Laurent Gbagbo should be forced out
militarily
By Kofi Akosah-Sarpong
With four demonstrators killed in Abidjan's Treichville
district by forces linked to disputed President Laurent
Gbagbo after a march to protest the killing of seven
women demonstrators earlier, all indications point to
the fact that disputed President Laurent Gbagbo and his
group should be removed militarily as Cote d’Ivoire
increasingly descend into turmoil.
Dr. Gbagbo, a documented tribalist and trouble-maker,
refuses to yield power to his competitor Dr. Alassane
Ouattara, whom he sees as not very Ivorian and who is
internationally acknowledged as the winner of last
year's presidential polls. Dr. Gbagbo is addicted to
power. That’s Africa’s notorious Big Man syndrome at
full throttle, pulling down Cote d’Ivoire.
Dr. Gbagbo’s insubordination is no surprise to those who
know him well. The Sierra Leonean academic and
journalist, Dr. Lansana Gberie, currently a Senior
Researcher at the Institute for Security studies (ISS),
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, who has covered African conflict
areas including Cote d’Ivoire, told me of Dr. Gbagbo’s
insolence, “I happened to have been in Ivory Coast at
the time of Gbagbo' very flawed election some eight or
ten years ago. Everyone I spoke to at the time was
convinced that Gbagbo was a mediocre and divisive
character.”
For misusing his PHD as a destructive tool, despite all
the rational and human devises available for him to
explore for Cote d’Ivoire’s peace, that has brought
untold suffering to his country in a continent where
unsuspecting Africans have huge mesmerizing view of
their folks with big academic degrees, Dr. Gbagbo’s PHD
in History from Paris Diderot University can now go
straight into the latrine pan, along with his other
panic-stricken mendacity.
Like most Africans with high academic degrees but who
have weak grasp of Africa and have helped bring Africa
down, Dr. Gbagbo has consigned himself to the class of
the Samuel Does and Idi Amins, thus joining the
global–pariah clubs. Said Dr. Gberie of Dr. Gbagbo’s
twisted unAfrican mentality, “This was in other to
counter the dominant narrative of the more populous and
wealthy Baoule group, President Bogny's ethnic group...
But I'm still slight shocked that he has turned to be
such a horrible disaster. He was giving the chance to
keep postponing and postponing the elections, stalling
and stalling, and finally the elections take place.”
The Dr. Gbagbo case highlights the persistent dilemma of
African elites place in Africa’s development: despite
their big university degrees, should Africans, often
blinded by big university degrees, look at the mental
health of their elites and leaders? Yes, we should,
based on our political history. It is hard to imagine
such thinking in Dr. Gbagbo’s demolition of Cote
d’Ivoire. This border on mindlessness. Some sort of
gradual replication of Rwanda’s genocide.
Dr. Gberie reveals that Dr. Gbagbo is “blinded by greed
that he is, he cannot himself deny that he lost badly to
his rival. Clearly the aim is to cause another round of
bloodshed in that beautiful, and if he turns out to be
the first victims of his own foolishness, should anyone
mourn? I am very deeply encouraged by the stance taken
by the international community, ECOWAS, AU and UN, and
one hopes that this will force Gbagbo to see reason and
leave..."
Decent African democrats should encourage the regional
military to force out Dr. Gbagbo from Cote d’Ivoire to
save it from further obliteration of African lives and
property. Dr. Gbagbo should be ashamed, ostracized and
excluded further civilized African communities; no more
toleration of him given orders“to take control of all
cocoa purchases and exports;” no more ordering that
electricity should be cut off from the northern part of
Cote d’Ivoire; no more entertaining him in respectful
audiences; no more grinning photo-ops with African
dignitaries; no more soliciting of his opinions by
editors.
In most respects, Ecowas’s decision to engage Dr. Gbagbo
has turned out to be a disastrous bargain. Far from
reasoning with Ivoirians and Africans to resolve the
Ivoirian crisis, Dr. Gbagbo has used such engagements as
cover to crush dissent, cause murders and plunge Cote
d’Ivoire into further crisis. Whatever cooperation the
international community established with Dr. Gbagbo has
now been damaged irreparably. It’s inconceivable that
any African government and international institutions
will have anything to do with Dr. Gbagbo.
Like Samuel Doe or Johnny Paul Koroma, Dr. Gbagbo has
failed himself, Cote d’Ivoire and Africa. Like Paul
Koroma’s smouldering Sierra Leone, Africans cannot
persuade Dr. Gbagbo to work constructively to end the
Ivoirian political crisis. African has had too much
patience with him and cannot watch him further burn down
Cote d’Ivoire. While Africans believe in diplomacy, the
African experience reveals that engaging dictators like
Mobutu Sese Seko is hardly ever a winning proposition.
As Dr. Gbagbo has revealed, the lowdown offends Africans
moral and traditional sensibilities.
Africans cannot bet on unreasoning dictators like Dr.
Gbagbo any more. The bet is on African people’s freedoms
and democratic rights. In the end, the biggest futility
is not removing tyrants of Dr. Gbagbo’s breed. The
continued occupation of Dr. Gbagbo at the Presidential
Palace in Abidjan represents instability not only to
Cote D’Ivoire but the entire Africa. The failure of
consistent diplomacy in bringing reason and humanity to
Dr. Gbagbo’s illegal attempts to cling to power at all
cost, despite all indications saying he shouldn’t, mean
Africans and the international community should resort
to military means to remove Dr. Gbagbo from Abidjan and
bring order to Cote d’Ivoire.
Kofi Akosah-Sarpong, Academic, writer
Canada,
March 13, 200119, 2010
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