Violence continues in Ivory Coast city Despite the arrest of strongman Gbagbo, some still are fighting … Shooting erupted in a sprawling Abidjan neighborhood where fighters loyal to Ivory Coast's arrested strongman Laurent Gbagbo have sought refuge, residents of the area said. The shooting appeared to be between residual forces of a pro-Gbagbo militia and forces that fought to install democratically elected President Alassane Ouattara, said two residents of Yopougon suburb that includes several ghettos of shacks as well as middle-class homes. The residents spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals. – AP
Dominant Social Theme: Gradually, the Ivory Coast returns to normal. The World Bank and the IMF will do everything in their power to make the Ivory Coast prosperous again.
Free-Market Analysis: Not long ago, the former president of the Ivory Coast, Laurent Gbagbo was forced out of the presidential residence at gunpoint. The new president, Alassane Ouattara is going to take up residence after repairs. That's about all that's clear right now. Most everything else is a muddle. But we would submit, nonetheless, that the Ivory Coast affair signals a turning point in the way the Anglo-American power elite is going about implementing its fear-based dominant social themes. That's why we've been covering the Ivory Coast so closely.
With its secrecy stripped away by literally millions of articles about its world-spanning plans, the British-based banking families and their corporate, religious and political facilitators have had to generate new kinds of fear-based strategies. And since people are not so easily panicked in the 21st century (as more truthful information is available) the elites have increasingly tried to use intimidation to implement their promotions. The problem with using intimidation is that it must WORK ALL THE TIME. There cannot be a single lapse. This is why every little incident now and for the foreseeable future will be increasingly magnified on the world stage. Gbagbo COULD NOT be allowed to stay in his bombed out presidential for fear that other African leaders would get ideas. Similarly, Gaddafi cannot be allowed to survive in Libya.
Yes, there will be setbacks, but the elite – apparently entering a new and more combative phase of one-world implementation – is not about to bow to what may be inevitable. It cannot surrender even a little and will not until the logic of the New Enlightenment and the mass of seven billion souls forces it to take a step back. It's happened before, most evidently and obviously when the Gutenberg press was in its heyday, with the new information available in printed books setting the world aflame.
Sooner or later the Internet may have its way, but the elites will stave that off as long as possible. They will continue to wield the weapon of their dominant social themes, the fear-based promotions used to frighten middle classes into giving up power and wealth to global institutions that are then leveraged to further erect one-world government.
In the case of the Ivory Coast, two kinds of memes are operating at once. For public consumption, worldwide, there is the theme that Laurent Gbagbo was a thuggish strongman who need to be taken out at gunpoint so that democracy could be restored to the long-suffering people of the Ivory Coast. The second message, the one we have been tracking more closely because it is in our view of the utmost importance within the context of the elite's onrushing potential global governance.
This message is that the UN itself, and thus the West, will determine election results in Africa (and perhaps worldwide) and that losers will be removed by force if they attempt to complain or even if they have good reason to doubt the UN's judgment. What the UN says, goes. Not only that, but the losers, if they do complain, stand a good chance of being hauled before an "international" court at The Hague.
Thus it turns out that the entire mechanism of the new international legal system aimed at bringing to justice those who commit "crimes against humanity" is just one more weary way for the City of London in particular (where the wealthiest and most powerful banking families are apparently ensconced) to project its power worldwide.
This latest strategy was prepared back in 2005 when in a very quiet vote (considering the import) the Security Council abrogated the 400-year-old Treaty of Westphalia, which recognized the sovereignty of nations. In its place, the Council subsisted R2P, which demands that the UN and its member nations protect citizens from their own governments if there is danger that those governments are becoming genocidal or even just overly violent (whatever that means). This basically gives free reign to the Anglosphere elite (which controls the UN) to overthrow governments where they wish, and to bring to bear international forces to do so.
That was the message of Gbagbo's removal, one aimed at African leaders throughout the Continent. The message couldn't be clearer. The Anglosphere intends to choose – or at least influence the choice of – Africa's leaders in the over 30 upcoming elections that will soon be taking place. In fact, intimidation does work in the short term. Many leaders have fallen in line decrying Gbagbo's behavior and stating that he should never have defied the UN.
In fact, this doesn't make any sense logically. Gbagbo had reason to believe the vote was fraudulent and what passes for the country's Supreme Court backed him up and threw out a number of Ouattara votes. At this point UN observers probably should have called for a new election or for further investigations. Instead, they simply ignored the Ivory Coast constitutional system and declared Ouattara the victor. This was what set off the violence and turned Gbagbo from a grudging participant in supervised elections into a resentful non-participant.
Of course the issues go deeper than that. While we do not claim any special insight into the Ivory Coast or Africa's larger problems (we merely follow elite dominant social themes where they lead us) an article just posted at Global Research by Dr. Kwame Osei entitled "Ivory Coast Uncovered – The Untold Story" sheds a good deal more light on what is taking place.
According to Dr. Kwame Osei The REAL issue behind the current impasse in the Ivory Coast "is a battle relating to French imperialism and control of the Ivory Coast." (Why are we not surprised?) Dr. Osei explains that Gbagbo was actually known throughout Africa as someone who stood against French imperialism and championed Pan-Afrikanism. Ouattara, he claims, is seen as an individual who is sympathetic to French business interests in in the region.
Dr. Osei traces the current conflict back to the "Afrikan" liberation movement that shook Francophone countries such as Ghana and the Ivory Coast. French president Charles De Gaulle demanded that in return for independence, French dominated African countries would have to give up 90% of ALL their revenue to the French Treasury in perpetuity. Additionally, he insisted that the currencies of Francophone countries must be linked to the then French franc so that French companies would have easy convertibility and an advantage generally when it came to business in the area. Francophone countries in Africa, Dr. Osei reminds us, "have huge mineral resources like enriched uranium, gold, diamonds, bauxite, chrome, oil and gas that are crucial for French industry."
The countries and their leaders, eager for independence, eventually agreed to the French terms. The result? African "independent" Francophone states were "forever enslaved to French economic interests." Gbagbo, a professor of history, was determined to reverse this state of affairs according Dr. Osei. He also intended to nationalize key industries, which would have removed them from French control.
While it is not clear how much of Gbagbo's agenda was carried out in the Ivory Coast, presumably if Gbagbo had won a UN sanctioned election, his ability to continue and expand his "Ivorian" efforts would have been considerably facilitated with increased credibility. The French were also aware Dr. Osei writes, that were Gbagbo's efforts to bear more fruit, they would have an increasingly powerful impact on French business interests throughout Africa. "[Such African] economic emancipation … would send the French economy into permanent recession since the massive revenue that Paris receives to fund its social and economic programmes would no longer be available."
Dr. Osei concludes with the following observation: "The question one must ask is why are the French supporting Ouattara. Well, Ouattara is a former employee of the IMF/World Bank, is western educated and trained and therefore is seen as a safe pair of hands by the French and their western cousins'. When as it appears that Mr. Ouattara assumes overall control of the country it will mean that French and western imperialism has won the day and Ivorian and Afrikan economic emancipation been dealt a severe blow."
As we have indicated, the power elite has likely traded fear for intimidation, but intimidation is a clumsy force that invites confrontation. In the Ivory Coast, we can see the pushback beginning even now. Gbagbo refused to play his part, and thus a million Ivorians were displaced, thousands murders and rapes took place ….
Now panic is setting in. French President Nicolas Sarkozy is withdrawing half his troops and most of his heavy military equipment. The UN Security Council after firmly rejecting Gbagbo's demands for a unity government has done an about-face and is now urging "an all-inclusive government" as we reported just the other day. There are more signs. The Khaleej Times Online reports on a bizarre press conference held by United Nations peacekeeping chief Alain Le Roy who on Friday "denied that UN troops were used to achieve regime change in Ivory Coast where international forces knocked out weapons used by deposed strongman Laurent Gbagbo."
According to Le Roy, the attacks mounted on Gbagbo presidential stronghold were made to protect Ivorians against the use of heavy weapons. "The trigger for the intervention was the fact that these heavy weapons were used repeatedly by the Gbagbo forces against the civilian population, against us and against President Ouattara," Le Roy told a press conference. "I can't understand how he did that. He knew that we were going to retaliate."
Le Roy even accused Gbagbo of bad tactics, saying that Ouattara had been smarter than Gbagbo because he hadn't used heavy weapons and thus had not drawn the wrath of the UN. Le Roy added, "Our intention was not any kind of regime change. That is not our mandate, our mandate is to target the heavy weapons … I agree it is clear that the forces loyal to President Ouattara took advantage of that and attacked the residence. But who triggered our intervention? It was not our wish to make regime change."
This is really remarkable "spinning." When Gbagbo was finally pried out of the presidential palace, there were plenty of reports of a large column of French and UN soldiers complete with tanks, artillery, etc. headed toward the presidential palace. And when Gbagbo was finally removed, there were plenty of eyewitness accounts claiming that the French had done the deed directly with UN backup. Ouattarra's forces were nowhere to be seen until Gbagbo was furtively handed off to them and the digital videotaping began. Now there are surely signs that the pacification of the Ivory Coast is not going as planned. The weird UN statements are just part of the evidence. Here's what Ouattara has to contend with:
Yopougon residents say they have been assailed by forces loyal to Ouattara, who on Wednesday went house to house searching for former soldiers, whom they shot and killed. On Thursday, residents said the pro-Ouattara forces were shooting into the air to frighten people into fleeing, and then pillaging their homes and shops. Abidjan had been a city under siege as pro-Gbagbo forces took a last stand and turned heavy weapons on civilians in their fight to keep in power the man who has governed since 2000, delayed elections for five years and then refused to accept his defeat in November balloting.
Thousands of people have been killed and wounded, the International Federation of the Red Cross has said. On Saturday, residents of Adjame neighborhood burned bodies and trash in a cleanup effort. An AP photographer saw two bodies, and residents said there were other bodies in a huge pile of flaming trash. "There are too many bodies to count," one resident said, when asked how many bodies had been burned.
Ouattara is planning on putting Gbagbo and certain aides and accomplices on trial for "blood crimes." Already, the UN is downplaying reports (all available on the Internet) of massacres by Ouattara's forces. The IMF intends to pour money into the Ivory Coast and the World Bank stands ready to do the same. (The larger spinning has begun as well. As we were editing this article, we came across a just-posted New York Times article – French Colonial Past Casts Long Shadow Over Policy in Africa – explaining the long-term history of the Ivorian conflict and providing a context that diminishes the purported coup and Sarkozy's involvement. We urge those who are interested to look up the article on the Internet and compare it to Dr. Osei's version, above.)
And yet … Abidjan is the Christian stronghold of Gbagbo's Ivorian revolution. Ouattara's forces raped and murdered their way down the Ivorian coast toward Abidjan, facilitated by UN and French troops, and then descended on Abidjan proper like a plague. Now disaffected Gbagbo soldiers (admittedly there have been atrocities on both sides) are spread throughout Abidjan, the capital of the Ivory Coast along with weapons caches. The populace, mostly Christian, is apt to support and shelter the non-uniformed soldiers that are their brothers, husbands and sons.
We may be reading this wrong, but we have a feeling it will be a long time before "sporadic shooting" truly ceases in Abidjan. We might even venture to suggest that the civil war that Western media is reporting is over now that Ouattara has placed his steady hand on the tiller of state is NOT over and may even be gathering strength. In the 21st century, when the Anglo-American powers shove in one direction as often as not others shove back. This is another issue the elites have yet to resolve, ambitious as they are.
In the strange saga of the little Ivory Coast we believe we are seeing a new and naked tactic of the elite – raw power politics intended to provide a warning to similar parties. This, however, may be directly related to the power-elite's inability to credibly implement its dominant social themes. Now they cannot afford to lose even once. They must present themselves as infallible. Taking over the world, seemingly their intention, was always going to be a big task. In our view, with these new and more violent tactics, they are making it even harder.
