Is Ivory Coast’s red card politics an own goal for democracy after Tidjane Thiam’s ban

Even a stellar worldwide enterprise profession can not put together you for the onerous realities of politics in Ivory Coast, the place some are questioning the democratic credentials of the West African nation most well-known for being the producer of a lot of the world’s cocoa and a few of its most interesting footballers.

That’s the painful lesson Tidjane Thiam is studying as he waits to see whether or not deal-making within the corridors of energy and standard stress from the road can rescue his bid to turn out to be president of Ivory Coast.

Seemingly relentless progress in the direction of the election set for this October got here to a juddering halt on 22 April when a choose dominated that the 62-year-old had misplaced his Ivorian citizenship by taking French nationality a long time beforehand and never revoking it till too late to qualify for this yr’s vote.

Transferring again to Ivory Coast in 2022 after greater than 20 years in world finance, Thiam had instantly been seen as a possible contender to succeed present head of state Alassane Ouattara who, at 83, is now within the closing yr of his third time period of workplace.

A scion of a standard noble household and an excellent nephew of the nation’s revered founding President, Félix Houphouët-Boigny, he had impressed as a prime authorities official and minister within the Nineteen Nineties, overseeing infrastructure growth and radical financial reforms.

A army coup then pushed Thiam to hunt a recent profession overseas, which culminated in high-profile stints as chief govt of UK insurance coverage large Prudential after which the banking group Credit score Suisse.

However returning residence finally, three years in the past, he launched into a gentle advance in the direction of the following Ivorian presidential election.

After the loss of life in 2023 of former President Henri Konan Bédié, long-serving chief of the opposition Democratic Occasion of Ivory Coast (PDCI), Thiam was completely positioned to take his place after which on 17 April this yr he was chosen because the occasion’s candidate for the upcoming presidential race.

That was no assure of victory, and particularly if – as appears fairly believable Ouattara opts to run for a fourth time period, backed by all of the belongings and benefits of incumbency and a observe report of 4 successive years of annual financial development above 6%.

Nonetheless, Thiam stood out because the prime various.

As an opponent of the ruling Rally of Houphouëtists for Democracy and Peace (RHDP), he provided Ivorian voters the prospect to alter their authorities.

But together with his centrist politics and strong technocratic credentials, his candidacy provided reassuring competence and the prospect of continuous the spectacular financial progress that Ouattara has piloted since 2011.

Now that potential trajectory is blocked. If the court docket resolution stands – and Ivorian regulation gives no possibility of enchantment for this specific situation – Thiam will probably be out of October’s contest.

It’s a race from which previous court docket convictions have already excluded three different distinguished opposition figures – former President Laurent Gbagbo, former Prime Minister Guillaume Soro and a former minister, Charles Blé Goudé – all central actors within the political crises and civil conflicts that brutally paralysed the progress of Ivory Coast between 1999 and 2011.

The prospect now could be that Ouattara or any chosen RHDP successor candidate will strategy the election with out going through any heavyweight political problem.

That may solely deepen Ivorians’ already widespread standard disillusionment with the nation’s political institution.

That is in opposition to the broader context of a West Africa the place the novel anti-politics rhetoric of the troopers who’ve seized energy in Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger already finds a sympathetic viewers amongst many disenchanted younger folks.

That basically issues in societies the place, usually, three-quarters of the inhabitants is underneath 35.

Amidst this disaster for West African democracy, there have been some moments of encouragement.

In Liberia in 2023 and in Senegal and Ghana last year, incumbent governments have been voted out, in free and honest elections whose outcomes have been accepted by all contestants with out argument.

The Senegalese consequence, specifically, owed much to the massive enthusiastic mobilisation of young people.

Many hoped that Ivory Coast might provide an extra optimistic instance of democratic alternative and the provide of change, and an instance that is likely to be all of the extra influential as a result of the nation is a affluent regional powerhouse.

It’s the financial engine of the CFA franc single forex bloc and moreover the cocoa trade, it is usually a key hub for enterprise companies and finance and a number one political voice within the regional grouping, the Financial Group of West African States (Ecowas).

What occurs in Ivory Coast actually issues and is broadly observed, throughout West Africa and certainly, additionally proper throughout francophone Africa extra typically.

Ouattara is without doubt one of the continent’s most distinguished statesmen, commanding broad respect internationally too.

And but now the run-up to the nation’s essential subsequent presidential election has turn out to be ensnared in a return model of the id politics that so soured the bitter disputes and instability of the Nineteen Nineties and 2000s.

Again then, the governments of first Bédié after which Gbagbo used the contentious “ivoirité”, which means “Ivorian-ness” regulation to close Ouattara out of standing for the presidency on the grounds that his household allegedly had international origins.

It was solely in 2007 that the federal government scrapped the ban on his candidacy and solely in 2016 – when he was already in workplace – {that a} new structure finally ended the requirement that the acknowledged mother and father of presidential candidates be native-born Ivorians.

The toxic mobilisation of id points had been a significant contributing issue to the civil wars, road violence and northern separatist partition that brutally scarred Ivory Coast for greater than a decade, as much as 2011, at a price of hundreds of lives.

In the present day the nation feels removed from such large-scale battle.

There isn’t a standard urge for food for a return to confrontation and politicians are staying nicely away from the incendiary rhetoric of the previous.

However the Thiam saga reveals how id points, even in a extra legalistic type and on this hopefully extra peaceable period, can nonetheless weigh closely.

Ivory Coast solely permits twin nationality underneath sure restricted situations.

So in its 22 April ruling, an Abidjan court docket declared that, underneath the phrases of a little-used post-independence regulation, Thiam had routinely misplaced his Ivorian citizenship nearly 4 a long time in the past when he acquired French nationality – after a number of years’ examine in Paris.

Though he formally surrendered that this February, and thus routinely recovered his unique citizenship, this was too late for inclusion on this yr’s register of eligible voters or candidates.

In useless, his attorneys had argued that, by way of his father, Thiam had French nationality from start – which, if accepted, would exempt him from the twin nationality ban.

Searching for to focus on the absurdity and inconsistencies of the scenario, he argued that, logically, the nation ought to now hand again its prized 2024 Africa Cup of Nations soccer title as a result of most of the gamers even have French nationality.

“If we apply the regulation the way in which [that] they simply utilized it to me, we’ve got to present the cup again to Nigeria – as a result of half of the workforce was not Ivorian,” he told the BBC.

And Thursday might convey one more setback in a scheduled court docket listening to the place a choose could now rule that Thiam can not, as a non-national, lead the PDCI.

The previous two weeks have seen persevering with political and authorized debate over this complete saga, with the Thiam camp hoping {that a} mixture of standard stress and discreet political negotiation will result in a compromise that lets him again into the presidential race, maybe together with the opposite excluded contenders.

And Ouattara, ought to he selected to not run, would possibly wish to safeguard his spectacular observe report and safe his worldwide repute by intervening with some form of deal that permits Thiam to run.

With months to go earlier than the polls, there may be nonetheless time for that. However no-one is relying on it.

Paul Melly is a consulting fellow with the Africa Programme at Chatham Home in London.