PDCI’s withdrawal supported by other parties

Five groups participating in Cote d’Ivoire’s transitional government – four political parties and rebels known as the New Forces - issued a statement on Sunday backing a decision by the country’s oldest political party, the PDCI, to withdraw from government, accusing President Laurent Gbagbo of “underhand methods”. Gbagbo’s Ivorian Popular Front, (FPI) and the Ivorian Worker’s Party (PIT) were the only two out of eight political signatories to the January 2003 peace accord that did not support Sunday’s joint statement. That accord, signed in Marcoussis, France, paved the way for an end to a rebel war begun in September 2002 and the formation of a transitional government that will oversee elections scheduled for 2005. On Thursday, the Democratic Party of Cote d’Ivoire (PDCI), which ruled from independence in 1960 to the country’s first ever coup in 1999, announced that its seven ministers would withdraw from the “dysfunctional government” until certain matters were addressed. The PDCI accused Gbagbo of plotting against the PDCI, undermining its authority and humiliating party leader Henri Konan Bedie. Pro-Gbagbo newspapers have repeatedly accused Bedie of stealing rice in a disputed business deal, among other accusations. The PDCI’s dissatisfaction had reached a high point earlier this year, when Gbagbo awarded a contract to run the container terminal in the main Abidjan port to a French company without an open tender and without reference to Patrick Atchi, the PDCI Minister for Economic Infrastructure, under whose responsibility the port falls. “The PDCI’s decision is the consequence of frequent malfunctioning and persistent obstacles in the implementation of the government’s programme,” the PDCI and the other five groups said. The five called on the PDCI to hold on “firmly” to its decision. Maurice Guikahue, PDCI spokesman, told IRIN that his party, the second largest in the national assembly, would not return until the malfunctioning of the government was corrected. The PDCI’s walkout followed a similar boycott by the New Forces, who suspended their participation in Prime Minister Seydou Diarra’s government from October to December. At the time, the New Forces also accused Gbagbo of dragging his feet on the implementation of the Marcoussis Accord and undermining peace efforts. The action by the PDCI has been condemned by the PIT and the FPI. FPI Secretary-General Miaka Ouretto said the move was part of a plot to destabilise the country and its government. The United Nations Mission in Cote d’Ivoire - which, starting 4 April, is to be transformed into a full-fledged peacekeeping mission - urged the PDCI to resolve its grievances within the framework of the transitional government. An official of one of the country’s smallest political parties, The Movement of Future Forces (MFA) - which has supported the PDCI’s decision - warned that “there would be more [such decisions] until we have clearly defined the role of the president, the prime minister and the ministers born out of Marcoussis.”