Is President Gbagbo tribalist?

Mamadou Koulibaly, in a Beninese newspaper: « We could have continued the momentum as a major party, if tribalism had not come to gangrene the FPI at point of losing President Gbagbo who turned on to become a tribalist ».

So then resolutely playing the detractors of a regime that would had brought him to the highest spheres of the Republic, Mamadou Koulibaly who was the interim chair of the FPI, the party which disclosed him to the Ivorians and which he left in July 11, 2011, has been prevalent in many national and international press, criticizing the regime he has served until the end. Among the evils he has regularly pointed, is tribalism, which is obviously an evil that must be fought without any concession to the survival of the young Ivorian nation. However, this can be highlighted Gbagbo regime with this tare ? Until then, that those who instruct the trial brought against Gbagbo tribalism said that based on their absolute discretion, we modestly tried to review the in recent years to allow visiblity in the management of the men nominated in various appointments by President Gbagbo and the logic of resource allocation in the country, not to mention the nature of support enjoyed by his regime.

Pushed very hard on the issue of tribalism in the press of the opposition then and the French press, and more specifically accused of « bétéisé » Republican Army, President Gbagbo, in a press conference on Mars 02 2003-Matin reported by Fraternité-Matin of 03/03/2003, had managed to confound his critics by showing the dashboard hierarchies of command FANCI (National Armed Forces of Cote d’Ivoire) and the Gendarmerie Nationale as follows

« In command of FANCI, there are 15 Krou, 20 akans, and 14 constituents in the chain of command FANCI. They are distributed in 8 Bete, 5 Baule, Agni 8, 2 Atties, 5 various Akan (Adioukrou, Ebrié …) Yacoubas 5, 3 Senufo, Malinke 5, and 1 Koulango.

In the hierarchy of command of the gendarmerie, there are 31 different Akan Akan including 18 and 13 Baoulés, 2 guérés, 4 bétés, 4 Gouros, 6 Sénoufos, 1 Mahouka et 4 Yacoubas. » « 

The thesis of tribalism is therefore not supported here, we will look elsewhere.

« Under the military transition, he attended the two governments respecting the geopolitics in the list of those who were defending the standard of the FPI. Mr. Amani N’Guessan, Hubert Oulaye, Mamadou Koulibaly, Affi N’Guessan, Leon Monnet and Sery Bailly had the honor and privilege to be chosen. « (03/03/2003′s Frat-Mat /)
« In his last government of 36 ministers before the attempted coup of September 19, 2002, there were 20 akans, 6 bétés et 7 northerners. « (03/03/2003′s Frat-Mat /).

In his presidential office, he agreed to put in strategic positions people from diverse backgrounds who not only fought but were for some of them, members of opposition parties which have never quit. And were appointed people like Paul N’zi David, a member of the PDCI and chief of staff and Jacques Anoma, director of finance or Nyamien Yao, minister under Bedie and member of the PDCI, and so on who have rubbed shoulders with President Gbagbo’s entourage, some people like Sarata Toure, Eugene Allou Wanyou, Koné Aboubakar, Felix Tyéoulou, Desire Tagro, Gervais Coulibaly and many others. So we went through a presidential cabinet composed of people from different ethnic groups.

With regard to the financial authorities who are the object of envy for the first time in the history of our Republic, a president, Laurent Gbagbo in this case, had made a call for applications to recruit the first responsibles. This had given us as general manager of the treasury Diby Koffi Konan Gnamien General Director of Customs, and Feh Kesse, Genera Director l of Taxes. So not a single person of his ethnic group where, under Houphouet-Boigny, for example, we had the right to Amani Goly taxes and Koffi Angoua to Customs, people from his ethnic group who had each more than two decades in their positions, and where now the three personalities in these positions are from the north.

Gbagbo, who had once said that « the relationship is not a job » even completely ignored the members of his ethnic group in the allocation of posts of presidents of institutions. So we had:

Mamadou Koulibaly, president of the National Assembly,

Laurent Dona Fologo, president of the Economic and Social

Youssouf Koné, Chancellor of the National Order,

Tia Koné, president of the Supreme Court,

Yapon Yapo Paul Yao the Yao N’Dré Presidents of the Constitutional Council.

Thus it is clear here that these positions are predominantly occupied by personalities from the north. At the expense of which would be operated on the tribalism which he would be guilty?

Even at the level of justice, where some politicians deliberately ensure impunity by placing their men, one could cite to discuss the most to the reign of Gbagbo, Raymond Tchimou public prosecutor in the Justice civil and miltary justice Ange Kessi, who today does not have a relent in his area to hunt FDS that marked their loyalty to Gbagbo.

Even the distribution of appointments to the heads of major state companies did not escape this desire not to appear as a tribal President. Ernest Dally Zabo LONACI with the DG as Assistant of Assoum Bamba, Marcel Gossio the Autonomous Port of Abidjan, Amara Touré to CIDT (Textiles), Desire Dallo at the Port of San Pedro, Philippe Attey to SOTRA, Sylvanus Kla to ATCI (Telecommunications). And we pass.

This shows that the smear campaign was based solely on the manifest of bad faith of those who are determined to deny the reality of an inclusive policy. For what purpose?

But maybe tthese detractors did not want to see in important positions, , people from the same ethnic group that President Gbagbo, even if they had the skills?
Thus, their criticisms were also focused on Desire Tagro, interior minister and member of the same ethnic group as President Gbagbo, and again sought to portray him as a tribalist of the worst kind. His denials are no longer sufficient, he had to make a statement to give details of appointments in the department that everyone can enjoy here:

Accused of « bétéïser ‘Administration – The Interior Ministry responds to the » Patriot « 
Under the appointments of Inspectors General, Deputy Inspectors, Deputy Managing Directors and Directors at Central Department of the Interior, one publication has suggested that the Minister would have promoted Desire Tagro that people of the same ethnicity as him .

To allow the Ivorian citizens and other well-meaning people to know the truth, the table attached to this release shows the statistical study to see which provides the distribution of posts by ethnicity and is summarized as follows:
- Total number of Inspectors General: 02 with no Bété ;;

- Total number of Inspectors General: 03 with no Bété ;;

- Total number of Inspectors: 29 including 02 Bétés ;

- Total number of Directors: 04 with 1 Bété ;;

- Total number of Deputy Directors-General: 05 not including a single Bété ;;

- Total number of Directors Central: 29 8.Bétés

The Interior Minister thanked the publication for giving him the opportunity to show the way forward.

The Deputy Chief of Staff in charge of Territorial Administration,
Acting Spokesman of the Ministry

Interior

Zoguéhi Gnahoua Auguste

Civil Administrator

End of statement.

And if we continue, we could talk about such young patriots in that we wanted to see a tribal militia. For tribalism can be characterized by the nature of support. It can be treated as such if the tribalist support it enjoys is that its exclusive single tribe. We will see here that these youth leaders called Patriotic come from all regions of Côte d’Ivoire

Charles Blé Goudé, Richard Dakouri, Yves Dibopieu, Idriss Ouattara, Konaté Navigué, Joël Tiéhi, Serges Kassi, Watchard Kédjébo, Touré Moussa Zeguen, Damana Adia Picass, Ahoua Stallone, Eugène Djué and Serges Koffi come from all parts of the Coast Ivory.

Finally, one might also speak of the decentralization policy that also addresses the concern of President Gbagbo of not capturing the country’s resources for the benefit of its region of origin, but to distribute them equitably to enable a balanced development of the Ivory Coast . Tribalism, not only focus on people from his home region to the detriment of others, it also preferred its own region at the expense of other regions. So we cannot blame President Gbagbo. On the contrary, we should honor him even as he not only has not made the choice to privilege his region or his hometown, but it has, as aresponsible politician, continued to develop the political capital Yamoussoukro so that the huge investments that had already been made by the country are not lost. Bédié had acted differently by moving without telling the political capital to his home in Daoukro.

Moreover, the Ivorian who understood that he had an inclusive policy on him as well given the electoral map in the first round of the last presidential election showed that he had a national electorate. 11 regions out of 19 won by Gbagbo. Do I Need to say more?

No, President Gbagbo is not tribalist. Besides, we only has to see those around him again, to their peril, when he was captured by the French military forces and handed over to Alassane Ouattara. They were from everywhere and just check the list of political prisoners in the north to see .

The last word is that if Gbagbo had gone at the end of last term that the people of Côte d’Ivoire has granted him, he would not have been succeeded by someone from his tribe because he had positioned one in this case, unlike other. And that’s not all!
tribalist come on?

Alexis Gnagno

ACC-Communication