Hundreds of demonstrators brought Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, to a halt on Monday with protests at a call by an international United Nations-mandated group for Parliament to be wound up following the end of its term last month.
Agence France-Presse correspondents saw barricades, manned mainly by youths, erected across streets in every district of the divided West African country’s economic capital, preventing any traffic from moving.
An estimated 1Â 000 people gathered outside the headquarters of the UN peacekeeping force, where police fired tear-gas grenades to disperse them.
Demonstrators included members of the fanatical pro-Laurent Gbagbo group known as the Patriots, saying that if Parliament’s fate were decided today, it could be the turn of the armed forces chief or the president.
Dozens of young college and secondary-school students manned barricades constructed out of burning tyres and trees felled to block roads, but police kept a relatively low profile, though street demonstrations have been banned in Abidjan for a year.
Schools and shops closed, while the streets of the Plateau business district, where young Patriots marched chanting ”Accept the authority of Gbagbo”, were deserted as employees abandoned efforts to get to work.
The protests followed rejection by the pro-Gbagbo press of the weekend move by the international working group tasked with overseeing the enforcement of a UN Security Council resolution aimed at restoring stability in Côte d’Ivoire and ensuring presidential elections by October.
Analysts saw the working group’s action as a bid to strengthen the authority of the transitional government of Prime Minister Charles Konan Banny and ensure that hostile deputies do not block attempts to implement the peace process, as happened last year.
Parliament’s five-year mandate expired on December 16, but the country’s Constitutional Council extended it at Gbagbo’s request.
The extension also had the backing of the four major groups — including opposition coalition parties — in the 223-seat chamber, which was elected in a disputed 2000 poll and provides key support for Gbagbo.
The working group comprises Benin, Britain, France, Ghana, Nigeria, South Africa, the United States, the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, the European Union, the African Union and the Economic Community of West African States.
A statement issued late on Sunday after a meeting of the group in Abidjan said that after consultations with all Ivorian parties it had concluded that the parliamentary term should not be extended.
It recommended that Banny, in consultation with Gbagbo, use the experience of various deputies to give them specific missions to achieve reconciliation in the country, which has been divided since a 2002 attempt to topple the president.
Nigerian Foreign Minister Oluyemi Ademijin said he hoped that Banny and Gbagbo would understand that the working group had acted ”in a spirit of reconciliation”.
Deputies of Gbagbo’s party had earlier warned the working group against any attempt to remodel Parliament, notably by bringing in the rebel New Forces that hold the north of the country, and the opposition Rally of Republicans, which boycotted the 2000 elections.
The working group also laid out a ”road map” for Banny, with a timetable of stages leading to the presidential elections, including the disarmament of opposing forces, restoring state administration and registering voters.
The group urged the beefing up of the UN presence in Côte d’Ivoire, in line with a recent call by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan for the temporary deployment of 3 400 extra troops and 475 police officers to add to the about 7 000 troops already on the ground.
The Security Council acted in October after peace attempts in Africa’s largest cocoa-producer and regional economic powerhouse collapsed amid intransigence on both sides and Gbagbo’s term expired.
With no progress made towards organising new presidential elections and Gbagbo refusing to step down, the UN gave the president another year in office but insisted on a prime minister acceptable to all sides.
Banny formed a new government in December, comprising supporters of Gbagbo, his political opponents and the rebels. — Sapa-AFP