April 15, 2010

The ongoing transport workers’ strike is the major issue in today’s Ivorian press. The dailies also report on the latest developments in the peace process underway in Cote d’Ivoire, especially the meetings between a UN fact-finding mission and the country’s political stakeholders.

1. The state-owned daily Fraternite Matin sounds an alarm bell saying that the Ivorian economic capital Abidjan could face a food shortage as a result of the ongoing transport workers’ strike. According to the paper, after the taxi drivers and other public transporters, food stuff carriers are also threatening to launch a strike to protest the high price of fuel in Cote d’Ivoire. The three-day strike, the paper says, has crippled business in the country’s markets, hospitals, schools and bars. In Yamoussoukro, Cote d’Ivoire’s political capital, the price of the food stuff has gone up, while youths in the southern city of Adzope yesterday vandalized private cars, reports the paper. “Famine at the doorstep of Abidjan,” sounds Nord-Sud Quotidien (a daily close to the cabinet of the Ivorian Prime Minister).
2. Reporting on the strike, Notre Voie (a daily close to the ruling FPI) says that 20 buses owned by a state company were vandalized yesterday in the outskirts of Abidjan, citing a reliable source close to the company. According to the paper, negotiations between the government and the striking drivers are deadlocked after the latter turned down the government’s offer to cut the cost of the gasoil by FCFA 15. “The strike will continue until the government reduces the price of the liter of gasoil from 645 CFA francs ($1.34) to FCFA 500 ($1.04),” the paper quotes drivers’ unions leader Eric Diabate as saying. To add to the drivers’ strike, the paper says, the General Union of Cote d’Ivoire’s Workers (UGTCI) – the most powerful Ivorian workers’ union -- yesterday threatened to launch a strike in “solidarity” with the drivers.
3. “UGTCI is preparing a coup,” says a prominent story in Le Nouveau Reveil (a daily close to the opposition PDCI-RDA party). “If the government does not take care of its responsibilities, we’ll react accordingly,” the paper quotes the spokesperson of the UGTCI as saying. The paper also fears that the situation could result in social unrest, adding that the RHDP, Cote d’Ivoire’s principal opposition coalition, supports the strikers.
4. On political issues, a report in L’inter (an independent daily) says the UN is engaged in efforts aimed at resolving the current impasse in Cote d’Ivoire’s electoral process. The paper attributes this statement to the head of the UN delegation, Raisedon Zenenga, who was speaking yesterday after a meeting with the ruling FPI party. Speaking to reporters after a meeting with the UN delegation, Secretary General of the opposition RDR party Henriette Diabate said: “Our preoccupations remain the same; that is the organization of the elections in order to resolve the crisis,” reports Le Nouveau Reveil. The paper also quotes the Secretary General of the opposition PDCI-RDA party, Alphonse Djedje Mady, as saying: “The task of the UN mission should not be limited to a simple evaluation of the situation.”
5. Still on efforts to relaunch the electoral process, Notre Voie quotes the Chairman of the Independent Electoral Commission (CEI), Youssouf Bakayoko, as saying that “the CEI will soon come out with proposals that will be acceptable for all.” The electoral commissioner, the paper says, was speaking after talks yesterday with the Ivorian Prime Minister, Guillaume Soro.
6. A prominent story in L’inter announces that the Ivorian Prime Minister, who is also the leader of the New Forces, is to punish former warlords who continue to hold back the disarmament process. The paper hints that during a closed door meeting held recently, the premier informed his collaborators about his plan to revive the DDR – disarmament, demobilization and reintegration – program, which started in May 2008; but was later halted. The paper quotes insiders as saying that the Prime Minister is willing to complete the disarmament program; however his commitment is hitting against the refusal of Com-Zones (New Forces’ military commanders) who still behave like warlords in the zones under their control. In a related development, a front-page story in Le Quotidien (a daily close to the ruling FPI party) says that the Burkinabe authorities could consider freezing the assets of the Com-Zones in Burkina Faso.