Ivory Coast? The battle’s over, what now?

 After the world viewed the images of the capture of Laurent Gbagbo, Ivory Coast’s former president, by Alassane Ouattara “red eyes” mercenaries and supported by the French Unicorn Force: what is left for Ivory Coast?

 In a country where Laurent Gbagbo was almost supported by half of the population (especially in the capital Abidjan), the new president Ouattara has now to rule a country who was affected by several crisis since 2003. Alassane Ouattara, whose personality these past few years was painted as the good father of democracy in the country, was in fact a real adventurer, supported by the ancient president Konan Bedie, Ivory Coast ancient president, who was in the past accused of totalitarianism. His presidential candidature was however rejected by the same Konan Bedie. This led Alassane Ouattara to become the leader of the North Rebels, a warlord would be more exact. His mercenaries just renamed: Republican Forces, where amnestied for the past crimes by the recent change in power. Alassane Ouattara is in fact a clan leader and nothing else. The argument of his democratic victory is a fiction which was useful in the perspective of a common accord between the forces. But in fact wasn’t.

The simple story which depicted the Ivory Coast civil conflict, showed the world a classic battle between the good democrat Ouattara and the bad tyrant Gbagbo, which ends with the intervention of French forces mandated by the U.N. to “protect civilians” and to “stop the use of heavy weapons”, and not to arrest a leaving president by bombarding his presidential palace.

Alassane Ouattara, as the great winner of the last events, will have to rule a country ravaged by ten years of civil war, and a weak trust from a large part of the population. Ouattara seems not to be the solution in a region where the country’s lack of independence was and is still going to be a major obstacle for its development process.

Daniel H. Goule