IVORY COAST president-elect Alassane Ouattara pledged yesterday to heal the country’s divisions, calling on militias loyal to his ousted rival, Laurent Gbagbo, to lay down their arms and join in a “new era of hope”.
Mr Ouattara, whose forces arrested Mr Gbagbo on Monday after weeks of heavy fighting in the economic capital Abidjan, said he would establish a South Africa-style truth and reconciliation commission to look into allegations of atrocities and abuses on both sides of the conflict.
Mr Gbagbo resisted international pressure to step down as president after losing an election last November, but his arrest after a four-month stand-off and intense fighting over the past three weeks has allowed Mr Ouattara to begin imposing his authority.
“I call on my fellow countrymen to abstain from all forms of reprisal and violence,” Mr Ouattara said in a speech on his TCI television station, calling for “a new era of hope”.
“Our country has turned a painful page in its history,” he said, and urged youth militias to surrender their weapons.
With security yet to be restored in parts of Abidjan and a humanitarian crisis having emerged in parts of the country, Mr Ouattara faces urgent challenges. His success in restoring peace will hinge on the reaction of Ivorians loyal to Mr Gbagbo, who won 46 per cent of the vote in last year’s election.
Mr Gbagbo briefly spoke on Mr Ouattara’s television station and called for an end to the fighting, but it was not clear whether pro-Gbagbo militias, which still control parts of Abidjan, would heed calls to lay down their weapons.
UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon called on Mr Ouattara to form a national unity government to help reconcile the country’s divisions, while his rival’s entourage said only negotiations with Mr Gbagbo’s camp would prevent further turmoil.
“There must be negotiations with Gbagbo, who is the only one who can prevent Ivory Coast from plunging into violence,” Pascal Affi N’Guessan, head of Mr Gbagbo’s party, told Radio France Internationale.
A further potential obstacle to Mr Ouattara’s efforts to assert his legitimacy – the involvement of French soldiers in Mr Gbagbo’s capture on Monday – continued to provoke debate yesterday.
A column of more than 30 French armoured vehicles moved on Mr Gbagbo’s residence in Abidjan early on Monday after French and UN helicopter gunships pounded the compound overnight.
The ex-president’s camp have said French special forces captured him, with Mr N’Guessan describing his removal as “a coup organised by the French army.” The French government, sensitive to the charge that it interfered in the domestic affairs of a former colony, says its forces supported Mr Ouattara’s army but did not enter Mr Gbagbo’s residence.
French prime minister François Fillon said the behaviour of the French forces was “exemplary” and worthy of pride. “Not a single French soldier put a foot inside the residence,” he said, adding that France’s Licorne force of 1,600 troops had no need to stay in Ivory Coast over the long term.
Socialist Party figures had criticised France’s involvement in the capture of Mr Gbagbo, with Paris deputy Jean-Marie Le Guen accusing President Nicolas Sarkozy of having gone beyond the terms of the UN resolution that authorised action to protect civilians.