Melting Pot

I've mentioned before I condemn any violence.  I have friends in Cote d'Ivoire who are strong Gbagbo supporters, others who are behind Ouattara and many who were with Bedie but have gone towards Ouattara.  Never mind their political allegiances, many of them are in danger, without money & unable to escape the violence in Abidjan ... Their blood is cheap, not even the media wants to expose the situation to assist.

So I find it difficult when I'm chatting online or by phone to Cote d'Ivoire trying to assist them, when the question of politics comes up.  I had one such encounter this afternoon.  A friend was telling me that the press reviews were depressing & I agreed.  'So much of it is anti-Gbagbo and people don't know the real truth when it's Ouattara's mercenaries doing the killing' - I thought for a moment and was surprised by this comment from someone who usually sticks in the middle & wants peace for Cote d'Ivoire.


I shot back; 'well never mind the press, the videos must be true surely?'  It all went very quiet ...

My friend knew that I was referring to the horrific video with a Pro-Gbagbo military vehicle in it, where people were being thrown onto a bonfire, still alive.  I've heard of many accounts of pro-Gbagbo attacks, I am also aware that Ouattara's 'Forces Nouvelles' - renamed this week as the 'Republican Army' aren't choirboys either.  But it has to be said that the photographic & video evidence shows much more pro-Gbagbo violence.  I was shocked to hear a Gbagbo aide talk on AlJazeera about a week ago in a debate saying that the 7 women killed & video of it was a fake.  He has the full video which apparently shows these women getting up afterwards & walking away.  Well if that's true why isn't it all over the internet or on YouTube???

Show the world the truth on both sides ... but stop the violence!

This conflict is creating many problems between people, friends & even family.  Those who are 'with' one of the Presidents and those who aren't but supporting the other one.  I'm loyal to my friends & treat them all with the same respect no matter their creed, colour, religion or political views but fear that I will lose friends who cannot see both sides of the situation.  Rumours are abound, another friend told me that Ouattara had made a bad choice of bringing in 2,000 Burkinabe UN troops.  I asked around about this and it seems to be completely unfounded ...

It's gone past the 'election debate' which votes should be counted, which were fraudulent; dependant on the camp you belong to.  The problem is now the violence, escaping Abidjan and towns in the west and sheer survival.  The 'Ivoriete' problem seems to have returned with a vengence; but look at any country in the world, we're all a cosmopolitan melting pot!

Ta voiture est allemande.
Ta vodka est russe.
Ta pizza est italienne.
Ton kebab est turc.
Ta démocratie est grecque.

Ton cacao est Ivoirien. 

......Ton café est brésilien.
Tes films sont américains.
Ton thé est tamoul.
Ta chemise est indienne.
Ton essence vient Libye.
Tes appareils électroniques sont Chinois.
Tes chiffres arabes, tes lettres latines...
Et tu te plains que ton prochain est un immigrant?

 Yako mes amis!

THIS VIDEO IS GRAPHIC AS DESCRIBED IN BLOG POSTS - VIOLENCE BEING CARRIED OUT - PLEASE BE AWARE OF VIOLENT SCENES

A Week from Hell

The situation in Cote d'ivoire at the end of this week is dire.

Deteriorating conditions with Abidjan slowly becoming a ghost town in the midst of heavy artillery firing, automatic weapon gunfire and shelling with people fleeing for their lives.

The 'official' figures of this increasing terror according to Ouattara's RHDP:
Dead (832)
Injured (1808)
Disappeared (100)
Arrested (876) but I believe these figures are lower than the reality.  52 people have died in just over a week, 7 of those being women and 5 children.

What does it take to get the international community to take action to end this conflict? 
Where are ECOWAS, AU, UN, EU & other western nations?
Where is Cote d'Ivoire's No Fly Zone?

For anyone interested, the UN mission UNOCI figures:  http://www.un.org/en/peacekeeping/missions/unoci/facts.shtml

Refugees are fleeing east, many trying to find shelter in towns and villages in the Sud-Comoe & N'zi-Comoe regions, those that have cash continue onto Ghana, Togo & Benin.  Towns & villages are brimming with refugees, some lacking shelter to house the thousands leaving the economic capital of Abidjan.  Others are heading north to Bouake and further afield.  At the moment it seems that the UN agencies such as WFP and UNHCR have 'forgotten' this exodus, concentrating on the 100,000+ that have fled westwards to Liberia.  Where I stayed in December & January have refugees coming in taxiloads and on foot, daily ... yesterday the count was at 750+ in a town of 18,000; they told me that they need assistance ... certainly camps will need to be built & health should be high on the priority list.  I'm ready to return but need international aid to get supplies there.

The scenes from Aboisso's 'gare routier' one I know extremely well, are incredible, always the crossroads to Ghana or towns in the region it now has thousands passing through or looking for somewhere to stay, others sleeping in the open  having paid well over the usual odds to just get that far.

http://observers.france24.com/fr/content/20110324-cote-divoire-deplaces-est-pays-violences-postelectorales-gbagbo-ouattara


A friend in Kinshasa asked me about the genocide posting, how could it be genocide? 

Immigrants who once supported this economy from neighbouring countries such as Burkina Faso, Nigeria and Guinea have been targeted.  Victims of horrific violence, from being beaten with bricks to 'necklacing' having a tyre placed over them and then being set alight.  Certain districts of Abidjan and towns in the west are being targeted for the 'terrorists' as the immigrants are now being labelled.  Many of those areas have Ivoirians from the north.  However this is not a religious war, I know many Ouattara supporters, who are Christian as well as Muslim, I also know of Muslims who are pro-Gbagbo ... a reader of an article 'Joelle' makes the same comment: http://www.twitlonger.com/show/9d5djm.  BBC's Mark Doyle who reported from Rwanda during the early days of the genocide there was shocked by the scenes & what he saw, tweeting that this reminded him of Rwanda ... #doylebytes on twitter

Monday saw the recruitment of youngsters by Ble Goude, Gbagbo's 'Youth Minister' with the promise of cash in their pockets, they filed into a stadium to chant “We will kill them now” and “The rebels will die”, with a reply of “Do you want a Kalashnikov?”- These youngsters are being offered the chance of an early death, it seems to be a mass suicide is going to take place with little training or knowledge of what they are undertaking.

It seems that international support for Gbagbo is waining, Angola's Dos Santos has seemingly refused to give more cash to keep the coffers full, to pay his military, civil servants and other supporters.  I heard that the youngsters who were joining his forces on Monday were being asked for 25,000CFA to enrol, more funds to try to meet his end of month payments to keep the support growing.


I remember in September/October buying 'Jeune Afrique' a French African magazine similar to the 'Economist' .. the cover was a photo of Gbagbo with the headlines 'J'y suis, J'y reste'.  I was on skype to my journalist friend 'ourmaninafrica' who was on a story in Korhogo in the north of Cote d'Ivoire at the time.  I asked him if he had seen this edition, I had read the several pages it extended to and felt that if Gbagbo didn't win (having not held elections for 5 years) then the future would be difficult and possibly return to further violence.  At that stage I was hoping he would win, but fairly & squarely and not going to this level of violence to make his point.

In my car I have a CD I bought in Aboisso just prior to leaving in January 'Y'a Rien en Face' a pro-Gbagbo mix of zouglou.  It often brings me near to tears, hearing the lyrics and remembering the fervent love of some of the tracks by many Ivoirians.  The lyrics themselves spell it all out, even before the elections took place that this would be the future if Gbagbo wasn't in power. 


At the end of this week there's NO:

Radio RFI BBC,
TV France24 & TV5
SMS/Text messages
The Press are being attacked
Electricity in the north of the country



Yako mes amis ...

Genocide In The Forgotten Paradise

Many people wouldn't know where Cote d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast) is on a map of Africa; it's a little paradise that has turned into a war zone.  A place full of hospitable people, sandy beaches, great food with mercenaries, kalashikovs & some dangerous politicians determined to wipe out half the population.

Last night was terrible.  The constant fighting in Abidjan I was hearing about on Twitter and friends telling me of their plans or their situation.  I don't care who is in power, the violence needs to be stopped by a responsible force before the whole region is inflicted by the Double Presidential Virus.

In the space of 2-3hours I was at my wits end trying to find a way to assist friends, friends of friends, orphanages & towns in the south east of the country ... I'm still fighting what looks to be a losing battle.  The aid is going west, to Liberia & the displaced refugees there.  They need it, I don't doubt that.

The world has forgotten Cote d'Ivoire.  It's just 'another conflict', the BBC & AlJazeera are trying to do their best with reports but CNN etc don't seem to care despite Anderson Cooper initially offering media support.  Libya is more important due to oil, Japan has had a terrible time of it & the states in the Middle East are all trying to mount their own revolutions - strangely it's also all oil related ... What does Cote d'Ivoire have to do to get centre stage in the media?  The fact that chocolate prices will rise which was the only selfish theme keeping the country in the news has been forgotten.

So genocide doesn't count?  It will be another Rwanda that when all these other world news items fade out, the world will pick up on & then feel sorry.  It'll be too late, just like Rwanda!  The UN are there, but behave like camera touting tourists, there to protect the population but in fact just counting the bodies that lie dead in the streets of Abidjan.

What can you do?  Anyone reading this with ideas, please put them forward in the 'comments' below ... I am ready to return with a NGO if I can find one who will let me assist in the situation but need help particularly in assisting the SE of the country.

Shelter - refugee camps for internally displaced in this area, a town mayor has told me of 420+ refugees in his town, more to count & more arriving daily.  They don't have room for these families, they need temporary shelter and will need medicines etc if these numbers continue to grow as the risk of disease will be high.  Childrens orphanages; children who need food & will probably need to move out to the countryside from the densely populated areas if this continues

Does anyone care?  Or will everyone wake up when the genocide has taken place???

Yako mes amis ...

Disclaimer & Understanding

If you scroll down this page to 17th December 2010 and work upwards you will see my account of Cote d'Ivoire post-election.  It's taken me a while to post this as I am worried about the current conflict.

I've kept people's names anonymous whilst the crisis is still going on, the place I spent most of my time in also remains anonymous; these views are my own with the facts as I found & heard them.

The people of a town & certain friends I can never repay for what they did for me, how they helped me ...

Please hope & pray for the future of Cote d'Ivoire that the conflict ends soon ...