Now that the capture of Laurent Gbagbo seems to have removed the main threat to stability in Cote d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast), vital questions arise about how to attain lasting peace, justice and reconciliation.
Gunfire continued in Abidjan on Tuesday, and there were reports that heavy weapons were being fired from pro-Gbagbo neighborhoods. Although many of Gbagbo's forces deserted him in the lead-up to his detention, analysts note that nearly half the nation voted for him in November's election, and genuine, lasting peace will take time and hard work.
Gbagbo disputed the results of the election, which the United Nations certified, declaring his rival, Alassane Ouattara, the winner.
"Clearly there has to be a disarmament, particularly of all the irregulars on both sides, and there has to be a significant effort to reintegrate them into Ivorian life," John Campbell, former U.S. ambassador to Nigeria, told a media conference call hosted on Tuesday by the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), where he is Ralph Bunche Senior Fellow for Africa Policy Studies. "The drama isn't over yet. There is still fighting. There is still bloodshed."
UN troops have moved Gbagbo to an undisclosed location to guarantee his security and to avoid his presence serving as a focus for remaining armed loyalists, analysts said.
Ouattara said that ''all measures" would be taken to assure the security of Gbagbo and his wife. He also said that he had asked the justice minister to launch legal proceedings against them and their aides.
Justice for All
Corinne Dufka, senior West Africa researcher for Human Rights Watch, said Ouattara needs to reassure all Ivorians that justice will not be one-sided and that mounting evidence of serious crimes committed by Ouattara supporters are investigated as vigorously as those by pro-Gbagbo forces.
"Over the past months hundreds of civilians have been gunned down, bludgeoned, burned to death and massacred by armed men fighting on both sides of the political-military divide," Dufka told AllAfrica. "Their families deserve to see justice done."
Support for calls to have Gbagbo tried at the International Criminal Court (ICC), as has happened with other former African leaders, such as Liberia's Charles Taylor, has been mixed.
"I would rather see Gbagbo taken out of the country, held in some type of custody - whether it's house arrest or jail - and the Ivorian court being re-legitimized, set up and built to capacity to actually hold a trial against him," Jendayi Frazer, former U.S. assistant secretary of state for African Affairs and Adjunct Senior Fellow for Africa Studies, said in the conference call. She advocated the creation of a regional African court of human rights that would be able to address cases such as Gbagbo's.
Human Rights Watch on Monday had cautioned against Gbagbo receiving "golden exile" in a country that would shield him from prosecution. (See Gbagbo Should Not Receive 'Golden Exile'.)
"It is up to the Ivorian authorities, under Ivorian law and adhering to international fair trial standards, to [try him]," Dufka said. "If they fail to do so, then an international process should step in."
National Reconciliation
In addition to bringing perpetrators of rights abuses on both sides of the conflict to justice, analysts say there are other deep-seated issues that must be addressed for Cote d'Ivoire to have lasting peace.
Once pressing humanitarian needs are addressed and the economy is back on track, it will be important to deal with land reform, as well as structural and institutional reforms, particularly regarding the balance of power, Frazer said.
"I think that you can create more localities of decision making, of governance, so that it doesn't all reside in the presidency, [making] that the big prize," she said.
A root of the conflict has been tension between those who consider themselves indigenous Ivorians and West African settlers who helped build the economy during the boom years before international prices for cocoa and coffee – Cote d'Ivoire's key exports – fell in the 1980s.
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"How do you move beyond those kinds of identities into a broader Ivorian identity?" said Campbell. "This is a long and painful process - but a process that I think becomes much easier if the economy is on the upswing," he said. "What, in many respects, was West Africa's strongest economy has essentially become severely damaged, [with] aspects of it destroyed … and what that's done is make everything worse."
Campbell stressed that if Cote d'Ivoire was going to emerge from the current crisis it would need the continued support of the international community.
"What worries me is that too often the international community has a very short attention span and simply moves on to the next crisis that dominates the news cycle," he said. "Were that to happen with respect to Cote d'Ivoire the whole process would, at the very least, take much longer and might well be compromised."
