Global Policy Forum

By Peter Murphy

Elections due in October in war-divided Ivory Coast are unlikely to happen until civil war factions make concrete concessions, despite the latest public agreement to stick to the deadline, diplomats said on Thursday.

U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan and several West African heads of state met leaders from both sides on Wednesday and coaxed from them a commitment to disarm government militias by July 31 in order to make the Oct. 30 elections date. But with less than four months to go, analysts say there is little hope free and fair polls can be organised in time.

"There is nothing new really. (U.N. and regional leaders) have no power to make elections happen. That is the problem and it has been for a long time," one Western diplomat said. "It all comes back to the Ivorians wanting peace and political actors being willing to compromise to make elections happen. Unless they are willing to do so, we are going to remain stuck," the diplomat said.

Annan met President Laurent Gbagbo and Guillaume Soro, leader of rebels who seized the country's northern half in a 2002/03 civil war which grew out of an attempt to topple Gbagbo. They set a July 31 deadline to disarm government militia in the cocoa-rich west after other dates passed in recent weeks, and said that electoral officials should be deployed nationally this month.

Despite several peace deals, mediators have repeatedly been frustrated by bickering over the details of plans to reunite the country -- creating a cycle of talks, deadlock, and more talks. But diplomats hope to keep up pressure on the main factions. "We want them to keep moving," said the Western diplomat.

A 7,000-strong U.N. peacekeeping mission backed up by 4,000 French troops keeps rebel and government sides apart. The latest U.N.-backed peace plan, announced last October, brought in a new prime minister with extra powers tasked with achieving disarmament and elections within 12 months. But at an African Union summit last weekend, Annan spoke of a possible technical delay but said it would need to be "very, very short" with polls taking place before the end of the year.

At Wednesday's meeting Annan said the question of whether Gbagbo would remain in office if elections failed to happen in October would be looked at if necessary at the time. Last October's deal extended his mandate by a year but Gbagbo says under the constitution he will stay in power until a successor is sworn in.

As well as the disarmament and reuniting the country, civil servants must deploy nationwide to prepare for the polls, and diplomats say that could be the most time-consuming hurdle left. Some civil servants, fearing for their safety, have been reluctant to return to the rebel zone.

"Deployment of people and setting up the electoral machine will take three or four months -- then registration of voters will take two to three months," one ambassador said. "Even Kofi Annan can't save the peace plan's deadline for elections in October. They won't have any choice other than to extend it."

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