450,000 people yet to return to the Ivory Coast

It happens over and over again in an armed conflict, the people are quick to leave but slow to return. The displaced people often go on living as refugees for years and years. They begin to grow dependent on aid groups because they can't establish their own livelihood in a different country.

OXFAM tells us that 450,000 people still remain refugees after the Ivory Coast conflict from earlier this year. With the story no longer in the international headlines, the aid groups are running out of food and water to provide for them.

From Reuters Alert Net, we read the latest assessment of the Ivory Coast refugees.

Although some half a million Ivorians have returned to their homes since the end of the conflict in April, 450,000 Ivorians remain displaced inside and outside the country -- the world's top cocoa grower -- according to a report by aid agencies Oxfam, the Danish Refugee Council and Care.

The International Rescue Committee said on Wednesday some of the displaced were sheltering in communities within Ivory Coast while others were in camps in neighbouring Liberia.

"Six months on, the majority of the 170,000 Ivorians who fled to Liberia are reluctant to go back due to persisting insecurity in parts of western Ivory Coast and concerns about targeted attacks by ethnic or political rivals. They remain in precarious conditions in camps and communities," the IRC said in a statement.

Ivory Coast's five-month post-election crisis ended when former president Laurent Gbagbo, who tried to cling on to power despite losing an election in November, was ousted by forces loyal to current President Alassane Ouattara.

More shootings on peaceful protesters in Cote d'Ivoire

Protesters in Cote d'Ivoire continue to be fired upon by government security forces. Four women were shot dead as thousands of women marched in what began as a peaceful protest. This follows an incident several days ago where eight people were shot dead.

Cote d'Ivoire remains at a political impasse because Laurent Gbagbo remains in power despite losing a recent election. The protesters are demanding that internationally recognized winner Alassane Ouattara be installed as the country's leader.

From Reuters Alert Net, reporters Media Coulibaly and Tim Cocks give us the latest from the Ivory Coast.

Ever since Gbagbo rejected U.N.-certified results showing he lost a November presidential election to Ouattara, supporters of the latter have seen their attempts at protest met with violent repression.

These ones initially appeared to go more peacefully, but were swiftly followed by outbreaks of gunfire.

In the downtown retail district of Treichville, witnesses said security forces fired on pro-Ouattara youths near a church, killing three young men and a 21-year-old women.

"It was a sit in. We prayed, some Muslims some Christians, then we went to St Jean church. Then we heard firing outside," said Helene Sommet, a Ouattara activist who helped evacuate the dead from the scene and take the wounded to a clinic.

"We took in 14 wounded. I'm at the clinic right now," she said by telephone, adding that she saw a truck with some of Gbagbo's elite Republican Security Company in the street.

There was no immediate comment from Gbagbo's military.

In Port Bouet, near Abidjan's airport, witnesses said about 50 pro-Gbagbo youths armed with AK47 assault rifles and machetes turned up to disperse 200 women who tried to march there.

"They fired into the air to disperse the women. They had weapons to intimidate them, but they didn't hurt anyone," said Bernard Aurega, a Ouattara party member who saw the march.

Guest Voices: Women In Liberia Mobilize For Peace

Continuing our series of posts from Concern Worldwide is a story about the Peace Women coalition who are fasting and praying for the refugees of Côte D’Ivoire. Writer Jenny Hobbs says the Peace Women understand what the refugees are going thru because Liberia recently survived through armed conflict.

Few people are aware that a group of women – calling themselves the Peace Women, dressed in colourful lappas (Liberian cloth), bright white t-shirts and white headscarves, were instrumental in bringing peace to Liberia. Their story, which begins with the simple act of sitting along the streets for months under the hot sun or torrential rains of Liberia, led to the exile of alleged warlord Charles Taylor in 2003, now awaiting his verdict in The Hague.

In 1998, women from all tribes and religions in Liberia united in their common goal for an end to violence, and played an essential role in the decommissioning of young rebels to install peace and democracy in a war-torn country. The movement took place under the auspices of the West Africa Network for Peacebuilding (WANEP). Today the work of these Peace Women continues. Here in Liberia, 75 women gather on a dusty football pitch to hold a 40-day fast and prayer meeting in solidarity for the women and children in neighbouring Côte D’Ivoire, where over 7,700 refugees have fled to Liberia.

The conflict in Côte D’Ivoire is escalating rapidly – official figures from UNHCR predict that 150,000 refugees are expected to arrive in the coming weeks, although the scale and uncertainty of the conflict indicate that these figures will rise significantly.

As Mama Kolubah Johnson, a member of the Peace Women group explained to me, the dangers for women in Côte D’Ivoire are well known to her group: “We have passed through the same problem here. Women and children suffer during war, women are raped, sometimes with their husband there. When men have guns they can say: ‘My man! This woman not for you, yeah?’ If the person has a gun your husband can’t say anything.”

Mama experienced the horrors of war when she was trapped in Monrovia, Liberia’s capital, as the rebel factions surrounded the city. Her husband was brutally killed during the war – oil was poured over him and he was burned alive while his wife was forced to watch. She was then left alone to care for her six-year-old daughter. It was then, that Mama Johnson decided to join the Peace Women’s movement.

Throughout the conflict in Liberia, women were subjected to rape—often gang rape—in brutal acts where objects such as bananas, pieces of wood and metal, guns, hot water, mud, dried batteries and hot peppers were used. A post-war WHO survey reported that 90 percent of interviewees, irrespective of age, marital status and religion, said they were ‘subjected to one or multiple acts of sexual abuse during the war or subsequently’. 75 percent of the 90 percent were ‘raped or otherwise badly abused, many by gangs of men’.

Throughout Liberia women joined together – Christians and Muslims from all tribes – and united in their call for an immediate end to violence.

As I spoke Mama, a Christian, was sitting next to her friend Miatta Sah, a Muslim. Miatta also lost her husband during the war, but due to the fighting it was not possible to make a grave or conduct a proper burial, a memory that still disturbs her today. Miatta talks of how proud her daughter is of her involvement with the Peace Women and her role in bringing peace to Liberia.

“We joined the group because during Taylor’s time the war was closing in on us. Our sisters, mothers and daughters were behind the fighters and in front of the fighters. We knew what would happen if the soldiers continued. We stood up on the street and cried for peace. We begged them. We went to them and physically begged for peace.”

The Accra Peace Accord was signed in 2003 and resulted in the exile of Charles Taylor. Liberia held peaceful and democratic elections in 2005, and Africa’s first female head of state was elected, President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. The day after the President’s inauguration she passed a new rape law, which provides harsher penalties for the rape of women, boys and children under the age of 18 years. Mama Kolubah and her colleagues in WANEP travelled throughout Liberia to support the disarmament process. Mama described her ability to forgive the perpetrators of violence:

“Those who did it, I forgive them. They didn’t know what they were doing, they were under drugs – heavy drugs – and they didn’t know. I had a burning desire to talk to them. I was assigned to Kakata to convince them to disarm, I went there. They cursed us, they cursed us and we begged them. It was when I touched his arm and asked him to leave the gun, I told him it was finished and it was time to leave the gun, and he put it down. They all cursed us but we kept begging.”

Unfortunately, gender-based violence did not end with the war. The Minister for Gender and Development highlights this in her preface to the National Plan of Action on Gender Based Violence, stating that although the conflict has ended, Liberian women and girls are still experiencing violence in all of its manifestations. Rape is the second most reported violent crime in Liberia and it is expected that actual incidence is much higher than reported.

“Rape is happening one-on-one now. They are raping little children aged 8 or 9 years. When their mothers are out getting food or finding means to pay for their education, the older men feel that the mother is not around so they catch the little girls.”

In over half (55 percent) of gender based violence cases reported between January 2009 and September 2010, the survivors were fourteen years old or younger. The Ministry of Gender and Development is working closely with women’s groups, such as WANEP and the Rural Women’s Association, to address violence against women and children, and to engage men and boys in social change.

Concern has been working in Liberia for fifteen years and has prioritized addressing Gender Based Violence through its livelihoods, HIV and AIDS, Water, Sanitation and Health (WaSH) and Education programs. Children are in danger of sexual exploitation and abuse on the way to and from school, and more shockingly, when they are attending school. Our work supports 30 rural primary schools in Grand Bassa County, south of Monrovia where only 28 percent of primary school-aged children were enrolled in school in 2009.

Our education program draws on the strength the Peace Women demonstrate in challenging violence in Liberia. We work with the Ministry of Gender and Development to provide leadership training for women in rural communities, and educate community members on child rights, women’s rights and the importance of protecting children from gender-based violence at school and in their communities.

To mark the 100th anniversary of International Women’s Day Concern is working in collaboration with WIPNET (Women in Peace-Building Network), the Liberian branch of WANEP, to provide training to 120 rural women in Grand Bassa County on gender equality and gender-based violence.

The training and awareness-raising campaign will take place on March 7 and 8 in six rural communities, bringing together young women who have children of school-going age.

As Mama Kolubah Johnson explains, it is essential that girls are educated to become the future leaders of Liberia.

“In the rural areas as soon as someone reaches 16 years the community will encourage them to get married. As soon as they are old enough to cut palm and make oil to sell they are needed to feed their families. The parents have a role to play. I took care of my own grandchild so my daughter could continue with her education. Now she is in college studying to become an accountant.”

Civil war and humanitarian crisis... in Côte D'Ivoire

Another African country besides Libya is on the verge of civil war and humanitarian crisis.Over 200,000 people have fled Côte D'Ivoire to escape fighting over a disputed presidential election.

From the IPS, writer Fulgence Zamblé collects first person reports from a few of the refugees.

Where people have remained behind, they have been deprived of food by the closure of markets. Water and electricity supplies have been cut off and schools are effectively closed throughout the territory.

In the west of the country, according to international humanitarian organisations, around 65,000 Ivorian refugees have crossed the frontier and been registered in neighbouring Liberia in the last two weeks.

All of these are people fleeing the escalating violence and confrontation over the past two months between the two rival parties who claim victory in the presidential election of November 2010 in Côte d'Ivoire. Laurent Gbagbo was announced as the winner by the Constitutional council, while Ouattara was declared winner by the Independent Electoral Commission and is recognised as such by the international community.

"We have spent three sleepless nights because of fighting. It's impossible to find food," Adrienne Tohoua, 35-year-old mother of four told IPS. Tohoua abandoned her house in Abobo PK 18, a precarious precinct in the north of the capital, home to more than 50,000 residents.

"We left several people behind who didn't know where to go and they would have been exposed to the fighting. Mortar shells fell among the houses and would have spared no one," she said, tears in her eyes.

Three hundred refugees have taken shelter in the Saint-Ambroise de Cocody-Angré parish in the city's northeast. Some 500 others have already passed through, on their way to other locations. Every day, displaced people file along the road towards this religious site.

"I have come eight kilometres to reach here. I'm going to rest briefly before returning to the road to reach my older brother who is already sheltering 13 people at his house," explained Séraphin Téty, holding his sixty-year old father by the hand. "He suffers from hypertension, so we need to find a health centre so we can manage his condition."

Many of the displaced lack the financial means to pay to flee. "I have a little in the bank, but it's closed. I have to move part of my family to the village and I find myself unable to pay for it," said Marcellin Tanoh.

Ivory Coast on the edge of civil war

A military blunder in the Ivory Coast may push the country into civil war. During a peaceful protest, seven women were massacred when security forces randomly fired into the crowd.

From the Guardian, writers Pauline Bax and David Smith give us the latest details.

The women's demonstration became a scene of terror when security forces opened fire with machine guns in Abobo, a sprawling, impoverished suburb of the commercial capital, Abidjan, where some of the deadliest clashes have taken place during three months of crisis.

They were about to set off from a roundabout on a march to call on Laurent Gbagbo to step down as president. "Men in uniform drove up and started shooting randomly. Six women died on the spot," Idrissa Diarrassouba told Reuters. A seventh died in hospital. Many others were wounded.

There was no official comment but a military source confirmed the shooting. "It was a blunder that we regret," the source said, adding that security forces believe rebels sometimes hide among civilians. "It is unfortunate."

The UN says at least 365 people have died since November's election, nearly all supporters of Alassane Ouattara, the internationally recognised winner. The UN said, just after the shooting, that more than 26 people were killed in the past 24 hours in Abobo, where most people come from the country's north.

Multiple delegations of African leaders have come through Abidjan, but Gbagbo has rejected offers of amnesty and comfortable exile abroad if he leaves office.

The UN, other organisations and analysts warn that the country could return to civil war, as in 2002-3, which divided north and south. The International Crisis Group says war is imminent, with skirmishes in Abidjan and the west of the country between militias and army loyal to Gbagbo and the former insurgent New Forces, backing Outtara.

"You cannot predict what the outcome will be," said Issaka Souare, a senior researcher for the Africa conflict prevention programme at South Africa's Institute of Security Studies. "Civil war is not inevitable but it's very likely, depending on how the mediation process will go."

Outside military intervention may now be required, he added. That was first threatened in December by Ecowas, the west African regional bloc of 16 nations.

However, Adekeye Adebajo, the executive director of the Centre for Conflict Resolution at Cape Town University, warned: "You have a situation that could erupt into civil war. But it could also be a stalemate that continues, which makes Ouattara the big loser. The advantage Ivory Coast has over many other countries in this situation is the presence of 9,000 UN peacekeepers who could maintain the partition."

He added: "There will be more clashes but the soldiers from both sides have not shown much stomach for war since 2002. It would take something dramatic for that to change. They each have half now, so why risk losing it all? And would the UN and French peacekeepers step aside? They have an obligation to maintain order."