Sidi,
It is not suprising that the guy wants to hold on to power. The reports coming from BBC World does not look
good. These military men always want to hang on to power as long as it takes. I am not suprise if the guy
declared himself the president , all i hope for is calm in the country. These people don't give up power and
they become worse than the regimes they overthrow. I hope that the protest will be calm and effective.
The Struggle Continues!!
Ndey Jobarteh
Sidi M Sanneh wrote:
> ABIDJAN, Oct 24 (AFP) - Ivory Coast was on tenterhooks Tuesday as it
> awaited official results from a weekend presidential poll through which
> military ruler General Robert Guei wants to hang on to power, as his main
> civilian challenger Laurent Gbagbo claimed victory.
> A tense calm had returned to the streets of Abidjan, the commercial
> capital, after security forces on Monday violently quelled protests over
> delays by the National Electoral Commission (CNE) in releasing results from
> the Sunday polls.
> Official figures from the vote -- the first step in Ivory Coast's return
> to
> civilian rule after 10 turbulent months under Guei's military regime -- were
> expected to be released at 11:00 a.m. (1100 GMT) on Tuesday.
> The delay, which fuelled fears that the government was trying to rig the
> figures, triggered protests by supporters of Gbagbo, who claims to have
> captured 61 percent of the vote.
> Soldiers used truncheons and tear gas to break up the demonstrations on
> Monday.
> On Tuesday, activity in Abidjan had returned to normal, with buses and
> taxis functioning normally, and shops open, although some schools near the
> electoral commission sent their pupils home.
> Early results released Monday showed that Gbagbo, a 55-year-old history
> professor, had captured 51 percent of the votes against 40 percent for Guei,
> but the figures were based on only eight percent of the ballots cast.
> Overall turnout among an estimated 5.4 million registered voters has not
> been officially announced.
> On Monday, soldiers entered the CNE offices in Abidjan, barred
> journalists
> from entering the building and spread panic among staff there.
> CNE chief Honore Guie appeared on national television to dispel rumours
> that he had been arrested.
> The independent daily newspaper Le Jour said the military ruler's "young
> people" had barged into the commission because they were "unhappy with
> initial
> electoral results."
> The paper said the soldiers had unplugged the commission's computers and
> attempted to arrest Guie.
> In an interview with a French private radio station in Paris, Gbagbo
> called
> on Guei to step aside and hand over power. "If he (Guei) has lost, let him
> hand over power to me; there is no other solution," he told Europe 1 radio.
> Gbagbo claimed he had captured 61 percent of the vote from more than half
> the votes tallied by his party in a parallel count to that of the electoral
> commission.
> Once a stable and relatively prosperous nation, Ivory Coast has been
> gripped by mounting political and military unrest. Financial aid has all but
> dried up, sending its struggling economy into crisis.
> The credibility of Sunday's vote has been seriously damaged because of a
> controversial ruling by the Supreme Court which barred all but five of 19
> presidential candidates from standing in the poll.
> As a result, the Organisation of African Unity and the European Union
> decided not to send any election observers apart from the 30 EU long-term
> observers already in place.
> A main opposition rival excluded from the vote, Alassane Ouattara, said
> he
> did not believe that Guei was ready to hand over power.
> "I don't know if he'll be beaten by the ballot, but in any case,
> everything
> suggests that General Guei is not ready to hand over power," Ouattara, a
> former prime minister of Ivory Coast, told French state radio in Paris.
> Ouattara, who was barred from running because authorities said he used a
> foreign diplomatic passport in the 1970s and could not prove his Ivorian
> parentage, called the election a sham.
> He also said his party, the Rally of Republicans, would not recognise an
> eventual victory of Gbagbo.
> "No, no, we will not recognise it. We consider these elections
> illegitimate
> because the procedures were corrupted from the start. The main candidates
> were
> not allowed to participate," Ouattara said.
> sa/jlr/gd
>
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