Abidjan — The National Reconciliation Forum in Cote d'Ivoire has spoken and set out its recommendations. For two long months, Ivorians from all walks of life and from all regions of the country - Muslim, Christian, animist, politicians and representatives from civil society and immigrant communities - talked and talked.
The objectives of the forum, which opened on 9 October, were to try to heal the wounds of social and political strife that have plagued Cote d'Ivoire for the past decade.
Many told their stories and spoke about their problems and past wrongs they suffered. For others, the priority was to highlight present day divisions and condemn the cancer of hatred and discrimination that has, in recent years, poisoned a nation that once prided itself on harmony in diversity and tolerance. Cote d'Ivoire is today riven with suspicion and tension.
Reminiscent of the groundbreaking Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa, the Ivorian equivalent may have been much shorter and received less international media attention, but it was, in many ways, as emotional and cathartic for those who took part. It was the first time such an event had been organised in Cote d'Ivoire.
Among the high-profile participants were the current president, the erstwhile military leader, the ousted exiled civilian president and a former prime minister, whose Ivorian nationality has been called into question, and who remains a 'wannabe' president of Cote d'Ivoire. Some of them had initially either refused to attend the forum or had laid down conditions for taking part.
General Robert Guei made dubious history when he was propelled from retirement in his village into the top job in Cote d'Ivoire, after the country's first coup d'etat on 24 December in 1999.
In 2000, Guei, then a civilian presidential candidate, again made history by attempting to steal a flawed and controversial election that he lost. The population responded by voting with its feet, launching a people's revolution that swept the military leader out and ushered in the winner of what remains a contested poll, President Laurent Gbagbo. Between two and three hundred people were killed.
Guei apologized at the National Reconciliation Forum. But, at the same time, he seemed quite unrepentant during his submission . He saw himself more as a victim than a man who had wronged the people during his 10 months in power, arguably the most fearful and violent period in the recent history of Cote d'Ivoire.
Henri Konan Bedie, the man who was overthrown in the coup that installed General Guei, returned home after two years' exile in France. Bedie stands accused of having presided over the country when the concept of 'ivoirite' (the notion that Cote d'Ivoire is for Ivorians) became almost blatantly institutionalised, and split the nation along largely regional and religious lines into the predominantly Muslim north and the mainly Christian and animist south.
Under President Felix Houphouet-Boigny, the Ivorian leader from independence in 1960 until his death in office in 1993, Cote d'Ivoire was perceived as an oasis of peace, stability and cosmopolitan unity in West Africa. Houphouet had encouraged his poorer neighbours, from all tribes and religions, to migrate to Cote d'Ivoire and help his country prosper and become the regional eldorado.
They did so, in their hundreds of thousands, mostly from from Upper Volta (now Burkina Faso) and Mali, but also from Guinea, Senegal, Nigeria and Ghana. The descendants of those immigrants remain in Cote d'Ivoire, but have increasingly begun to feel marginalized by indigenous 'natural' Ivorians.
The man who came to symbolize this group of several millions of 'adopted' Ivorians is Alassane Dramane Ouattara, one-time prime minister under Houphouet. Ouattara is both a Muslim and a northerner. And here lies the rub.
Ouattara stood as the presidential candidate of his Rally of the Republicans (RDR) party in the 2000 election, but was disqualified on the grounds of nationality. He said, and has consistently maintained, that he is Ivorian. The Supreme Court ruled that he was not. Ouattara is deemed, by his detractors and political opponents, to be from Burkina Faso, across the border.
"I have never used another nationality," Ouattara told national and traditional leaders, foreign diplomats and others attending the Reconciliation Forum. He told the gathering that, as an Ivorian citizen, he had worked, as a senior official at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and as the governor the Central Bank of West African States (BCEAO).
Ouattara's exclusion from the contested 2000 October presidential poll sparked violent clashes between his RDR followers and those who supported the Ivorian Popular Front's (FPI) candidate, Laurent Gbagbo, who was declared president. More lives were lost.
Ouattara was again barred from contesting the legislative elections in December 2000, leading to more bloodshed.
The National Reconciliation Forum has reopened the festering wound of his nationality and family history, by recommending that the opposition leader be recognised as Ivorian and granted citizenship. The issue has dominated political discussion in Cote d'Ivoire and this recommendation has certainly rekindled the debate.
While testifying at the forum in early December, Ouattara made an emotional speech that lasted 90 minutes. He refuted the Supreme Court's conclusion that the elderly Ivorian woman he calls his mother was not in fact his mother. He declared it shameful and insulting that his mother should be treated this way.
Not only does the law require that a presidential candidate should be Ivorian, but that his or her parents should also be Ivorian.
The National Reconciliation Forum's conclusions may carry moral weight and momentum, and its chairman, Seydou Elimane Diarra, a northerner and a Muslim, is well-respected, but the recommendations of the organising committee are not law in Cote d'Ivoire.
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Its findings have been presented to Gbagbo, and while the Ivorian leader declined to express a view, simply commenting, "I have nothing to add," he continues to say that the matter must be decided by the courts.
The National Reconciliaton Forum was prompted primarily by the political and social tension in Cote d'Ivoire, but there was also pressure from donor countries who wanted to see an end to the turbulence that has rocked the world's number one cocoa producer.
Laurent Gbagbo, after little more than a year in the presidency, will have to find a balance between his domestic constituency and his international allies. So, what should the President do? Bless the recommendations of the Forum and push for his political opponent, Alassane Ouattara, to be certified Ivorian?
If Ouattara were to be given his citizenship papers, he could still face another hurdle that could again bar him from contesting the top job in the land; he might have to prove that he has never used a Burkinabe diplomatic passport, which could automatically exclude him from even trying to become the Ivorian head of state.
Assuming Ouattara gains citizenship, and if that last hurdle is cleared, there is the possibility that he could stand against Gbagbo in the next presidential poll. This is a development Gbagbo would like to avoid at all costs. But could the price of political expediency be too high? Ouattara is as ambitious as Gbagbo and has not indicated that he is prepared to relinquish his bid for the presidential palace.
