ouattara the winner, making the UN Mission in Ivory Coast (UNOCI) "a partisan in the Ivorian conflict, rather than a neutral peacemaker". From that point, the UN, along with France, militarily intervened to open the way for the northern rebels (the Forces Nouvelles) to defeat the Ivorian Armed Forces and capture Laurent Gbagbo "under the shameless pretence that it was acting to protect civilians".

Mbeki deplores France's Françafrique policies, with which the neo-colonial power advances its own interests at Francophone Africa's expense.

He notes that President Gbagbo had no possibility to act on his own to reunify the country and achieve reconciliation amongst the peoples. (In this regard it is important to remember that when Pres. Gbagbo did attempt to reunify the country in Nov 2004, France intervened to prevent it.) Mbeki asserts that President Ouattara will not be able to realise those objectives either, outside of an honest agreement with the Ivorian population represented by Gbagbo.

Mbeki also quotes US ambassador in Ivory Coast, Wanda L. Nebsit, who, in July 2009, expressed concerns about the role being played by Blaise Compaore, the president of neighbouring Burkina Faso.

Finally, Mbeki concludes that the events in Ivory Coast have "exposed the reality of the balance and abuse of power in the post-Cold War era, and put paid to the fiction that the major powers respect the rule of law in the conduct of international relations, even as defined by the U.N. Charter, and that, as democrats, they respect the views of the peoples of the world.

"We can only hope that Laurent and Simone Gbagbo and the Ivorian people do not continue to suffer as abused and humiliated victims of a global system which, in its interests, while shouting loudly about universal human rights, only seeks to perpetuate the domination of the many by the few who dispose of preponderant political, economic, military and media power."

What the World Got Wrong in Cote D'Ivoire
By Thabo Mbeki,
Foreign Policy, 29 April 2011

Ivory Coast: churches filling up -- with refugees.

While Ivory Coast seems to have disappeared out of the news, the situation for Christians remains absolutely dire.

Here are just a few articles that describe something of what Christians are facing in the new Françafrique Côte d'Ivoire.

Abidjan

On 8 April, the BBC reported that some 1,800 people were holed up inside Abidjan's St Paul's Cathedral.

Father Augustin Obrou, spokesman for the archdiocese of Abidjan, described the situation inside:

"There are almost 1,800 people here, among them women and children who live locally, civil servants and employees who have been unable to return home because of the violence and have nowhere else to go.

"We've had no running water for a week now, and we have babies here, as well as people who have been shot and pregnant women. . . But we are not alone in this situation - other local churches have a similar number of refugees.

"People can't leave because there is no transport. Even if you have a car you are afraid of being shot at, and if you go on foot you can also get attacked. Also people can't be sure that their houses haven't been looted, and many neighbourhoods are too dangerous right now. Generally people are traumatised, so they don't speak much . . .

". . . we are coping by digging water out with long pipes, but it's difficult and people come to fill their buckets from the only pipe working. Those who came with food eat, and those who are from this area rush out and look for whatever food they can get and rush back to the cathedral. And as priests we share, but we only eat the bare minimum to survive.

"It's a very difficult humanitarian situation.

"The other problem is that we have no medicines, and many are unwell, but we can only watch them suffer."

Here is how Daniel Howden, in Abidjan for The Independent, reported the situation on 14 April (nearly one week later).

"Abidjan's cathedral rises like a white harp from the hillside above the city's lagoon. While fighting raged all around it for the past fortnight in the Plateau district more than 2,400 people sheltered inside.

"Now the war is supposed to be over but most of the refugees have chosen to remain. There has been no water for two weeks and almost no food either. Wounded people lie untreated and the old and sick are without medicine.

"Father Jean Baptiste Akwadan is surprised that there hasn't been more help: 'There's been nothing from the government or international agencies,' he says. . .

"Agnes Yaba, a young woman from the war-torn neighbourhood of Abobo, gave birth among the Cathedral pews two days ago. She named her new son Paul, and he now faces an uncertain future."

San Pedro

As mentioned in the previous post A Cry from Abidjan, some 5,000 residents of the southern port city of San Pedro -- Bete, Guere and other tribes that support Gbagbo -- having escaped pro-Ouattara militias, had taken refuge in the Cathedral of St Pierre.

Meanwhile in Duékoué

Some 27,000 ethnic Guéré (a western tribe that supports Laurent Gbagbo and is predominantly Christian) remain holed up the Catholic mission in Duékoué. According to Father Cyprien Ahouré, head of the mission, the mission desperately needs assistance, for they are only really capable of caring for about 1,000 people.

These people survived the 28-29 March ethnic-religious cleansing by pro-Ouattara ethnic Malinké and Baoulé Muslim militias -- a pogrom in which an estimate 800 civilians were slaughtered. Now however, their children are dying of diarrhoea and other treatable diseases while a cholera outbreak looms. And as if things could not get worse, it is simply too dangerous to leave the compound to bury the dead. Women with shaved heads are everywhere.

COTE D'IVOIRE: Mourning and fear in Duékoué
IRIN (Integrated Regional Information Networks) a service of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
Reporting from DUEKOUE, 15 April 2011.

Bah Bonao Sidonie's (41) one-year-old grandson recently died at the mission after a short bout of diarrhoea. IRIN reports: "Bah had already shaved her head when her grandson died. Three of her brothers had also been killed in Duékoué’s Carréfour neighbourhood in March 'when the soldiers [anti-Gbagbo forces] came'. She buried the child herself, alone.

" 'I asked people living here at the mission, as well as the blue helmets, to accompany me to bury my grandson, but I went hours without getting any help,' she told IRIN. 'The youth here at the mission risk being attacked by the Dioula [Malinké] so they can’t go out. I put the child’s body on my back and walked to [the cemetery near] Carréfour; only God accompanied me. I prayed to God to protect me,' she added. 'I dug a hole with a `daba’ [traditional hoe], buried the child, said a prayer and came back.'"

A report from the UN's refugee agency, the UNHCR, tells of the plight of other survivors who, after escaping pro-Ouattara militias, fled towards the Liberian border.

Alarming IDP conditions in western Côte d'Ivoire; reconciliation needed
Briefing Notes, 15 April 2011

"In western Côte d'Ivoire, and with the security situation apparently calming, our staff are reporting large groups of internally displaced people (IDPs) living in alarming humanitarian conditions. . .

". . . a UNHCR team recently visited the department of Zouhan-Hounien and one of its sub-prefectures, Bin Houye, near the border with Liberia, They met more than 1,000 displaced people mainly originating from Guiglo, Blolequin and Toulepleu [towns also attacked by pro-Ouattara militias]. Some were staying on the premises of a Catholic church and the Ivorian Red Cross in Zouhan-Hounien. . .

"Meanwhile, nearly 6,000 Ivorians have crossed into neighbouring Liberia's Grand Gedeh county since Monday. As supporters of former Ivorian President Laurent Gbagbo, these ethnic Guéré refugees – who had been waiting on the border for weeks – said they crossed into Liberia by foot following news of Gbagbo's arrest and reports of reprisal [read: ethnic-religious] attacks in Abidjan. Some arrived in Liberia malnourished. . .

"With this week's new influx, there are now more than 150,000 Ivorian refugees in Liberia, in addition to over 13,000 hosted in other West African countries.

A CRY FROM ABIDJAN -- Christians imperilled

A cry emerges from Abidjan. A cry of desperation, it emerges only to be suffocated by the din of Western media celebrating the restoration of "democracy" and the return of "normalcy".

A CRY FROM ABIDJAN
-- from a Christian family trapped in Abidjan

"We living in great penury and fear to be looted or even killed like hundreds or even thousands of families in Abidjan. What is going on is beyond imagination: a pure genocide is currently performed right in the eyes of the French and UN troops and the international humanitarian NGO's, targeting entire ethnic groups, as well as a category of people based on their political affiliation or work. Whosoever is suspected to be from the Dan, Wê, Bété (Gbagbo's tribe), Akyé, Abbey, Ebrié -- basically all the western and southern tribes -- is targeted. Militaries, policemen, customs, all men in arms are tracked and killed, along with their families. In some extreme cases, people are killed only because they are not from the north and not Muslims."

------------------------------------------

CHRISTIANS IMPERILLED

Before Laurent Gbagbo was captured -- Amnesty International published this warning:
Côte d’Ivoire: Warning of ‘human rights catastrophe’ as forces reach Abidjan
Amnesty International 31 March 2011

"Côte d’Ivoire civilians are at immediate risk of massive human rights violations Amnesty International warned today, as forces loyal to Alassane Ouattara reach the country’s commercial capital Abidjan. [. . .]

"Local sources have told Amnesty International’s delegation currently in Côte d’Ivoire that dead bodies are still lying in the streets of Duékoué [in western Ivory Coast], and tens of thousands of civilians are still sheltering in the Catholic Mission without adequate food, water, sanitation and medical care."

[NOTE: the massacre in Duékoué of around 1000 civilians by pro-Ouattara forces on 28-29 March, occurred in the presence of some 1000 Moroccan U.N. peacekeepers. In its defence, the U.N. has said the majority of the force was deployed around the Catholic mission, defending some 30,000 civilians who had sought refuge there. See report from Salesian Missions official news service. ]

Amnesty continues: "On 29 March, the Republican Forces killed civilian Jean Louana, election campaign director of one of the current ministers appointed by Laurent Gbagbo. They also shot down a Pastor of an evangelical church along with eight members of his congregation."

Quite rightly, Amnesty's report lists abuses from both sides. However, like virtually all Western media it insists on referring to the ethnic massacres perpetrated by pro-Ouattara forces (Republican Forces) as reprisal attacks. This is incongruous considering the fact that the pro-Ouattara forces are the aggressors, the invading forces.

The day after regime change was effected, Amnesty International released this plea:
Reprisal attacks against Gbagbo supporters in Côte d'Ivoire must stop
Amnesty International 12 April 2011

"Perceived supporters of former Côte d'Ivoire President Laurent Gbagbo are at risk of violent reprisals, despite President Alassane Outtara’s call for Ivorians to 'abstain from all forms of reprisals and violence', Amnesty International warned today.

"Today in Abidjan, armed men, some wearing military uniforms, have been conducting house-to-house searches in neighbourhoods where real or perceived supporters of Laurent Gbagbo are living, including Yopougon and Koumassi.

"One eyewitness told Amnesty International how a policeman belonging to Laurent Gbagbo’s ethnic group was taken from his house this morning and shot dead at point blank range in front of him.

"'Dozens of young people are going into hiding in Abidjan out of fear for their lives. In the western part of the country people suspected of being pro-Gbagbo are also terrified. Many are hiding in the bush after their villages were burned down and they need to be protected,' said Véronique Aubert, Amnesty International’s deputy director for Africa.

"Amnesty International has learned that the village of Zikisso, 300 km west of Abidjan, has been attacked several times, including last Sunday, by armed forces allegedly loyal to President Alassane Ouattara. The village chief, Gnagbo Matthias, was abducted by these forces on Monday and is reportedly being held in the town of Lakota.

"Humanitarian conditions are rapidly deteriorating in a Catholic mission in Duékoué, 600 km west of Abidjan, where 27,500 people took refuge after hundreds of people were killed on the basis of their ethnic origin or presumed political affiliation. . . "

An independent report from the Associated Press (AP) also confirms that ethnic-religious-political killings are taking place in the south and western regions.

Reprisals rock Ivory Coast after strongman deposed
AP 13 April 2011

"GUIGLO, Ivory Coast (AP) — The young man in civilian clothes didn't have the right answers for troops loyal to Alassane Ouattara and they suspected he was a fighter backing his rival for the presidency. So one of the soldiers kicked the man in the teeth.

"Fifteen minutes later, an Associated Press reporter saw his body, the chest torn open by bullets, dumped outside this western town.

"Reprisal killings erupted as Ouattara's fighters made a lightning assault to force his rival Laurent Gbagbo from power. And although Gbagbo was captured Monday in Abidjan, Ivory Coast's commercial capital, suspected Gbagbo supporters are still being rounded up in cities and villages, especially in western Ivory Coast.

"Parishioners are reporting the kidnappings of dozens of young men in San Pedro, said a Catholic priest in the cocoa-exporting port city in southwestern Ivory Coast. He asked not to be named, explaining: 'We are all in danger'. . ."

AP reports that some 5,000 ethnic Bété and Guere refugees (predominantly Christian tribes loyal to Gbagbo) are holed up in San Pedro's Cathedral of St. Pierre, surrounded by pro-Ouattara forces who recently shot open the gate and fired into the crowd, killing one and wounding several.

"A woman at the cathedral who was too scared to give her name said her neighbor, the headmaster of the Catholic primary school, was killed Monday night at his home because he belonged the wrong tribe.

"'We have a very toxic and explosive mix here of political, ethnic, religious and land rivalry,' the priest said. 'The recent tumultuous events have brought long-simmering conflicts to a head. Who knows where this will end'."

See also:
COTE D'IVOIRE: Accounting for atrocities
IRIN 14 April 2011
A quote concerning Abidjan: "Kouamassi, south of the lagoon, and Yopougon, one of the most densely populated parts of the city, with strong pockets of support for Gbagbo, have remained tense. Residents in these areas have talked of man hunts and executions, of incoming troops targeting Gbagbo supporters, with the young particularly vulnerable. They paint a damning picture of the operations and general behaviour of the Forces Républicaines de Côte d’Ivoire (FRCI), troops loyal to President Alassane Ouattara. . ."

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NOT ALL AFRICA CELEBRATING
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GHANA's former President, Flt Lt Jerry John Rawlings, has described the arrest of Cote d’Ivoire’s President Laurent Gbagbo as a repetition of the tragedy of DR Congo’s Patrice Lumumba, who was popularly elected in 1960 on a platform of independence and resistance to neo-colonialism only to be assassinated in 1961 in the service of Western interests.

Rawlings laments: “Fifty years down the road, with Africa still groping for freedom and justice, Black Africa repeats the tragedy of Patrice Lumumba, while next door fellow Arabs are fighting and dying for their freedoms. Whither are we bound?”

(see: Patrice Lumumba: the most important assassination of the 20th century
Guardian, 17 Jan 2011 (50th anniversary of assassination))

Mr Rawling was scathing concerning the humiliation and "violent manhandling" that accompanied the arrest of Laurent Gbagbo, his wife, and family.

He also expressed grave concern over the verifiable reports that the rebels were conducting house-to-house "cleansing" operations in Abidjan, wherein men have been executed and women and young girls abducted.

Rawlings told myjoyonline.com that “Reports by the Red Cross and other international organisations of the massacre of 800 in Duekoue by the advancing rebel forces and the failure to lay the blame where it belongs by the international community further exposes biases in the Ivorian crises.”

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FINALLY: All Elizabeth Kendal's work on Ivory Coast dating back to the Sept 2002 coup, have now been uploaded to the blog.
http://elizabethkendal.blogspot.com/search/label/Cote%20d%27Ivoire

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IVORY COAST: where Islamic and Western interests converge

By Elizabeth Kendal

Ivory Coast is an ethnic-religious fault-line nation. The north is predominantly agrarian and Muslim, while the south, which is more urbanised, industrial and administrative, is predominantly Christian and animist.

Decades of mass Muslim immigration helped make Ivory Coast prosperous, as workers flooded in from neighbouring poor Muslim states to work in Ivorian industries, in particular cocoa. But rapid population expansion eventually resulted in land stress, while subsequent economic downturn resulted in rising unemployment.

It was into this tense climate that presidential aspirant Alassane Ouattara, an ambitious former Prime Minister and Northern Muslim, came playing the race and religion cards for political gain. While his ploy has won him popular backing amongst Ivory Coast's Muslims and immigrants, it has fuelled tensions and aggravated divisions -- as racial-religious politics always does.

Ouattara has campaigned for the naturalisation of all immigrants; something that would give Ivory Coast -- which is politically secular and officially 30 percent Muslim -- an instant Muslim majority. All objections to this scenario -- objections that generally arise from native, secular and non-Muslim Ivorians -- are met with cries of "'Islamophobia", "xenophobia" and "racism".

Precisely because he is a Muslim who is prepared to play the immigrants-and-Muslims-as-victims card for political gain, Ouattara has the backing of most (but not all) African states. Islamic states support him as he advances an Islamic agenda. Meanwhile, to those regimes in poor African states desperate to maintain the inflow of remittances from Ivory Coast, Ouattara represents maintenance of the status quo.

More importantly, precisely because he is prepared to sell-out Ivory Coast's sovereignty and her immense agricultural (coffee, cocoa) and mineral (diamonds, oil) wealth in exchange for power, Ouattara has the backing of resource-hungry Western powers, in particular the neo-colonialist hegemon: France.

In this regard, the international media does largely misunderstand the situation in Ivory Coast. For the high stakes in Ivory Coast relate not only to race ('Ivorite' vs 'immigrant') and religion (Christian vs Muslim), but also to Ivorian independence vs French neo-colonialism.

To this end, Alassane Ouattara is essentially France's man in Ivory Coast. He is France's guarantee that their exploitative monopoly and neo-colonialist hegemony over Ivorian amenities -- including water and telecommunications and banks -- will remain. The colonial pact brokered in the 1960s mandates that 65 percent of the foreign currency reserves of former French colonies in Africa go into the French Treasury, while a further 20 percent of reserves go to cover "financial liabilities". Did you ever wonder why Francophone Africa was so poor? And while this is revenue that France clearly cannot afford to lose, it is revenue that Francophone Africa obviously cannot afford to give.

Source: SLAVERY BY ANOTHER NAME: CFA franc
The Frontier Telegraph, 29 Jan 2008

It is this poverty-perpetuating French neo-colonialism that staunch nationalist Laurent Gbagbo has been fighting for decades. This is why France particularly is so keen to see regime change in Ivory Coast.

And France is not alone. Since 9/11 the US has been keen to lessen its dependence on oil from the Persian Gulf. Present tensions in the Middle East have only deepened that resolve. Consequently, the US is actively seeking to increase its control over the oil reserves in the Gulf of Guinea. Oil from the Gulf of Guinea is not only of a higher quality than that of the Persian Gulf, it is also (or at least it portends to be) more secure.

In late 2010 the Atlantic Council, the preeminent pro-NATO think tank co-released a report entitled "Advancing U.S., African, and Global Interests: Security and Stability in the West African Maritime Domain." It proceeds from the fact that "The Gulf of Guinea is at the brink of becoming a greater supplier of energy to the United States than the Persian Gulf and is therefore of far higher strategic importance than has historically been the case."

See: Militarization Of Energy Policy: U.S. AFRICOM And Gulf Of Guinea
by Rick Rozoff, 8 January 2011

To this end, it is important to note that Ivory Coast, on the Gulf of Guinea, is one of only five African states (a group that includes Libya) not subordinated to US Africom. Africom is essentially US "boots-on-the-ground" in Africa. It is military cooperation on humanitarian projects, or as Horace Campbell, professor of African American studies and political science at Syracuse University puts it, Africom is "fundamentally a front for US military contractors like Dyncorp, MPRI and KBR operating in Africa".

Source: There's no business like war business
By Pepe Escobar, Asia Times online, 30 March 2011

Sustaining and advancing neo-colonialism against nationalist forces.

At the end Cold War, NATO lost its reason for existence. And so it was that the "humanitarian intervention" was born.

A "humanitarian intervention" invariably involves entering an asymmetrical civil conflict on the side of the weaker force, allegedly for the purpose of saving lives. This however, rarely achieves the desired humanitarian result. Rather "humanitarian interventions" normally culminate in frozen conflicts; or in the empowering of forces that could never have achieved power in their own right, and therefore will never be able to sustain power in their own strength, and therefore will require the assistance of a "stabilisation force" or of "peacekeepers" -- in other words, "boots-on-the-ground" (what some might call an occupation).

It is little wonder that sceptics view the "humanitarian intervention" as little more than opportunistic neo-imperialism or neo-colonialism. NATO's humanitarian interventions in Yugoslavia and Kosovo (at the expense of many hundreds of thousands of displaced Serbs), and Russia's humanitarian interventions in Abkhazia and South Ossetia (at the expense of the some 200,000 displaced Georgians) are classic examples. France's "humanitarian intervention" in Ivory Coast is destined to go down in history as yet another appalling example of outright neo-colonialism and neo-imperialism, this time at the expense of native, secular and non-Muslim Ivorians.

The following reports make good background reading:

Cote d'Ivoire: Tearing Apart.
By Elizabeth Kendal, WEA RLC
Thursday 17 October 2002

Cote d'Ivoire: The Foreign Muscle Behind the Rebellion.
By Elizabeth Kendal, WEA RLC
Tuesday 5 November 2002

IVORY COAST: Christians anxious as war threatens.
By Elizabeth Kendal, WEA RLC
WEA Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin - No. 298 - Wed 17 Nov 2004

From this point -- Nov 2004, after France's violent and destructive "humanitarian"/military intervention to prevent President Gbagbo from reunifying the state -- the conflict in Ivory Coast was essentially frozen.

In democracy we trust

The West insisted that Ivory Coast could be reconciled, reunified and essentially saved by means of democratic elections, such is their faith in "democracy" and the inherent goodness of man. In reality however, Ivory Coast's divisions are so profound and the stakes are so high that, unless genuine reconciliation occurred first, elections could only trigger conflict.

See: IVORY COAST: on the brink of war.
Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin (RLPB) 085
By Elizabeth Kendal. Wed 08 Dec 2010

Ivory Coast (IC) went to the polls on 28 Nov 2010, despite the fact that the northern rebels, in violation of all agreements, had not disarmed.

In Ivory Coast, as in most democracies, an electoral commission manages the mechanics of an election while a constitutional council or court investigates complaints before proclaiming the definitive result. On 2 Dec 2010, Ivory Coast's electoral commission (which is dominated by Ouattara supporters by a margin of 20-2) illegally pre-empted the constitutional council's decision and broadcast via French TV from Ouattara's headquarters that Ouattara had won the election. When Ivory Coast's Constitutional Council, which had been investigating irregularities, announced on 3 Dec 2010 that Gbagbo was the winner, a political stalemate ensued.

Source: STATEMENT BY THE GOVERNMENT OF IVORY COAST
BASIC FACTS SURROUNDING THE CONTROVERSY OVER THE NOVEMBER 28 ELECTIONS
20 DECEMBER 2010

Despite the fact that this was a political problem that warranted a political solution, Alassane Ouattara, bolstered by the support of the "international community", moved to seize power by force.

Virtually all of Ivory Coast's state institutions, including the army, are loyal to President Gbagbo, as is at least half the registered population (concentrated in the south). As such, Abidjan will not yield willingly.

In fact this would be a totally asymmetrical conflict were it not for foreign interference. The rebels would never be able to seize or retain power without Western support. Fortunately for them, in Ivory Coast, Islamic and Western 'interests' converge once again.

In fact France is so keen to see regime change in IC that it has sent attack helicopters against the Presidential Palace and Ivorian military barracks -- in the name of "humanitarianism" of course -- and this despite that fact that these facilities not only house whole families, but they also abut residential areas.

While UN and French helicopters were attacking Ivorian positions in Abidjan, northern militias allied to Alassane Ouattara were pressing south. Some 800 were massacred last week in the south-western town of Duekoue when it came under attack from northern militias. Subsequently, UN peacekeepers found themselves guarding tens of thousands of civilians seeking refuge in a Duekoue church.

While for Ouattara this is primarily about personal power and personal wealth, for many of those allied to him, this conflict is nothing short of Islamic jihad.

VALE

In 1913 William Wade Harris of Liberia crossed into Ivory Coast preaching the power of Christ over spirits. Dressed in white and carrying a cross, a Bible and a bowl, he baptised around 120,000 and, according to Dr Elizabeth Isichei (1995), 'permanently rewrote the religious geography of the Ivory Coast'.

But permanence can never be assumed. That which is good must be treasured and preserved. What Harris achieved, greed and mass Muslim immigration have undone. Once the most free, safe and prosperous country in all West Africa, Ivory Coast may never recover. Religious liberty and Christian security, once a given, will be tenuous now.

IVORY COAST: ON THE BRINK OF WAR

Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin | RLPB 085 | Wed 08 Dec 2010

--------------------------------
IVORY COAST: ON THE BRINK OF WAR
--------------------------------
By Elizabeth Kendal


Like Sudan and Nigeria, Ivory Coast is divided by a volatile ethnic-religious fault-line. Whilst the less-developed North has long been predominantly Muslim, the South -- Ivory Coast's economic and political engine -- has historically been predominantly Christian and African Traditional Religion (ATR). Decades of mass immigration (1960-1993) from the neighbouring Muslim states of Burkina Faso, Mali and Guinea might have been great for the economy, but they have tipped the demographic balance so that Ivory Coast -- officially about one-third Muslim -- is actually
majority Muslim.

The civil war that erupted in September 2002 was portrayed by the international media as a crisis of democracy and human rights caused by Southern xenophobia and Islamophobia. In reality, Ivory Coast's crisis is the consequence of decades of Muslim mass immigration coupled with political ambition and an internationally-sponsored Islamic agenda. The civil war was fought essentially between those who want all Ivory Coast's Muslim immigrants naturalised -- giving Ivory Coast a Muslim majority overnight -- and those who do not. Though he denies it, former Prime Minister Alassane Ouattara, a Northern Muslim, was doubtless behind the September 2002 failed coup that triggered the war. Ouattara and his party, the Rally of the Republicans (RDR), have been playing the race and religion cards for political gain. Ouattara's intent has been to have all the Muslim immigrants naturalised (over 4 million: estimated to comprise between 30 and 40 percent of the total population) so that he (their champion) can dragnet the Muslim vote. Ouattara has long had his eye on the presidency.

The civil war left Ivory Coast totally polarised, split between a virtually ethnic-religiously cleansed, rebel-controlled Muslim North and a government-controlled predominantly Christian, non-Muslim South. Since the war the North has been in serious decline with AIDS, poverty and lawlessness increasing exponentially. In November 2004 Ivory Coast's Christian president, Laurent Gbagbo, launched surprise airstrikes against rebel positions in the North in an attempt to reunify the country. However, former colonial power France (which backs the rebels for economic gain) intervened, razing all IC's airforce planes, destroying runways and sending tanks against the Presidential Palace, around which loyalists formed a human shield.

The West had insisted that Ivory Coast could be reconciled, reunified and essentially saved by means of democratic elections, such is their faith in 'democracy' and the inherent goodness of man. In reality, the divisions are so profound and the stakes are so high that, unless genuine reconciliation occurred first, elections could only trigger conflict. Elections were held on 28 November 2010, with both Gbagbo and Ouattara claiming victory. The US, European Union and African Union have recognised Ouattara as the winner and called for Gbagbo to respect democracy and step down. Russia meanwhile is blocking a UN statement that would recognise Ouatarra, saying that this is not the UN's role. Ivory Coast's non-Muslims are traumatised, fearing that their homeland -- once the most prosperous 'Christian' nation in West Africa, home to the region's largest cathedral, home-base to most of West Africa's regional Christian ministries -- is about to come under Muslim political domination.

(COMMENT: Ivory Coast's crisis -- the consequence of decades of Muslim mass immigration -- is a foretaste of what several states in democratic Europe may be facing in a generation or two.)


PLEASE PRAY SPECIFICALLY FOR GOD TO:

* give Ivory Coast's Christian leaders -- pastors and politicians --
great spiritual wisdom and authority.

* bring revival to the Church in Ivory Coast so believers will be
compelled to go out with the gospel in boldness, empowered by the
Holy Spirit, so that Ivory Coast might be spiritually transformed.
For only then will the peoples 'beat their swords into plowshares
and their spears into pruning hooks . . .' (Isaiah 2:4 ESV)

* intervene in the tense climate by interposing a spirit of restraint,
compelling the people to seek a negotiated solution as a means of
averting another destructive civil war -- a war that would certainly
attract international jihadists.

IVORY COAST : CHRISTIANS ANXIOUS AS WAR THREATENS

WEA Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin - No. 298 - Wed 17 Nov 2004

-------------------------------------------------
IVORY COAST : CHRISTIANS ANXIOUS AS WAR THREATENS
-------------------------------------------------
By Elizabeth Kendal

When mostly Muslim rebels (backed with foreign funds and arms) seized control of northern Ivory Coast (IC) in 2002, Christians, southerners and government supporters fled south for their lives. As those fleeing included most of northern IC's doctors, nurses, professionals, administrators and school teachers, living conditions in the north have deteriorated markedly under rebel control. Of great concern are reports from MSF (Doctors without Borders) and the UN that AIDS has increased markedly in the north of IC as desperate girls prostitute themselves to survive. Having abandoned the government of national unity, the rebels declared in mid October their refusal to negotiate further or disarm.

On 4 November, President Laurent Gbagbo launched a surprise air raid on rebel strongholds in the north, attempting to defeat them militarily and re-unify the country. When nine French peacekeepers in rebel territory were killed in an IC air raid on 6 November, France immediately responded by destroying the two IC helicopter gunships used in the raid. France then struck pre-emptively to 'neutralise' IC air power, destroying all IC's air force planes and the airport tarmac. When French tanks then headed for the Presidential Palace, government supporters streamed into the streets and created a human shield around it. Some government supporters furiously attacked French interests. Whilst no non-African died in the protests, French soldiers killed up to 100 and wounded some 1,000 protesting government supporters.

Though France, the former colonial power in IC, is acting as peacekeeper and peace mediator, it is not neutral. Intelligence agencies have long believed that France would like to see or even engineer a coup in IC. President Gbagbo is opposed to the pro-France policies of IC, believing they are not in IC's best interests. Gbagbo's rival, A D Ouattara, the president of the RDR party to which the rebels are aligned, implemented many pro-France initiatives when he was IC Prime Minister. France would benefit economically if Ouattara were back in power. What we have today is a still uncertain future, with a three-way stand off between the IC, France and the rebels.

IC has a huge population of immigrants from Guinea, Mali and Burkina Faso, its poorer northern Islamic neighbours. The possibility of the rebels' aims succeeding causes IC's Christians great anxiety, as all these migrants would be naturalised, making IC instantly a Muslim majority nation. Then, by the strength of their votes, the constitution could be amended and A D Ouattara
elected president. (Presently he is barred from the presidency due to issues of nationality.) If that happens, IC will never be the same again, but will become a reflection of its northern Islamic neighbours. This scenario does not sit well with Ivorians – Muslim, Christian and traditional religionists – who regard their liberty as precious.

PLEASE PRAY SPECIFICALLY FOR:

* God to expose the plots and schemes of corrupt, self-serving
politicians who would destabilise a free and prosperous nation
in pure self-interest.

* great wisdom for all IC leaders, especially President Gbagbo
who is a Christian; may he draw close to God in this crisis, and
emerge more dependent on God than ever before. 'Some nations
boast of their armies and weapons, but we boast in the Lord our
God.' (Psalm 20:7 NLT) 'The horses are prepared for battle, but
the victory belongs to the Lord.' (Proverbs 21:31 NLT)

* Christians in Ivory Coast to be drawn to pray, and may they
receive wisdom, courage and radiant power from the Holy Spirit
for visible Christ-likeness in the midst of a society filled
with hostility, fear, anger and confusion. 'Godliness helps
people all through life, while the evil are destroyed by their
wickedness.' (Proverbs 13:6)

* God to be preparing the Church in Ivory Coast to be an
instrument of grace, reconciliation and healing.

* Almighty God to rescue Ivory Coast, and for justice and liberty
to prevail across the whole nation.

Cote d'Ivoire: "We want all of Ivory Coast" (rebels)

Date: Friday 11 June 2004
Subj: Cote d'Ivoire: "We want all of Ivory Coast" (rebels).
To: World Evangelical Alliance Religious Liberty News & Analysis
From: WEA RLC Principal Researcher and Writer, Elizabeth Kendal.


This posting covers three issues:

1. the targeted stabbing murder of a priest in the rebel attack on Gohitafla at 4am on 7 June 2004,
   
   
2. the decline in living standards in northern Cote d'Ivoire under rebel control,
   
   
3. the address by Imam El Hadj Harrissou Fofana, one of Cote d'Ivoire's most prominent Muslim leaders, before a gathering in Abidjan on 29 May 2004.

In his address, Imam Fofana alleges that foreign Islamists have infiltrated and profoundly influence Cote d'Ivoire. He also alleges that an Islamic political party offered to pay the National Council of Imams and Muezzins of Cote d'Ivoire a large sum of money to launch a disinformation campaign from their mosques, denigrating the nation and all non-Muslims, presumably with the intention of preparing the ground for religious conflict.

-------------------------------------------------------------

PRIEST STABBED TO DEATH IN GOHITAFLA

At around 4am on Monday 7 June, unidentified gunmen entered the town of Gohitafla, a frontline town in divided Cote d'Ivoire (CI) that lies on the south end of the demilitarized "zone of confidence" policed by French peacekeepers.

The group of around 30 gunmen entered the farming village of Gohitafla from the rebel-held north only hours after President Gbagbo had flown out of CI for a 9-day visit to the USA. Suspicion abounds that the rebel forces had attempted to re-ignite hostilities in President Gbagbo's absence, and in his native region.

Djedje Augustin, reporting for http://www.ivoirealites.net , writes that the gunmen were members of Guillaume Soro's rebel forces, although the rebels deny that they were responsible for the attack. Reuters reports that seven were killed and 14 wounded in battles between the rebels, the National Armed Forces of Cote d'Ivoire (FANCI) and the French peacekeepers, and two civilians were stabbed to death.

Augustin spoke to sources on the scene who believed that the toll was probably much higher. They believe 11 civilians were murdered and report that there was considerable property damage as well. Augustin's on-site sources also revealed that the Catholic Church in Gohitafla was targeted and the priest stabbed to death.

DETERIORATION OF THE NORTH

The situation in the north has deteriorated drastically since the 19 September 2002 coup that plunged the nation into civil conflict and left the north in the hands of the Muslim rebels.

The BBC reports, "Bouake is everything one might expect of a rebel stronghold. Men with Kalashnikovs are everywhere, strolling through the market or showily flexing their muscles from the outboard of a passing jeep. Few have complete uniforms. Many have replaced missing boots with hi-tech trainers; whatever else, the rebels seem to be winning the fashion war.

"Most wear T-shirts in honour of their commander or company - thus a group wearing Cheetah tops can be followed by a procession of "Che Guevaras", and even a gaggle of "Osama Bin Ladens". One company seems to employ only bearded soldiers. All are heavily armed..." (Link 1)

According to the BBC, most civil servants, including teachers, fled south to Abidjan after the September 2002 coup. According to UNICEF, "80 percent of the doctors, nurses and midwives in northern Cote d'Ivoire have fled since the country plunged into civil war in September 2002. Drugs and equipment have been looted from hospitals and health centres and the system for monitoring the outbreak of epidemics has been paralysed." (Link 2)

The rebels remain committed to their original objective - the capture of all of Cote d'Ivoire. The BBC article notes, after one rebel commander recently spoke of secession, rebel leader Guillaume Soro responded by explaining that secession was not an option he was considering. "'Why should we content ourselves with Bouake?' he told an excited crowd in Bouake's football stadium. 'We want all of Ivory Coast!'" (Link 1)

---------------------------------------
A MUSLIM LEADER SPEAKS
---------------------------------------

El Hadj Harrissou Fofana is one of Cote d'Ivoire's most prominent Muslim leaders. He is the president of Al Coran and spokesman for the National Council of Imams and Muezzins of Cote d'Ivoire, comprising 15 Imams and 15 Muezzins. On 29 May, Imam Fofana addressed a huge youth gathering in Abidjan. (Link 3)

Imam Fofana expressed the concern that the nation's peace, historic tolerance, and religious freedom are being threatened by outside Islamist forces and corrupt politicians advancing their own personal political agendas.

Reporting on behalf of the National Council of Imams and Muezzins of Cote d'Ivoire, Imam Fofana said that, over the course of some time, foreign Muslims have come to occupy 85 percent of the senior positions in mosques as Imams and Muezzins, while Ivorian Muslims have been marginalised.

The problem with this, according to Imam Fofana, is that these Muslims have come to be leaders and teachers of Muslims in Cote d'Ivoire (CI), yet they do not understand CI history or culture, its republican institutions, its Constitution, or its electoral code. He also accuses the foreign Muslims of teaching a "blurred" Islam, and charges that politicians and the Islamic organisations in CI have been complicit in supporting the elevation of foreign Muslims into positions of leadership. He says that no one should be surprised therefore that Cote d'Ivoire has changed so much over the past decade.

Imam Fofana called for the preaching of foreign Imams to be monitored and for the rebels to be disarmed.

Imam Fofana also alleged that members of the Rally of the Republicans (RDR), Dr Ouattara's party, recently offered the National Council of Imams and Muezzins of Cote d'Ivoire 60 million FCFA (USD $110,323.00) to run a campaign of disinformation from their mosques, denigrating both the country and its non-Muslim population.

(Rally of Republicans spokesman Mr Cissé Ibrahim Bacongo, denounced the claims as lies and propaganda. Link 4)

According to Imam Fofana, the National Council of Imams and Muezzins of Cote d'Ivoire refused "the money of the corrupt politicians", saying that they would prefer freedom and independence in poverty, to opulence with slavery and destruction. He says the concern must be for peace, for love between Ivorians and foreigners, love between religious communities, and respect for each other and the beliefs of each community.

Imam Fofana appealed to the gathering not to give up, but rather resist the provocations of foreign Islamists and corrupt politicians, and help change the direction of the nation back to the
path of freedom, peace and prosperity.

These words confirm the analysis that at the core of the conflict in Cote d'Ivoire is a battle for the very soul of Cote d'Ivoire - a nation that has historically had a Muslim minority (roughly one third Muslim and one third Christian), secular government and complete religious freedom.

Links

1) Life on hold in rebel-held Bouake
By James Copnall. BBC, Bouake, Ivory Coast. 11 May 2004
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/3700889.stm

2) Cote D Ivoire: EU Re-Equips 25 Health Centres, Mainly in the
North. UN Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN)
Yamoussoukro, 4 June 2004.
http://allafrica.com/stories/200406040751.htmlv

3) Harrissou Fofana: "Il faut ivoiriser les fonctions d'imam et de
muezzin en Cote d'Ivoire."
Notre Voie. 3 June 2004
http://www.eburneanews.net/eb.asp?action=lire&id=8912

4) Accuses par Harrissou Fofanal le RDR et le CNI repondent a l'imam
imposteur. By Ferdinand Yao
Le Patriote (Abidjan) 2 Juin 2004
http://fr.allafrica.com/stories/200406020388.html