Tony Eluemunor
22 February 2008
analysis
Nairobi — Like Kenya in East Africa, Cote d'Ivoire was the model of economic prosperity and political stability in West Africa for nearly three decades until something went terribly wrong and the country unravelled in a way that has several uncanny parallels with Kenya. In this first of a two-part series TONY ELUEMUNOR, NATION Correspondent, West Africa, reports
Until about a decade ago, Cote d'Ivoire was, as people on the street would say, the "Kenya of West Africa" - politically stable as its neighbours succumbed to brutal military coups and civil strife.
Although some countries like Senegal escaped this fate, from Mali to Nigeria, one West African country after another fell to military rule or a murderous civil war and in some cases, both.
In Eastern Africa, too, as Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, the former Zaire, the Republic of Congo, Sudan and Somalia either fell apart or were consumed by genocidal conflict or brutal military rule, Kenya (and Tanzania) almost alone survived. And even in comparison to Tanzania, Kenya had a growing free market economy while Tanzania remained hobbled by a misbegotten socialist experiment that failed to put food on many tables.
Cote d'Ivoire was an oddity in the West African sub-region. Like Kenya, it became not just an engine of economic growth but a veritable powerhouse, achieving impressive economic figures almost unheard of in the rest of Sub-Saharan Africa.
Abidjan was clean and relatively violence-free. The roads were good and electricity and water reliable even as decay ate deep into the innards of the capitals of its neighbours.
As Nairobi became the home of two UN specialised agencies and the regional headquarters for many other international organisations, Abidjan hosted the African Development Bank, several other regional organisations and a large expatriate population.
In East Africa, Tanzania boasted more wildlife. But that didn't matter as Kenya's "Out of Africa" mystique and superior tourist infrastructure drew in the visitors and their dollars.
In West Africa, even though there may have been more elephants in Guinea or even Nigeria, tourists preferred Cote d'Ivoire , which was much easier to navigate. Safari tourism in West Africa was synonymous with Cote d'Ivoire. Nigeria, on the other hand, conjured up images of political instability, lawlessness and decaying infrastructure in a very big country that has refused to demonstrate continental leadership and whose citizens have remained poor despite its vast resources, oil in particular.
Today, not many people in Africa remember the province of Upper Volta in the former French West African federation that was made up of landlocked Upper Volta and Cote d'Ivoire . In 1984 President Thomas Sankara changed the name of the former to Burkina Faso.
From the 1960s and through the 1980s, Cote d'Ivoire remained in the firm grip of its benign strongman, Felix Houphouet-Boigny, an authoritarian figure who had a number of things in common with Kenya's founding father Jomo Kenyatta who died in 1978.
Until Houphouet's death in 1993, it had seemed as though Cote d'Ivoire would live happily ever after. Since independence in 1960, Cote d'Ivoire had known no other ruler with Houphouet, its undisputed head, treating the country like one big family.
Cote d'Ivoire seemed as stable as the earth itself, and like the earth, able to accommodate the most variegated life, just as Kenya in its heyday.
But after Houphouet's death, political cracks began to appear in the country's superficially neat, functional and enlightened exterior. Ethnic divisions became more pronounced, the line between the arid north and the humid south hardened and the violence spawned by political and electoral disagreements unleashed the evil force that has engulfed one African nation after another.
Ambassador Ralph Uwechue, publisher of the now-defunct pan-African magazine Africa, once called this evil force the "problem of demographics." He was referring to the different ethnic groups that make up most African states that were lumped together into geographical entities carved out by European colonisation and whose differences burst into the open after independence because of disagreements over power-sharing and the unequal distribution of national wealth.
In Cote d'Ivoire, the most obvious reason for the breakdown was succession rivalry, and the most immediate effect evolved as it did in Kenya.
In 2002, when Raila Odinga uttered his famous "Kibaki tosha" (No one but Kibaki) declaration, he insured that the previously unsuccessful presidential aspirant would emerge as the leader - and later victorious candidate- of the National Rainbow Coalition (Narc). Kibaki's decision not to honour the memorandum of understanding with the Odinga-led Liberal Democratic Party (now defunct) that would have led to the creation of an executive prime minister's office and the appointment of Odinga to that position sowed the seeds of the feud that would lead to the collapse of the Narc government in 2005 after Odinga and his allies led a successful opposition in a constitutional referendum.
The two men ended up facing each other in the December presidential election which Odinga's opposition ODM claims was rigged in the incumbent's favour. The disputed victory set off unprecedented waves of violence that have rocked the country.
The Ivorian crisis, too, built up slowly and did not explode into civil war until President Laurent Gbagbo fell out with former student leader Guillaume Soro, his former ally when the sociologist-turned-politician was in the opposition. Soro, who had served as Gbagbo's trusted and most effective foot soldier in the grassroots mobilisation days, emerged as leader of a rebel militia that was later called the New Forces.
But not everyone was surprised by the turn of events in Cote d'Ivoire. While Western powers pointed to the country as a beacon of stability, more circumspect voices warned about a peace of the graveyard. It was a staunchly one-party state, and Houphouet-Boigny was not just the party leader - he was the party.
Houphouet, the wily coffee farmer, had begun to cast his shadow over the territory well before independence. A French-trained medical doctor, as a young man he founded the French West African Inter-territorial Union of African Farmers with an Ivorian section called the Democratic Party. This became the vehicle that hoisted him to undisputed power.
He was elected deputy from the colonial territories to the French National Assembly in 1945 and served as minister in French government from 1956 to 1959. He was the country's first president. Only 30 years later in 1990 did he permit a multiparty presidential election, which he won hands down. His principal opponent was Laurent Gbagbo of the Ivorian Popular Front.
When Houphouet died on December 7, 1993, his chosen Prime Minister, Alassane Ouattara, was expected to step into the late leader's shoes. As Ouattara's condolence was broadcast nationwide telling the nation that all citizens had been orphaned by the irreparable loss, French troops in battle dress were caught on camera escorting Henri Konan Bedie, Speaker of the House of Representatives and head of the National Assembly, into the studio of the national television.
Then in full view of the nation, Bedie handed a prepared speech to the obviously confused newscaster, who bravely declined to read it and invited Bedie to read it himself.
Still flanked by the French troops, Bedie declared that the passing of the "great elephant" had placed major responsibilities on his shoulders as the Head of the National Assembly, and he announced confidently that he was "ready to shoulder that responsibility" and "provide leadership in this hour of need".
The following day, Michel Camdessus, the French head of the International Monetary Fund, announced that the organisation had made three top-level appointments: one of them was Ouattara.
If the appointment was France's way of dealing with "the Ouattara problem," it was to be proved woefully wrong. It only worked for a time, and it did not go far enough.
One question often asked is how a patriarch who dominated a country as Houphouet-Boigny did Cote d'Ivoire could have died without making succession plans. The second is: Where are his children?
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