Tue, Mar 29, 2005 page9

• Ivory Coast's former miracle comes undone

  • By Brigitte Granville
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  West Africa's jewel is fracturing. The Ivory Coast miracle is now the Ivory Coast hell, where natives and non-natives live in fear.

  Since the arrival of a small contingent of French troops in 2003, the horror of this latest African civil war has occasionally intruded on the awareness of the global public, only to recede again. Last November, for example, seven French soldiers were killed in a regime-ordered air raid against the northern rebels. France retaliated by destroying the minute Ivoirian air force.

  With its peacekeeping mandate due to expire on April 4, France may decide to leave. Many Ivorians fear that this will mean renewed civil war.

  But instead of international intervention, the Ivory Coast needs homegrown solutions for its problems. It must avoid the pernicious ethnic nationalism of recent years that led to one ethnic group being banned from running in the presidential election. Without solutions that claim broad support, the Ivory Coast will likely join the grim list of the world's failed states precisely because of its inability to develop into a cohesive nation based on equal political rights for all.

  The problem of inter-ethnic conflict is, sadly, all too typical of Africa. The Ivoirian example is neither unique nor the most extreme -- at least not yet. Rwanda's horrors, and more recently Darfur, come quickly to mind. But the Ivory Coast's dilemma is notable both because the country's decline came from a relatively greater height, and for the lessons it holds concerning how states fail.

  At first sight, the Ivory Coast's post-colonial history looks like a variation on standard themes. Independence from France (in 1960) spawned a dictatorship remarkable mainly for its longevity. Felix Houphouet-Boigny's rule lasted more than 30 years, until his death in 1993, when power passed to his handpicked successor, Henri Konan Bedie. Houphouet's fondness for money and power was plain from the outset, and his regime offered no exception to the dismal African rule of corruption, fraud, cheating, cronyism, embezzlement and weak law enforcement.

  These handicaps to the country's development grew worse over time. As early as the 1960s, Houphouet was spending lavishly on his native jungle-bound village, Yamoussoukro, which in 1983 replaced the port city of Abidjan as the capital. Yamassoukro boasts grand eight-lane highways lined with over 10,000 lights and a full-scale replica of St Peter's in Rome.

  Alongside such Pharaonic waste, however, the infrastructure and economic development supported by continuing dependence on French finance and public-spirited expatriate French technocrats helped produce what became known as the "Ivoirian miracle."

  Indeed, at independence, the Ivory Coast was the most prosperous state in French West Africa, with coffee and cocoa exports accounting for 40 percent of the region's total exports. This relative prosperity lasted until the second oil shock of 1979, when global stagflation depressed prices for the primary commodities that comprise the Ivory Coast's narrow export base, while rising interest rates increased the cost of servicing the debt contracted by the Houphouet regime.

  Economic crisis and corruption undermined Bedie's presidency, leading to a military coup in 1999. But the new regime, facing continued unrest, eventually allowed multi-party democracy.

  The result has been disastrous, as ethnic rivalries sharpened. Whatever else is said about such French-backed authoritarian regimes, hindsight leaves no doubt about the benefits of the social stability seen in the Ivory Coast during the period until the 1980s, when France remained paternalistically engaged with its former colony. The political upheavals of 1999 and 2000 resulted in a new "democratic" constitution that became an invitation to civil war.

  Regional and religious tensions had been growing since Houphouet's death and were aggravated by the new constitution, which enshrined ethnic discrimination. About four million northerners were denied political participation or land ownership on the grounds that they were descendants of migrants from neighboring countries. Yet the only real difference between most inhabitants of the Ivory Coast -- which has the most immigrants of any West African country -- is the timing of their forefathers' arrival.

  The nationality issue first came to a head over the status of Alassane Ouattara, the Muslim opposition leader and talented technocrat whom Bedie barred from running in the 1995 presidential election on account of his "foreign" ancestry. Stripped of his Ivorian citizenship in 1999, Ouattara is popular in the north of the country, which has been held by the "New Forces" rebels since 2002.

  The rebellion led in January 2003 to a French-brokered deal in which all sides -- including the New Forces -- signed up to a government of national reconciliation. The parties also agreed to work together on modifying national identity, eligibility for citizenship, and land tenure laws. But the deal has not stuck, and the conflict has continued.

  The best hope for the Ivory Coast is probably a parliamentary-based system that will require inter-ethnic alliances to form governments. The division of the country into more ethnically homogeneous federal components might also promote stability. Above all, dominance by one group through a powerful presidency must be avoided. But that will require strong international supervision, resembling today's EU Protectorate in Bosnia. The alternative is a vicious circle of violence and poverty, exacerbated by rapid population growth.

  Brigitte Granville is professor of international economics and economic policy, Center for Business Management, Queen Mary, University of London.
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