IVORY COAST: Months after the end a bloody war that ended when former leader Laurent Gbagbo was captured and Alassane Ouattara became president, Ivorians say they still live in fear of the FRCI

Record ID: 182136

  • Title: IVORY COAST: Months after the end a bloody war that ended when former leader Laurent Gbagbo was captured and Alassane Ouattara became president, Ivorians say they still live in fear of the FRCI
  • Date: 5th January 2012
  • Summary: ABIDJAN, IVORY COAST (FILE) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF FRCI SOLDIERS PROVIDING SECURITY AT A PEACE CONCERT IN 2010 / DOG BARKING PEOPLE LINING UP FOR CONCERT VARIOUS OF ARMED FRCI SOLDIERS FRCI BADGE ON SOLDIER'S ARM
  • Embargoed: 20th January 2012 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Cote d'Ivoire
  • Country: Ivory Coast
  • Topics: Conflict,Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA3PBM5EGZCWG7B78G5F5KOHY70
  • Story Text: Sieving through debris after their house was ransaked and burnt down in the town of Sikensi, in southern Ivory Coast, this family still feels the war is not yet behind them.
    It's been eight months since the end of the armed conflict, but the former rebels, now part of the new Ivorian armed forces, the FRCI (Republican forces of Ivory Coast) are still being blamed for committing human rights violations and killings in areas formerly known as pro-Gbagbo.
    "On the 24th my little sister gave birth. We went to the hospital. When we got back we found they head burnt everything, my big sister lost 120000 FCFA, and all the clothes, everything is lost," said Rachel Ange Poda, a woman from the town of Sikensi, around 60 km north-west of the commercial capital, Abidjan.
    According to the UN, 10 civilians lost their lives and around 15 others were injured in December in clashes between elements of the FRCI and civilians in the areas of Vavoua and Sikensi.
    It all started as a minor altercation between a FRCI soldier and a local youth from the Abidji tribe, but it quickly degenerated into inter-ethnic clashes, pitting FRCI fighters and members of the northern Malinke tribe against members of the southern, more pro-Gbagbo Abidji tribe.
    "They started shooting at us. They burnt everything here. We weren't able to do anything, they pushed us back all the way to Teque. Here we have a place we call Teque, we went all the way there, they pushed us back all the way there. There they didn't do anything, but we weren't that strong in numbers to be able to defend them and push them away. They burnt our house, we don't know what to do in order to be able to sleep," said Jean Gaston N'guessan, a man from Sikensi.
    Tensions are starting to die down but the local population continue to blame the Malinke for the attack, saying they have hidden weapons in their mosques, which the local Imams are denying.
    "(They say) that the weapons are always kept in our mosques. But we haven't heard them one day saying that weapons are held in churches, why is that? Why would we keep weapons in our mosques, to do what with them? So that we can go kill our mentors, those people who welcomed us here, who gave us land?" said Imam, Moustapha Diabi.
    Even in Abidjan, where most of the FRCI forces have now withdrawn to their barracks, civilians are still angry about the seeming lack of control of those forces and the amount of arms still visible casually on the streets of Abidjan.
    Every so often, occasional bursts of automatic fire ring out, and people are worried about their security.
    "I think security is not very good today, we thought that things will get better, with some of the FRCI leaving (going back to their camps) but unfortunately there are still muggings, everywhere, armed robberies everywhere, as for example what happened in Sikensi," said Didier Gibli, a man who sells mobile phones in Abidjan.
    Others think it is the result of the divisions that have split the country for years and that continue to be a problem after the fall of Laurent Gbagbo.
    "It's true that the FRCI have a serious problem, but it's also the fault of the population who haven't accepted them, it's also the population who haven't accepted the FRCI because we must admit it, although I don't want to go too much into politics, but the area of Sikensi it's an area which was always in support of the president which has just fallen," said a taxi driver, Djakaria Ouattara.
    According to the Ivorian Human Rights League, President Alassane Ouattara ordered the soldiers to return to their barracks after an incident in the pro-rebel city if Vavoua, but they refused.
    In Abidjan, some FRCI soldiers swapped their military uniforms for civilian clothes but kept their arms.
    The unrestrained behaviour by some elements of the FRCI is beginning to anger the public.
    "With all the FRCI there, they (the government) should really review their situation, because we are traumatised, we don't want to see their military uniforms everywhere in no order, they should respect our country, so the uniforms should stay put in their barracks. We shouldn't have to see them out at every step, we've already been traumatised, so we don't want to see them anymore on the streets, because it traumatises us even more," said Celestine Gounou Okapo, a woman who earns her living selling coffee in a collective taxi station in the leafy suburb of Cocody.
    The United Nations peacekeeping mission in Côte d'Ivoire voiced its concern about reports of numerous human rights violations by members of the country's armed forces, the FRCI.
    A spokesperson for the mission accused members of the FRCI of carrying out rapes, acts of torture, armed robberies and other abuses in several locations.
    The mission noted that Ivorian authorities were taking additional steps to improve the security sector and to improve discipline within the FRCI and said it would support it in achieving national reconciliation after a decade of deep divisions.
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