Nowhere to run, but no fun hiding

Drop down from the mansion-lined streets of Cocody, the posh diplomatic suburb of Abidjan, and nestling on the hillside is Gobele - a shantytown of some 5,000 self-proclaimed foreigners. Most have never lived in their 'homeland' and few are planning to move there, whatever troubles they have in Cote d’Ivoire. After Cote d’Ivoire was split in two by civil war in September 2002, government forces destroyed many of the shantytowns in Abidjan which host immigrants from other West African countries. The government claimed they were hotbeds of rebel support. “It’s true we were spared the worst of it in September (2002), but we are foreigners so we still get police visits,” said Marshood Aramu Balgum, a Nigerian citizen born in Abidjan and resident in Gobele. Most of the inhabitants of these ramshackle houses built of corrugated iron and recycled wood are of Burkinabe origin. Douamba Boukariy, one Burkinabe resident of the lagoon-side slum, said Gobele had suffered repeated harassment by policemen and paramilitary gendarmes on the hunt for money to steal and goods to loot. “When they come they are all over the place!” Boukariy explained. ”They are looking for arms in houses, but they find nothing. But if they find money, mobile phones - hey! - you know the only reason they didn’t take that TV there was because they couldn’t put it in their pocket!” Gobele has had mains electricity for some 15 years. But plumbing is non-existent with public latrines strategically perched overhanging steep slopes. During the most recent raid a few months back, one young Burkinabe man refused to hand over his hard-earned cash, but paid for his insolence with his life. “He worked at a kiosk - one of the little portable cafés," Balgum said. "When the police asked him for money he refused to give them any, so they beat him and they beat him until they beat him to death,” he said. "Ivorians are not bad people" But despite such incidents, few in Gobele think badly of their Ivorian neighbours - even the rich ones on the hill, where President Laurent Gbagbo has his official residence. “The Ivorians are not bad people. I know - I was born here," Boukariy said. "There are these youngsters that talk of ‘Cote d’Ivoire for the Ivorians’ but it was not like that before. It is the politicians,” he added.

Gobele shanty town

The Young Patriots, a militia-style pro-Gbagbo youth movement, has been widely blamed for a series of attacks on immigrant communities in Cote d'Ivoire's biggest city and de facto capital. In March 2004, Young Patriots stood shoulder to shoulder with the security forces to crush a banned opposition demonstration. For several nights after the protest, the homes of immigrants and suspected opposition supporters were terrorised by Gbabgo’s self-styled foot soldiers. Dozens of people were shot on their doorsteps or taken away and never seen again. UN human rights investigators concluded that at least 120 people had been killed in the crackdown. “It used to be that only the army was armed, but not anymore. Now there is a civilian army everywhere,” said Boukariy. “We are scared. Now you don’t know if your neighbour has a gun stashed,” he added. But Boukariy said he had no plans to join the 365,000 other Burkinabe migrants to Cote d'Ivoire who have already fled back to Burkina Faso. “Every country has its problems,”he philosophised. “When the war started, I saw people go. But peace will come.” “Anyway, I was born here. I only go to Burkina for holidays and then come back - how can I just go and live there?” A quarter of Cote d'Ivoire's 16 million people are believed to be immigrants from other West African countries, who came to seek their fortune in what was until recently the most prosperous nation in the region, or their descendants. But there is no longer so much forest to be cut down and turned into cocoa and coffee plantations as there once was and jobs in the big cities have become scarce. The immigrants' presence has therefore become increasingly resented by a large swathe of the local population. The civil war has only made things worse. Many of the immigrants are Muslims from Burkina Faso, Mali and Guinea who belong to the same ethnic groups as the rebel leaders in northern Cote d'Ivoire. Outbreaks of violence against immigrants and sporadic police raids are occasional hazards for the population of Gobele. But on a day-to-day basis, their hardest struggle is to find a job. No jobs to be had Justin Kossi was born in Benin. He came to Cote d’Ivoire in 1987 and like thousands of others he came looking for work. But things have taken a turn for the worse since the war broke out two and a half years ago.

No luck at job interview for Justin Kossi

“Only this very morning I went for a job working in the canteen of a big supermarket over in Riviera Golf," Kossi told IRIN. "They asked me if I was Ivorian, and when I said no, do you know what they replied? - 'Shame!'" Other Beninese men gathered around, muttering and nodding their agreement. They said everybody finds it hard to get work now that war has put a brake on Cote d'Ivoire's once-booming economy, but that for foreigners it is even harder. “I used to have a good job. I was a cook for a French man, a teacher at the French school,” said Kossi. “But when the war broke out, he left for France. I have been unemployed ever since.” But no matter how bad things get, few in Gobele can imagine beating a retreat to their distant "homeland." “I myself, I am a Nigerian,” said Balgum. “But I have never been there!”