COTE D IVOIRE: Political rivals want new date set for peace-making poll

[ This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]

ABIDJAN, 20 Sep 2005 (IRIN) - Leaders on both sides of the political divide in Cote d'Ivoire are calling for talks to fix a new election calendar after the United Nations acknowledged that a key vote scheduled for next month would have to be called off because of delays in implementing a peace deal.

The African Union, for its part, is planning to bring the continent's heads of state together for a summit on Cote d’Ivoire in the next six weeks, an AU official told IRIN from its headquarters in Addis Ababa.

Cote d'Ivoire's 30 October election had been billed as an opportunity to turn the page on three years of war. The postponement of the vote is now raising fears of a new escalation in hostilities in West Africa’s former economic powerhouse, diplomats say.

The last months have seen little to no progress on disarming rebels who seized control of the northern half of the cocoa-rich nation three years ago, or on removing weapons from the hands of thousands of militiamen who support President Laurent Gbagbo in the loyalist south.

Gbagbo said on Monday night that he had written to invite all parties to a parley in the Ivorian capital Yamoussoukro.

“If we conclude we cannot be ready (by 30 October) then we will issue a new date that conforms with our desire for disarmament,” he told a crowd of people wounded and displaced by the conflict that grew out of a failed coup against him on 19 September 2002.

The ballot at the end of October was to have been the climax of a peace deal, overseen most recently by Thabo Mbeki, the South African president chosen as the mediator for the AU.

Speaking at another rally later on Monday, Gbagbo said Mbeki should chair the Yamoussoukro meeting, according to a Reuters report.

But Mbeki has fallen out of favour in recent weeks with the rebels, who have banned him from the north and have been urging the AU and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to officially declare his mission as mediator ended.

“Mbeki does not understand this crisis at all,” rebel leader Guillaume Soro told IRIN in an interview this weekend in their northern headquarters in Bouake.

And during talks on Monday with the current head of ECOWAS, Niger President Mamadou Tandja, Soro accused Mbeki of “bias” in favour of the government camp in Cote d’Ivoire and said it was time for Western African states to take over peace efforts.

“We are calling on Presidents Tandja and (Nigerian President Olusegun) Obasanjo to help our country,” he was quoted as saying by Agence France-Presse.

Diplomats fear a failure to find a solution and stave off the looming political tussle could easily stoke barely-dormant tensions in this nation, with its long history of ethnic violence.

Gbagbo has said he will stay on as president until fresh elections are held, but his political rivals and the rebels claim he does not have a mandate beyond 30 October and have called on him to stand down and give way to a transitional authority.

The UN, which heads a 10,000-strong peacekeeping force in Cote d’Ivoire and was overseeing the election, admitted earlier this month that it was technically unfeasible to hold the poll on time.

"It's not going to be possible [to hold the election] because the political leaders and parties have not cooperated," said UN chief Kofi Annan. "Practically, on a technical level, it is not possible."

With only weeks left before ballots are supposed to be cast, voters' lists have not been updated, many voters are yet to be identified and the electoral commission due to spearhead the vote is not even up and running.

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