UN calls on Côte d’Ivoire to push for presidential elections in late 2009

United Nations officials today called on Côte d’Ivoire’s leaders to set a timetable as soon as possible for much-delayed presidential elections so that the vote can take place in the divided West African country in the latter half of this year.

The number of identified voters has passed the 4.6-million mark and the operation should be completed by spring if the current trend continues, the UN Operation in Côte d’Ivoire (UNOCI) said in a news release.

“This timetable is crucial, not only in order to maintain the present momentum, but also to allow for national planning and thus avoid accumulating delays,” it added, calling the identification and registration process, which has proceeded without any major incidents, “an historic advance” in a country that has been divided since 2002 between the Government-held south and a northern area dominated by the rebel Forces Nouvelles.

“Without a target, without a date, without a timeline, we cannot provide the support that the process deserves,” Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s Special Representative for Côte d’Ivoire Y. J. Choi told a news conference in Abidjan, the country’s commercial capital.

UNOCI set out a five-stage “rational” timetable: producing a provision voter list in the spring; issuing a definitive list after the three months allowed for resolving disputes; producing identity cards over a six-week period; distribution of cards and equipping 11,000 polling stations, for which a few weeks will be needed; and the presidential campaign itself, which on previous occasions has lasted two weeks.

“Naturally, it is understood that it is the responsibility of the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) to set the new timetable,” the mission said. “In the interests of the Ivorian people, as well as of the international community… UNOCI is asking the IEC to publish a new electoral timetable without delay so as not to compromise the dynamic of the peace process.

“For their part, the international community and UNOCI will continue to provide their support in order to ensure the success of the peace process.”

The elections, a key part of the peace process that UNOCI has been fostering for the past five years, have been repeatedly postponed over the issue of voters, and were last scheduled for 30 November 2008.

In a related development, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported that displaced people returning home in the west of the country are facing shortages of food, water and medical facilities.

UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Côte d’Ivoire Georg Charpentier has just completed a tour of the region, where village chiefs also cited the extremely high insecurity stemming from ongoing violence by ex-combatants and youths.

In 2006, the total number of internally displaced persons (IDPs) was 750,000. By September, 2008, nearly 70,000 IDPs were identified as having returned home in the west, but the returns have been complicated by clashes with host communities over property rights, causing secondary displacements and ongoing ambushes and armed assaults against IDPs, including rape and murder.