13/04/2011

LAURENT Gbagbo, Cote d’Ivoire's isolated and besieged strongman, has finally been seized by opposition forces in Abidjan. After four months of killings, displacement of people and Gbagbo hide and seek, last Monday, it took a convoy of some 30 French military vehicles, including tanks and armoured personnel carriers to offer protection for scores of pro-Ouattara troops to storm Gbagbo’s residence and smoke him out, unhurt.

No suicide pill, no bullet to the head, only a ceremonial slap on the cheek for what one Ghanaian prison officer told a leading politician after his arrest in 1966, this slap is “for your misrulement.”

Last Sunday, UN and French forces had to launch air attacks against Ggagbo, while ECOWAS was seemingly considering its option of going to the UN Security Council for a resolution to apply military action.Ivorians, whether they voted for Ouattara or not have greeted Gbagbo’s arrest with relief. They are happy that this military intervention has opened the way for the new leadership to restore peace, reconcile the nation and put it back on the road to economic prosperity.

The Ghanaian government has its own task to accomplish: employing all the diplomatic skills that Mills has so far shown not to have, to normalise relations with the Ouattara administration. President Mills calculated wrongly by backing the clear wrong horse with a disgraceful yo-yo kind of foreign policy unknown to Ghana in continental political leadership.Mills lost. But, Ghana should not be a loser from this regrettable faux pas.

Gbagbo's refusal to go was a threat not only to millions of his own countrymen but to the region as a whole, something our own leader could not see. Instead, our president was prepared to put his personal friendship with Gbagbo ahead of the interest of his country and continent. It is the highest form of leadership betrayal.

Moreover, we are disappointed by the reaction from certain government quarters here in Ghana to Gbagbo’s arrest. Ghana Government officials have been heard reducing the arrest of that Ivorian despot to an unwelcome ‘imperialist, neo-colonialist’ intervention.

Until the assault that led to his capture, Gbagbo's men had been gaining ground – a situation that would have only led to more and more slaughter and more and more refugees. They recaptured the television station and attacked civilians in the Adjamé and Attécoubé neighbourhoods of the city, which contain many opposition supporters.

There was a real risk of a repeat of the ethnic slaughter that took place recently in Duékoué. Indeed, the French and UN forces must be commended for the leading role they played in giving Ivorians a chance for a return to normalcy. They have saved the situation. If it takes an imperialist to save African lives so be it! It is a shameless run for cover for President Mills and his team of propaganda warriors who said military intervention was a ‘no option’ to hide behind the discredited scapegoat chant of imperialism. Shamelessly, Ghana’s Foreign Minister could be heard across Africa Tuesday morning describing the capture of Gbagbo as a “welcome relief,” curiously arguing that the slaughtering that took place recently was avoidable!

Alhaji Mumuni, the common view across diplomatic circles is that the attitude of African leaders like President Mills only encouraged the Gbagbo intransigence, condemning some estimated 2,000 Ivorians to a needless death and over a million Ivorians displaced from their homes and country. It has been a major diplomatic disaster arguably unmatched in Ghana’s diplomatic history. Mills has failed Ghana with this. He should bow his selfishness in shame. Indeed, it was a military intervention that took out Gbagbo. Those who thought their DziWoFeiAsempolicy was for peace were in fact those who effectively became the warmongers because their procrastinating option was only entrenching in la Cote d’Ivoire a needless civil war.

Had the French and the UN not been stung into action (conveniently so) by attacks on their headquarters, the Golf Hotel and also the residence of the French ambassador, a civil war would still be raging.

President Mills, it took swift, decisive and sharp military intervention to restore the democratic wishes of the majority of Ivorians and to put the nation back onto the road for peace, democracy, freedom and development. You have been proved wrong and several lives have been saved as a result of that. Thank God! Your posture on the Ivorian crisis sent a very negative signal about your principled stance to democracy and has even spread anxiety over Ghana’s pending 2012 polls. You need to restore some level of confidence in the minds of Ghanaians about your sincerity.

It is essential that elections mean what they say and that the collective will of regional groups like ECOWAS is enforced and not undermined by its own leading member states, like Ghana. That is one important way of breaking the link between elections and civil disorder.

To conclude, we are cautioning Ouattara against heeding to calls to put Gbagbo on trial. We are not convinced that is the way to go. Peace, reconciliation and unity must be of urgent priority. Any action taken must be measured by how it can help efforts to bring lasting peace, reconciliation, stability, unity and development to la Cote d’Ivoire.