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Last Tuesday, 28 of us flew North from Abidjan to Bamako, the capital of Mali on the river Niger. The Niger is a big river which runs all the way from Guinea through Mali, Niger and Nigeria. Bamako is much less developed than Abidjan in terms of infrastructure, but the SIL centre where most of us are staying is very nice and we’ve been made to feel very welcome by our colleagues and friends who usually live here. Today the three who made the long drive also arrived. There is just one member left in Abidjan. She is due to fly to Switzerland tomorrow.
Fortunately our flight on Tuesday left at 10am, so we went to the airport early. Things got rather ugly there later when some extremist protesters, angry at France for protecting the leader of an opposition party, tried to enter the French military base – next to the airport – and had to be dispersed with tear gas and water cannons! We are glad to be away for a while. I did speak to one of our employees at the office on Wednesday morning. All seems fairly calm there now and we hope and pray that the negotiations will lead to lasting peace.
We have been taking the opportunity to rest a bit from the stress of the last 6 weeks in Abidjan. Christopher and Emma however have even started at a new school. They and 6 others have joined a small missionary school just around the corner called Bamako Christian School. They will be following an American curriculum while there, their third different school system this year! Emma has to learn all the American States, the rest of the class had already learned 35 of the 50!
On Monday, we have some people coming from Germany and Nairobi to help us think through our options as individuals and as a group.
Here’s part of what I sent out to our international administration yesterday lunchtime:
Dear All,
This is to inform you that, this morning, I have taken the decision that all SIL members currently in Côte d’Ivoire should leave within the next 10 days. This decision is based on:
i) the consensus of our Embassies that "non-essential" personnel should leave as soon as possible.
ii) the unanimous view of our Field Crisis Management Committee
iii) general agreement among the SIL membership here
Our plan is to regroup in Bamako, Mali. Some will travel by scheduled flights, others in personal vehicles that will make the long overland trip East to Ghana, North to Burkina Faso and then West to Mali (probably at least a 3 day journey). A few will be leaving for other places due to other commitments.
At present the situation in Abidjan remains calm and we expect some of our employees to be able to keep certain essential services running from the Abidjan centre.
Thank you to everyone who has been providing so much support to us at this time. Please continue to pray for our dear national colleagues who will remain here and that peace will return to the whole country so that SIL’s work here can move forward once again.
Trusting the Lord for the future and for his glory,
Paul Shaddick
Acting Director
As you can probably imagine this wasn’t an easy decision. It was also hard to break the news to our employees yesterday afternoon. Soon after finishing our meeting with employees in Abidjan we learned that the rebels and the government had signed a ceasefire, which began at midnight last night. We are still convinced however that leaving is the right thing to do for the moment.
We will be flying, with most of our colleagues, on a scheduled flight to Bamako next Tuesday. We are hoping, if the situation continues to improve, to return to Abidjan in about a month.
Here is a summary of the current situation from our perspective here in Abidjan. Much of the information we have comes through local and international news reports via Radio, TV & the Web. These do not always agree, and few sources seem entirely reliable. Personal telephone contacts with national colleagues in other parts of the country sometimes give a different picture to what we hear through the media.
All SIL members are currently either in Abidjan or out of the country. We have not yet decided to evacuate as a group, but are doing all we can to be ready should this be necessary. Some other mission groups have left, but mainly those who had no real base of operations in Abidjan.
Rebels claimed an important victory on Sunday when they took over the town of Daloa. Yesterday, they said that they were no longer willing to talk about a ceasefire because the Ivorian government had brought in Angolan troops. Whilst some armoured vehicles did arrive from Angola only the rebels affirm that troops were also brought in. Last night loyalist forces regained control of Daloa, this was confirmed by personal contacts there this morning. This is the first significant victory for government forces since the quashing of rebel actions in Abidjan during the days immediately following the initial attacks on Sept 19th.
The situation in Bouaké is difficult for those who remain there. Many thousands of people have left due to a lack of food and security particularly following a brief government incursion into the city last week. We have been doing what we can to get help through to national colleagues and friends in rebel controlled regions.
We hope and pray that efforts towards negotiation will bear fruit and that somehow a longer-term solution will be found to the problems which have beset Ivory Coast over recent years.
We understand that there isn’t too much coverage in the British media of what is happening now in Côte d’Ivoire, so I’ll try to summarize how things have developed since our last message.
Life in Abidjan has mostly returned to normal, though with all our expatriate language workers here in Abidjan, our work is not proceeding at all as it would normally. We are mostly spending our time trying to get to grips with the current situation, where half the country is cut off from our offices in Abidjan. We are looking into what level of work can be maintained under the current circumstances and how best to minimize the impact on work and everyone’s lives in the event that we Westerners would leave. Some missions with little or no work in Abidjan have already left, but most are just waiting like us to see what develops next. A few of our SIL colleagues have left the country with our blessing for one reason or another.
The Ivorian government decided not to sign a ceasefire agreement last weekend, saying that they will not negotiate unless the rebels lay down their arms. The rebels, for their part, say they do not trust the government. Several government offensives seem not to have achieved their objective of dislodging rebels from the central city of Bouaké (pop. 500,000) and the northern city of Korhogo.
British and French media are out of favour with the government for giving voice to the rebels, so their FM transmitters have been put out of action. We can still listen on short-wave, but many don’t have that option or access to Internet reports. The Ivorian media who are willing to publish or broadcast paint a very different picture than what we hear from international sources.
The children have been back at school for the last ten days or so. We till have a curfew at night which limits social opportunities in the evenings. Everyone is feeling pretty worn out and stressed, though we are doing our best to keep some balance between work and family life.
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