ECOWAS and Cote d'Ivoire

The 39th Ordinary Summit of the Heads of States and Government of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) ended yesterday in Abuja, and while NEXT chose to see the statement released as a statement of intent for military action in Cote d'Ivoire (this editorial gives away their perception that war is imminent), I see ECOWAS' statement as being the usual, dangerous fudge.

It is "usual" because they have not really decided to do any specific thing other than keep pushing a decision down the road until the situation resolves itself. But it is dangerous becomes sometimes people end up in wars they do not want to fight because they keep making commitments to fight, and (especially) engaging in the gamble of drawing lines in the sand and promising to fight if someone crosses that line; almost always they truly and deeply hope the person backs down and doesn't cross their line, yet once the line is crossed they must either fight or lose credibility.

You shouldn't talk about military action unless you are serious about it.

And Nigeria shouldn't be getting involved in military actions of uncertain duration, uncertain length and uncertain expense. The budget and debt situations of the self-anointed dozen or so countries who named themselves the "international community" mean they cannot credibly promise to refund our expenses.

Alas, the Federal Government could care less what I or any other citizen thinks. They are too busy trying to impress the "international community" and play at being a regional giant. For all I know, NEXT may be right, and the government may be planning a military intervention in Cote d'Ivoire.

If it has to happen, we shouldn't take sides.

I know the "international community" says Ouattara won the election (only Heaven knows how they are so sure when the vote was rigged in both the North and South of the country).

And I know Laurent Gbagbo is yet another in the line of believers in the concept of Ivoirite, a xenophobic, tribalist, regionalist, divide-and-rule device invented by ex-President Henri Konan Bedie as a strategy for cementing his hold on power.

But the reality of the Ivoirien political situation is the country has to move beyond Neo-Houphouetist politics and politicians, and must specifically move past the personalities and political factions and rivalries associated with Bedie, Ouattara and Gbagbo. These men are polarizing figures, and their continued dominance of the political stage is an invitation to future instability, regardless of what happens in the present case.

That is the view from Cote d'Ivoire's domestic angle.

From the point of view of Nigeria's strategic regional interests, it hardly matters which of the three major factions wins the presidency. Ouattara and Bedie (both political scions of the Houphouet-Boigny) would govern the country as an overseas department of France, with monetary policy drawn up in Paris, and fiscal policy designed in the IMF offices in Washington; they would both treat Nigeria as an existential threat and not as an ally or trading partner. And while Laurent Gbagbo hates the French (because they were allies of his lifetime rival Houphouet-Boigny, a man who undemocratically oppresses Gbagbo and his supporters), he too sees Nigeria as an existential threat, and not as a regional ally or potential major tradting partner.

As with most of our "Big Brother" nonsense since 1960, we would be in effect facilitating the rise of a government (one way or another) that will treat us with utter disdain, regardless of the fact that we helped them.

All things considered, if Nigerian soldiers go into Cote d'Ivoire, it shouldn't be to fight one faction as the ally of another faction. We should only go in to serve as a neutral force, spread out around the country, to superintend a new national election in which everyone with a political history is barred from contesting. We should only go in at the invitation of both factions, consequent on both sides agreeing to the plan for new elections with a completely clean and new slate of candidates.

Of course neither side will agree to this .... and I have no problem with that, so long as neither side expects our soldiers to DIE to put them in office. I am tired of people using Nigeria to chop awoof. If you want us involved in resolving your disputes, do it our way; if you don't want to do it our way, then don't ask us to risk our lives and money to do it your way -- it is your way, so you take all the risk and leave us out of it.

We need to start articulating firm positions consistent with our strategic outlook, rather than just parroting whatever happens to be the reigning (and always temporary) opinion of the "international community"

EDIT: I thought I was the only one who felt a new election should be held, with the current faction leaders barred from standing again. As it turns out, a South-Africa-based Ivoirien professor agrees with me somewhat.

EDIT-2: Some of you may be wondering why my comments above do not address the humanitarian situation. There is violence in Cote d'Ivoire and the possibility (though not guarantee) of worsening violence if nothing changes in the immediate future. In reality, my comments do address the humanitarian situation, not by attacking the symptoms but instead by attacking the disease itself. I repeat again that the Neo-Houphouetist brand of politics embodied by Bedie, Ouattara and Gbagbo is the proximate source of the political, economic and sociocultural crises in the Cote d'Ivoire -- and it is militias loyal to these men that are responsible for the violence. To end the symptoms, you have to end the disease. It is long past time for a new post-colonial Cote d'Ivoire to emerge from the political debris of the old, neo-colonial Cote d'Ivoire.