From Abidjan to Bed-Stuy: Reflections on Home, War and Like Ideals

The problems all started when President Boigny died, said Assita Calhoun. And then she dropped her head.

“Do you not want to talk about it?” I asked.

“No, it’s okay. I’m just angry, disappointed. And sad,” she said.

During those 30-plus years Felix Houphouet-Boigny was president of Cote d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast), people from the northern, southern, eastern and western regions -- everyone -- she said, got along fine.

The country’s capital, Abidjan, where Calhoun grew up, was clean and bustling; there were a lot of trees; almost all of the children attended school, she said.

“We were thriving. We were like the New York City of West Africa,” she insisted. “Ivory Coast was prosperous. All the artists, filmmakers... they came to Ivory Coast to make it before they went anywhere else.”

But all of that changed when Boigny died in 1993. His son, Konan Bedie, became the country’s temporary successor, but he refused to submit to a democratic election. He felt the post should be his, after his father held it for so many years.

Under Bedie, in just a few short years, the country spiraled into a recession and deteriorated. Citizens grew angry at losing so quickly the lifestyles they had become accustomed to living. And so began a decade-long game of presidential musical chairs via one coup d’etat after another.

One by one, Calhoun’s sisters moved away to Paris. But Calhoun chose the United States, settling in Brooklyn.  Eventually, she married, had children and opened a small business on Fulton Street in Bedford-Stuyvesant. She established for herself a life far removed from a time when she shared a small home with 6 brothers and sisters -- a place where obedience was expected at all times and discipline was swift.

But still, she says her life growing up in the Koumassy neighborhood of Abidjan, overall, was a happy one. Her family was considered middle-class. Her mother, from the Senoufo tribe, and her father, from Mandingo-Malenke tribe were a part of a prominent network of successful families.

Tradition was – and still is – a big deal in West African culture. Every elder, related or not, watched over you and disciplined you as though you were their own. Education was important. Children played like children. Little girls couldn’t wear pants and learned to cook and clean, while the boys learned to be the boss.

But that was twenty years ago. By 2002, Calhoun was well settled into her new life in Brooklyn. But she was getting homesick. She decided to take her two youngest children – ages 2 and 4 – to visit her beloved Ivory Coast, so they too could experience the fresh air, nature and familial support she received as a child.

“When I went there in 2002, from the airport to my house, I cried,” said Calhoun. “The view, the scenery, the lifestyle of the people, it just broke my heart. I did not recognize it, because it had deteriorated so bad.

“What I remembered and loved about the country most was all of the trees, the weather, the people and the fresh air,” said Calhoun. “When I returned, there were no trees standing, it was dirty and everyone in my village was exactly where I left them, except now everyone was poor and without jobs.”

Since Calhoun left and returned, Bedie had been overthrown by one of the rebel forces' leaders, General Guei. And Guei, according to Calhoun, also terribly mismanaged the country. A few more coups and five years year’s later, Laurent Gbagbo -- who originally had prepared but had been denied the chance to run against Bedie -- had emerged to lead a coup against then-President Guei.

Before long, it all became a swap of power that pitted one region of the country against the other: North against South, South against West, and then West against North again.

All the while that power is changing hands, so is the distribution of money, with each region rising and setting like the sun, favored according to which president was in power.

By the time Calhoun had returned with her two children 2002, General Guei was still the sitting president, and the country had spiraled into an unrecognizable state of disrepair.

“In Africa, it’s not like here, where everything is under control, especially money,” said Calhoun. “They get funds from European countries, or whatever, but those funds are not being controlled by any sort of treasury. In Africa, each president keeps the money for his family, and only his people get to have jobs.”

During her visit to Abidjan, Calhoun said she witnessed the worst corruption she has ever known. The city would turn off the water and electricity at random. Hunger had worsened, and safety had become a big issue:

“Before I left in 1993, our place and another family, like six houses down, were the only homes with lights in the front of our house,” said Calhoun. “Most families could not afford to have lights running through the night like that. But the city’s not going to do it for us. So we have to pay for our own lights to light the street.

“So When I returned to my neighborhood and saw that at around 6:00 pm, it was pitch-black, I cried. I thought, ‘So after we left, nobody was ever able to put lights in front of their house?’ It’s so dark there at night now, it’s scary.”

She continued, “In Plateau, the nicest region of Abidjan, you have to get out of there by 6:00, 7:00 at night. Because that’s when it starts getting dark, and the fake army people will start to pull you over on the bridge.

“They strip you down. Tell you to empty your pockets; sometimes they ask for your papers to your car. When you show them the papers, they claim the car is stolen,” she said. “They take your keys, and tell you to go to the precinct the next day and clear things up.

“They don’t give you their name, or a number, you don’t know who stopped you, so you say, ‘So if I go to the precinct tomorrow, who am I supposed to ask for?’ They yell, “What do you mean who are supposed to ask for? Just go to the precinct and claim for your car. Bring all the paperwork!'

"You will never see your car again” she said.

As fate would have it, two days before Calhoun was scheduled to return to the U.S., an all-out civil war broke out in Ivory Coast. Laurent Gbagbo had overthrown General Guei. He killed his entire family, and left them dead in the street, said Calhoun.

Calhoun and her family were forced to stay in the country an extra week while fighting continued. Eventually, they made it out.

For the past ten years since her last visit to the Ivory Coast, fighting continued. It escalated after last November’s election, when former President Gbagbo refused to cede power to the newly elected leader Alassane Ouattara.

Bloody communal and tribal fighting worsened in subsequent months until Gbagbo finally stepped down in earlier this month. Ouattara called for a cease-fire on Saturday.

Purportedly, after close to 20 years, the civil war in Ivory Coast has ended.

The International Committee of the Red Cross now estimates that the final death toll is around 2,000 since last November's election. But according to Calhoun, it’s far higher.

Her sister Rakiyah, who has been unable to leave the country because of problems with her birth certificate, says there are dead bodies and burned tires strewn throughout the street, and thousands of bodies that have gone unreported.

Calhoun is deeply saddened by what has come of her country, but she says she is happy with the life she has been able to build in here in America.

She adds that she has serious doubts she will ever return home. Her mother and four of her sisters are in Paris. One of her brothers has settled in Brooklyn. The other, in Chicago. Her father is also here with her in Bed-Stuy.

And her children? They know playstations and iPhones, Nicki Minaj and the Disney Channel. But they may never know the once beautiful, thriving country of their mother’s origin.

“How does it happen,” I asked, “in 2011, that a country can be prosperous for so long, set such a great example for so many years, and then suddenly, reverse everything it has built for itself?”

“Greed. And a thirst for power," she answered without hesitation. "If you think about it, the same thing is happening here in America, just not as extreme.

“Alassane’s people are from the North and Bgagbo’s people are from the South, so we just don’t get along,” she Calhoun, whose family is from the North. “It’s like, your man took over for all these years, and now we are here and you’re going to pay. It’s like a vendetta.”

“I mean, we’re all human beings. Why can’t we get along?” she said. “At the end of the day, we’re all the same people, and we all want the same things.”

"...All want the same things, yes..." For better. Or for worse.