Behind Imperialism's Gang-up on the Ivory Coast (People's Voice)

BEHIND IMPERIALISM'S GANG-UP ON THE IVORY COAST

By Asad Ali

            According to the capitalist press, Ivory Coast President Laurent Gbago is a dictator who lost the election to Alassane Ouattara, and the AU (African Union), ECOWAS (Economic Community OfWest African States) and the rest of the world should force Gbago to step down. Except that the election results were declared for Gbago by the country's Constitutional Court, which is the deciding body, not the purely administrative Independent Electoral Commission.

            France and the United States, among other imperialist countries, want us to ignore the Ivory Coast's constitution and pick and choose the winner they like. The writer Leo Gnawa in his article "Ivory Coast: Obama is Wrong" finds a parallel with the Bush vs Gore US election of 2000, which was also decided by a court and not administrators. Would Americans have accepted NATO or UN troops intervening for Gore?

            Ouattara is a former IMF (International Monetary Fund) Deputy Director who was Prime Minister under President Felix Houphouet-Boigny. Gbago was a leading dissident and political prisoner against Houphouet‑Boigny, later founding the FPI (Ivorian Popular Front). Houphouet‑Boigny favoured French businesses and helped overthrow his neighbour Kwame Nkrumah, winner of the Lenin Peace Prize and independence hero of Ghana, the first non‑Arab African country to be decolonized.

            Before the Ivory Coast's independence from France, Houphouet-Boigny was a French MP leading other African MPs in alliance with the PCF (French Communist Party). He broke with the communists under pressure from socialist Francois Mitterrand (later French President) saying "I, a bourgeois landowner, I would preach the class struggle?". In 1985 Ivory Coast was the first non‑Arab African country to restore ties with Israel.

            In 2002 Gbago survived a coup attempt followed by a civil war, when France intervened with troops to get concessions for the rebels while recognizing Gbago's right to be President. Some commentators fear that if Ouattara is allowed to seize power from Gbago he will again favour the IMF and French businesses, whereas Gbago would require competitive bidding in the Ivory Coast'sfavour, giving equal opportunity to Chinese and Russian investors.  If the AU and ECOWAS intervene in the Ivory Coast on behalf of France and imperialism, it could be a dangerous example threatening the sovereignty of other African countries under international pressure such as Zimbabwe or Sudan. 

            Ouattara called for ECOWAS special forces to invade, predicting Gbago "will start running away. I know him well." The Communist Party of neighbouring Benin issued a statement rejecting any intervention "whatever the excuse" and that it was "inadmissible for any patriot and a democrat" to call for the trampling of Ivorian sovereignty.  Meanwhile Gbago has stood firm in the face of a visit by Nigerian ex‑President Obasanjo, who an unnamed Ouattara advisor has said was going to give an ultimatum "in a mean way."

            The Ivory Coast was also abandoned by its US lobbyist and ex-Clinton aide Lanny Davis, on the grounds that Gbago would not take Barack Obama's phone calls so that he could be "presented with options."

(The above article is from the Jan. 16-31, 2011, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $30/year, or $15 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $45 US per year; other overseas readers - $45 US or $50 CDN per year. Send to People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 706 Clark Drive, Vancouver,BC, V5L 3J1.)