If momentum is what counts in politics, this has been a wonderful week for Ivory Coast's president elect Al-Hassan Ouattara, writes Gamal Nkrumah Al-Hassan Ouattara has a tough job ahead as the new boss of Ivory Coast -- that is if France ratchets up enough military pressure to oust Ouattara's rival from office. French President Nicolas Sarkozy is as keen as mustard to have Ouattara placed in a rearranged French-style presidential palace. As Al-Ahram Weekly went to press, negotiations were underway to officially install Ouattara, the winner of November's run-off vote, as president of Ivory Coast. The French are feigning fatigue with having to be pushed beyond the responsibilities Paris should have to shoulder. Having taken half a century to overhaul its colonial mindset, France has scarcely rushed to distance itself from its old colonial business concerns in Africa. Sarkozy was aiming to reconcile war-weary pacifists in France to yet another military commitment in Africa. He certainly will play up the success of the operation to oust Gbagbo. Evidently, the French are running the current gruesome Ivorian show from the Gendarmerie barracks in the heart of Abidjan, conveniently located on a lagoon close to the presidential palace and television headquarters. When France's interests are threatened, the French do not flinch from embarking on unilateral action. Côte d'Ivoire, was after all, France's most lucrative African colony. The worst may be over but that does not imply a fast recovery for the Ivorian economy. The French are prepared to chip in. The prospects of another Great Lakes region or Congolese-style catastrophe may have receded but the next three or four years will not be a pleasant time to run Ivory Coast. Ouattara is at last on the very threshold of tasting power and he hopes to include those hungering for it in his democratically elected government. There are signs that the entourage of his rival incumbent president Laurent Gbagbo is starting to get the jitters. His room for manoeuvre is severely restricted. He is putting on a brave face, though. He hardly has the most just cause or the most interesting tale to tell in Africa. Ouattara, on the other hand, presents his case in a low-key, conventional style that eschews sensationalism. The dark realism of Côte d'Ivoire's bête noir, Gbagbo, has been to exploit to the full the chilling spectre of tribalism and ethnic tensions. Northern Ivorians, according to Gbagbo's dreadful theory, are not "real" Ivorians. They reside in the parched and impoverished hinterland of the resource-rich coastal areas where "real" Ivorians relish memories of a once luxurious lifestyle thanks to nature's bounty. There is something in this thesis, but less than the fretters affirm. The central charge of Gbagbo's supporters is that Ivory Coast can no longer afford the luxury of employing "foreigners" as it did during the bloom of economic health in the period of unstoppable growth and development in the 1970s and 1980s under the leadership of the founder of the nation Felix Houphouet Boigney. He was a symbol of national unity and encouraged people from the impoverished drought-stricken Sahelian states to the north of the Ivory Coast to join their kith and kin and co-religionists in northern Ivory Coast. But as Ivory Coast plummeted from boom to bust and blight, resentment of the intruders from the north intensified. Gbagbo aimed above all to draw a dividing line between the relatively wealthy Christian south and the poor and restive north. Ouattara, a Muslim northerner, in sharp contrast sought to soothe the seething religious, regional and tribal passions. "Direct negotiations based on African Union recommendations affirming Ouattara's presidency are currently underway," confessed Gbagbo's spokesman Ahoua Don Mello. "The two parties are also negotiating judicial and security conditions for Gbagbo's camp and his relatives." It looks as if Ivory Coast is being cast adrift. Endowed with a motley of inestimable raw materials and cocoa and coffee plantations, Ivory Coast is not doomed to slink along the bottom of the African league after the ouster of Gbagbo. "We are very close to convincing him to leave power," French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe told the French National Assembly in Paris. Juppe could not have overstated the importance of French force in regaining control of the Ivorian economy. Nevertheless, the prospects for economic growth for Ivory Coast look reasonable. France showed its true colours a couple of years ago in Ivory Coast when it intervened militarily ostensibly to protect its "national interests". This particular incident marked a watershed in Franco- Ivorian relations with France instigating retaliatory air strikes that destroyed the bulk of the Ivorian military aircraft and strengthen the hand of the rebel New Forces against Ivorian troops loyal to Gbagbo. Gendarmes in Ivory Coast's economic capital Abidjan came under fierce attack by Gbagbo henchmen. The port city is a major Gbagbo bastion and rioters loyal to Gbagbo attacked French troops. They also deliberately destroyed French commercial and industrial interests in Abidjan claiming that France, the former colonial power in Ivory Coast, favoured Ouattara and the northerners, and was indulging in neocolonialist escapades in Ivory Coast. "Sarkozy's downfall will be at the hands of his Ivorian foes," Gbagbo supporters ranted and raged. Sarkozy haughtily turned his nose up in typical Gaulish fashion. Sarkozy's arrogance ironically enabled Gbagbo's supporters to stand tall as defenders of the homeland. Their political opponents were portrayed as traitors or lacking in patriotism. Gbagbo's supporters have been singularly successful in wrapping the Ivorian tricolour around themselves and their cause. Gbagbo was engaged in an extraordinary gamble. In March 2007, however, Gbagbo agreed to accommodate New Forces leader Guillaume Soro as prime minister. Soro has now defected to the Ouattara camp. On the face of it, this was a dramatic political turnaround by the Muslims and northerners in Ivory Coast. Soro himself is non-Muslim, yet he endorses Ouattara. By any objective criteria, Ivorians have not yet learnt how to share riches fairly. The vote that declared Ouattara the winner and now threatens to relegate Gbagbo to the political doldrums is the culmination of a peace accord signed in March 2007 that ended several years of Ivory Coast's civil war that pitted northerners against southerners. Gbagbo's treacherous strategy was far from subtle: divide and rule. Ouattara's supporters' strategy was to edge towards the country's principal ports of Abidjan and San Pedro, their prime targets. Ouattara is an optimist even in the direst situations. He understood that Gbagbo must quit. Yet Ouattara should not have had to try this hard -- and with French help. All this speaks to the impatience of the age. The shock tactics of Gbagbo misfired badly. War stories are by definition gruesome, diabolical tales of the unexpected. However, Ivorian politicians have signally failed to answer the deep questions about their country and its people that underlie such tales of brutality. Ouattara must contend with a nationalist, xenophobic backlash that could render his presidency less than harmonious. This argument works, but as Ouattara recognises, only to an extent. Old soldiers, the saying goes, never die. They just fade away. Gbagbo's troops are not about to evaporate, to disappear in thin air. Nationalist indignation among Gbagbo supporters is rife. Worse, perhaps, is a sense that Ivory Coast is now being deserted by foreign countries -- both its traditional Western benefactors such as France and the United States, as well as the neighbouring West African countries. This sort of partisan rhetoric is tedious. Despite these caveats, it is reasonable to presuppose that the economy of Ivory Coast will get a boost when Ouattara assumes office. Anti- Ouattara sentiments are unreasonable and irrational. Cooling attitudes towards Gbagbo are presenting some pressing problems for his cohorts. A humanitarian catastrophe of apocalyptic proportions is now unfolding in Ivory Coast, a country once considered the wealthiest of West African nations. Neighbouring West African states, far poorer and less developed than Ivory Coast, are now finding it hard to cope with the flood of refugees from Ivory Coast. The irony is that most of the refugees are nationals or sons and daughters of people who once upon a time emigrated from the neighbouring countries to Ivory Coast when the country was experiencing an economic boom in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. This good performance was driven by high commodity and oil prices. Today, Ivorian attitudes to the West African economic migrants on its soil are hardening. Yet, the incumbent president's cronies are warming up to Ouattara. Such backroom dealing has made both parties look shambolic. But Gbagbo's defenders are in greater disarray. The picture that emerges from Ivory Coast's political landscape is somewhat contradictory. Is there any chance that the trend can be reversed? Eyes will now turn to Ouattara. Thanks to its bounteous oil revenues Ivory Coast will make an impressive economic comeback. Though, considering Nigeria's experience, abundant oil reserves may be more of a political headache rather than a boon for the Ouattara government, if not for the country. Looking into the future, Ivory Coast is stuck in the present. Its problems are eternal. One is a hardy perennial: Ivory Coast is still answerable to its former colonial master France. This tradition survived the dark, kill-joy years of Gbagbo. Franco-Ivorian dossiers abound, gathering dust in rundown archival offices. This pile of paperwork points to two conclusions. The first is that partnership has produced plenty of fringe benefits for Ivorian officials. The second conclusion is that partnership has gone too far.
