EU gives 7 mn euros to aid 'peaceful' ICoast poll

The European Union unveiled a seven-million-euro budget Thursday to facilitate "credible and peaceful" elections in Ivory Coast, seven months before presidential elections in a country that has endured several electoral crises.

"One of the objectives is to strengthen the confidence of the population" in the electoral system, said EU ambassador to the country, Francesca di Mauro, Thursday.

"The EU has neither the vocation nor the will to replace the Ivorian authorities, nor to influence the process or the results," she stressed.

"It backs only one candidate: social cohesion."

Sourou Kone, the first vice-president of the Independent Electoral Commission, organising the polls, expressed hope the partnership would allow for "successful" elections, via "transparent and peaceful" polls.

The money is mainly aimed at encouraging young people to vote by raising their awareness of the importance of "the holding of credible, peaceful and participatory elections".

The programme also hopes to deploy 700 observers for the October 25 presidential vote and the 2026 legislative elections and to support institutions organising the polls.

It has also identified 15 localities deemed "at risk" that are earmarked for more community support.

In 2010-11, post-election violence in Ivory Coast left some 3,000 dead after the current president, Alassane Ouattara, defeated the then incumbent Laurent Gbagbo.

He refused to concede defeat after a highly controversial vote.

In 2020, at least 85 people were killed in violence on the margins of an election in which Ouattara won a third term.

Ouattara, 83, who has been in power since 2011, has not yet said whether he plans to run for a fourth term.

But some observers fear that attempts to prevent some opposition candidates from running could lead to more violence.

Gbagbo is among those to have declared his candidacy, but the authorities have ruled that he is ineligible. They have struck him from the electoral roll following a criminal conviction against him following the 2010 post-election violence.

On Monday, the electoral commission is due to publish the provisional voters' list, which is expected to include around nine million voters in the country of 29 million people, nearly half of whom are minors.

The opposition is demanding this list be revised before October's presidential election.