Ouattara seeks third term in vote hit by unrest

ABIDJAN - Ivory Coast voted in a presidential election on Saturday with opposition leaders rejecting the ballot after a boycott and pockets of unrest against President Alassane Ouattara’s attempt to secure a third term.

At least 30 people have been killed in pre-election clashes since August, stoking fears of a repeat of the 2010-2011 crisis that left 3 000 dead when then-president Laurent Gbagbo refused to accept defeat by Ouattara.

The Ivorian leader’s decision to run again angered opponents who called for an “active” boycott and civil disobedience over a third mandate they branded an unconstitutional “electoral coup”. Ouattara appealed for calm on Saturday, but opposition candidates dismissed the vote as a failure and an exiled former rebel chief said he no longer recognised the Ivorian leader as president.

“I appeal to those who launched this slogan for civil disobedience which has led to deaths: Stop. Ivory Coast needs peace,” Ouattara said after voting in the capital Abidjan. Polls closed at 18h00 GMT, though it was not clear when official results will be announced. Electoral law allows for up to five days for tallies to be released.

A former IMF economist in power since 2010, Ouattara is once again facing off against veteran opposition leader Henri Konan Bedie in a bitter rivalry that has marked the West African country’s politics for decades.

“The electoral coup has been a failure. The Ivorian people succeeded in halting this election,” opposition candidate Pascal Affi N’Guessan told a news conference at Bedie’s residence. Tweeting from exile, former rebel chief Guillaume Soro, who once gave Ouattara military backing in the 2010 crisis, told Ivorians to work towards removing Ouattara. “I no longer recognise Ouattara as President of the Republic. People of Ivory Coast, we have no other option than to work to remove Ouattara,” Soro wrote on Twitter. The ballot in French-speaking West Africa’s economic powerhouse is a crunch test in a region where Nigeria is emerging from widespread social protests, Mali faced a coup and jihadist violence wracks the Sahel.

-Nampa/AFP