April 2011 post-electoral crisis saw French and UN helicopters fire upon military camps and the Presidential Palace of Ivory Coast President Laurent Gbagbo to remove him from office and install his rival Alassane Ouattara. As with all such Western interventions, the operation was said to be an effort to stop attacks on civilians.

Today, ten years later the country is experiencing another violent crisis in the wake of the upcoming October 31, 2020 presidential election. Incumbent President Alassane Ouattara is preparing to run for a third presidential term, in violation of the constitutional limit of two 5-year terms. Additionally, the Ouattara government has been denying former president Gbagbo his right to return to the country and to be issued a regular passport, even though the International Criminal Court has acquitted him of all indictments.

A united front of Ivorian opposition parties and civil society are mobilizing protests in the streets to claim freedom from the current Ouattara government and the yoke of French neo-colonialism. The country’s armed forces and militiamen have been cracking down on the protests, killing more than 40 people and hundreds have been kidnapped and arrested. Parallel conditions are taking place with Ouattara’s France-backed counterpart in Guinea, Alpha Conde.

You’re invited to an in-depth briefing that will unpack classic media blind spots where the youth are protesting police brutality; there is people’s power movement in Mali, Guinea, and in the Ivory Coast. This will be a virtual event co-sponsored by the Institute for Policy Studies, and Convention for Pan-Africanism and Progress (CPP).

Speakers:
• Gnaka Lagoke, Convention for Pan-Africanism and Progress (Ivory Coast)
• Aissatou Biro Diallo, Founder of Pan-African Movement of Democratic Women (Guinea)
• Sidy Danioko, Activist, PhD in Computational and Data Science (Mali)

This is a virtual Zoom event, register here.