"Electoral Desert' In Ivorian Opposition Heartland Daoukro

Daoukro, Ivory Coast, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 1st Nov, 2020 ) :Standing by a large tree trunk blockading the road,Ivorian student Bernard Kouadio was determined to halt any voting in his hometown Daoukro.

Makeshift barricades made of chairs, tree branches and crates quickly went up in the opposition stronghold during Saturday's presidential election, heeding a call for a boycott from opposition leaders.

"There is no election in Daoukro," Kouadio said.

Polling stations did not open in Daoukro, fiefdom of Henri Konan Bedie, the veteran leader who called for a boycott and civil disobedience against President Alassane Ouattara's attempt to run for a third term.

In power for ten years, Ouattara says a reform allows him to reset the two-term presidential limit and run again, angering the opposition who says his bid breaks with the constitution.

Clashes over the third term have killed at least 30 people since August, reviving fears over the kind of violence that left 3,000 dead during a post-election crisis a decade ago.

Protests broke out in Abidjan and opposition strongholds during Saturday's election, which the opposition leaders called a failure for Ouattara's re-election bid.

In Daoukro, young men manning the barricades came out early to stop the ballot.

"We don't want a third mandate," said Eugene Kouakou Kouadio, a cashew nut farmer also at the blockade, carrying a slingslot.

In Benanou, a village near Daoukro, not far from Bedie's residence, large tree trunks blocked the roadway leading to the town of Bocanda, 70 kilometres (45 miles) away.

Opposition youth blocked all access routes to Daoukro, a central town of around 70,000 inhabitants, effectively preventing the arrival of electoral material.

Economic activity was at a standstill, shops were closed, and no taxis were running.

Local officials were forced to reduce the number of polling stations, concentrating them on three sites, but they remained closed all day.

"There is an electoral desert. There is no vote in Daoukro or in all the neighbouring areas," said Jean Kouakou, activist for Bedie's PDCI party.

To prevent any clashes between rival ethnic communities who back competing sides in the election, 50 police and gendarmes were deployed on points of the main road that crosses the city from north to south.