COTE D'IVOIRE: PDCI walks out of cabinet, more die in ethnic clashes

Photo: F. de La Mue

President Gbagbo, seen here with French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin during a state vist last month in Paris, is once again accused of sabotating peace efforts

ABIDJAN, 5 March 2004 (IRIN) - One of Cote d’Ivoire’s two main opposition parties has suspended its participation in a broad-based government of national reconciliation, accusing President Laurent Gbagbo of sabotaging the country’s peace process. It withdrew from government as local newspapers reported that at least 11 people had been killed in a fresh outbreak of fighting between immigrant farmers and villagers of Gbagbo’s Bete tribe near the southern town of Gagnoa. Ministers of the Democratic Party of Cote d’Ivoire (PDCI), which was founded by the country’s first president, Felix Houphouet Boigny, failed to attend Thursday’s cabinet meeting. The PDCI said it was “suspending the participation” of its seven ministers in the coalition government because Gbagbo had plotted against the party, undermined the authority of its ministers and humiliated its leader. The party is led by Henri Konan Bedie, who served as President from 1993 until his overthrow in a military coup in 1999. Pro-Gbagbo newspapers have repeatedly accused him of stealing rice in a disputed business deal, among other accusations. PDCI spokesman Maurice Kakou Guikahue said on Friday that the party had been frustrated for some time by what he called Gbagbo’s “underhand methods.” “We cannot work in a dysfunctional government,” Guikahue told IRIN.” Once this malfunctioning is corrected, we will have no problem (to return).” Things came to a head earlier this year when Gbagbo awarded a contract to run the container terminal in the port of Abidjan to the French company Bollore without an open tender and without reference to Patrick Atchi, the PDCI Minister for Economic Infrastructure, who is responsible for the port as part of his portfolio. The PDCI walkout followed a similar boycott of government staged by rebels occupying the north of the country at the end of last year. The rebels, who are officially known as “The New Forces,” ordered their nine ministers to withdraw from the cabinet in September, accusing Gbagbo of dragging his feet over the implementation of reforms demanded by the January. Political tension rose over the next three months while implementation of the peace agreement remained frozen. However, the rebels finally returned to the government at the end of December after mediation by West African leaders and the UN special envoy to Cote d’Ivoire Albert Tevoedjre. Although the government has maintained a ceasefire with the rebels since May last year, the uneasy peace in Cote d’Ivoire continues to be marred by frequent outbreaks of ethnic violence between armed civilians. Abidjan newspapers and international news agencies reported that at least 11 people were killed in the latest such clash in the village of Broudoume in the cocoa-growing region near Gagnoa on Wednesday night. The confrontation pitched local Bete villagers against immigrants from other parts of Cote d’Ivoire and other West African countries, who had settled in the area. Several hundred of these settlers were driven off their farms by the Bete towards the end of last year as a result of disputes over land ownership and cocoa marketing procedures. This led to clashes in the same area in November which left about 10 people dead. The latest fighting appears to have started when unidentified attackers came out of the forest and began shooting into houses in Broudoume. Officials in the nearby town of Ouragahio contacted by IRIN refused to comment on the incident. Relief workers in Abidjan said troop reinforcements had been sent to the area and local Red Cross was treating the wounded. Although the rebels have resumed their place in cabinet, they have made clear that the have no plans to begin disarming on Monday, the date announced by Prime Minister Seydou Diarra for the start of a disarmament, demobilisation and rehabilitation (DDR) process ahead of planned elections in October 2005. Rebel representatives boycotted a meeting of the National Commission on DDR on Thursday after announcing last week that they would only disarm in phases in step with the implementation of key reforms demanded by the French-broker Linas Marcoussis peace agreement. Amadou Kone, a senior aide of rebel leader Guillaume Soro, told IRIN by telephone from the rebel capital Bouake that rebel representatives did not attend the meeting because “the agenda was not to our liking.” “It is not possible to begin disarmament on 8 March.” Kone said, but he added that the rebels were genuine in their desire for a political settlement. “We are worn out, we are the ones who are dealing with the people, school issues, health issues. We want peace,” he said. Amid such gloom, the only positive news was an announcement by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) that the rebels had released eight more prisoners of war on Thursday. In initial group of 40 were freed in December. The ICRC said it believed that the rebels had now released all the prisoners of war they were holding.