FILE PHOTO: Farmers work at a cocoa farm in Daloa, Ivory Coast Oct. 3, 2023. REUTERS/Ange Aboa/File Photo
PRESIDENT Alassane Ouattara of Cote d’Ivoire (also known as Ivory Coast) threatens to plunge the world’s largest producer of cocoa into a new cycle of political crises with his decision to run for a controversial fourth term.
Any eventual flashpoint in Francophone West Africa’s biggest economy will also increase the risk of a southward spread of violent insurgency plaguing the country’s neighbours to the north.
For these reasons, the African Union, the Economic Community of West African States (Ecowas) and Abidjan’s other foreign partners – including France – should leverage their close diplomatic and personal ties to convince Ouattara to step down at the end of his current term.
The economic stakes couldn’t be higher. From 2012 to 2019, Cote d’Ivoire averaged a growth rate of 8.2%. Its economy is projected to be one of the fastest growing in Africa over the next couple of years, averaging 6.5% by 2026.
During Ouattara’s tenure, per capita income expanded to US$2,729 (2023) from US$1,654 (2010). All these achievements would be at risk if political order broke down.
The mixed bag that is Cote d’Ivoire’s recovery over the last decade, amid stunted political development, is reflected in the polls.
According to a 2023 Afrobarometer survey, Ouattara enjoys a 60.8% approval rating. Yet the same poll finds that 65.3% of Ivorians are dissatisfied with democracy.
Ominously, more than 65% agreed that armed forces have a right to intervene in politics when leaders abuse power.
These figures should worry anyone interested in ensuring constitutionalism prevails after Ouattara leaves office.
They also reflect leading opposition members’ boycott of the 2020 presidential election, thereby eroding its legitimacy. (Ouattara won 95.3% of the vote as a result.)
Despite the last decade of stability, it is worth recalling that Cote d’Ivoire isn’t immune to political violence. The country had a coup in 1999 and has had two civil wars since then.
Allowing for an open presidential election in 2025 would be the ultimate signal that Cote d’Ivoire has finally escaped the vortex of instability that has bedeviled it since the death of its founding president, Felix Houphouet-Boigny, in 1993.
It would also cement Ouattara’s legacy as a leader who stabilised the economy and institutionalised politics.
Cote d’Ivoire is also an important bulwark against increased rebel fighting that continues to hobble Sahelian states of Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger to its north.
A coup in its economic capital Abidjan, an outbreak of conflict or security lapses occasioned by political paralysis would provide an opening for violence from the north.
It would then not be conceivable for instability to spread into Cote d’Ivoire’s much poorer, weaker neighbours to the west: Liberia and Guinea.
The fact that Ouattara got away with a controversial third-term run in 2020 and is aiming for an another reflects a lingering challenge to democratic consolidation in African countries.
Often, regional organisations like the African Union or Ecowas are quick to condemn military coups but ignore “constitutional coups” whereby presidents artificially reset the clock on term limits through constitutional amendments (like Ouattara did).
Both are threats to democratic consolidation and deserve the same level of vigorous condemnation.
Leadership turnover is the truest test of political maturity. Although a decade ago Ouattara may have convincingly argued that his candidacy was a symbolic guarantor of stability, that argument lacks any basis now.
Cote d’Ivoire has a wealth of viable presidential candidates, including former president Laurent Gbagbo and former Credit Suisse Group AG chief executive officer Tidjane Thiam.
Ivorian voters and political elites would be wise to learn from their Senegalese counterparts.
During his tenure, President Abdoulaye Wade leaned on the National Assembly to amend the constitution, after which he claimed the move had reset the clock on term limits.
In the end, the main opposition parties rallied together in the runoff contest to defeat Wade in the 2012 election.
The problem with the electoral option is that intra-elite coordination will be harder to achieve in Cote d’Ivoire, where institutions are still stalked by the recent history of political instability.
Make no mistake, the justifications for an Ouattara run that may have worked in 2020 or 2015 no longer hold. Allowing him another term risks a stable future. — Bloomberg
Ken Opalo is an associate professor in the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. The views expressed here are the writer’s own.
