Apathy and unease ahead of Ivory Coast’s polls after protests in Abidjan

Ahead of Ivory Coast’s Saturday election, there is an air of apathy in Abidjan’s Blockhauss neighborhood, where hundreds of protesters were arrested and several wounded during protests earlier this month.

Security forces launched tear gas at demonstrators during the protest, which authorities claimed was illegal as they had banned political marches days earlier.

Elections in Ivory Coast have often been fraught with tension and violence, but despite October’s protests, this year has been relatively calm.

In a barbershop in the neighborhood, Pierre Kouame said the entire neighborhood was affected by October’s violence, with tear gas entering several homes and police beating down his relatives' doors in search of protesters.

He said despite not taking part in the march, he was caught up in the clashes.

“They took me, they started to beat me, they put me in their car, they said it's us who throw stones, it's us who do (bad things), it's us, it's us, what do we do? I didn't do anything,” he said.

He deplored the response from security forces and said it should have been handled differently.

As he cut Kouame’s hair, barber Aristide N’zebo said he hoped that the election would pass peacefully because tensions have slowed things down economically for the neighborhood.

“For some time now, given the situation in the country, things haven't been moving too much. Things have become a bit slow, and when things get slow, everything gets expensive again, he said.

“So we aren’t doing too well.”

He said he had faith that the election would go on without problems, and was looking forward to things getting back to normal.

Local orange seller Awa Diarra said whoever wins the election, she is only interested in peace.

“We only want peace. That's all. So that everyone can go about their business. Peace. That's all we ask for.”

Ivory Coast saw intense violence following the 2010 election, when Laurent Gbagbo refused to concede defeat. About 3,000 people were killed in the unrest.