Will power sharing work in Côte d'Ivoire? 10 critical questions.

Elections for the presidential run off took place in Côte d'Ivoire on Sunday the 28th of November. A curfew was set in place two days before. It is the 10th of November today. What the country has is double of what they voted for: 2 Presidents, 2 Prime Ministers, 2 Parallel governments and 2 electoral authorities. Add the curfew to all of that!

The doubles run deep. In the physical layout of the country itself, in its media, in the administration and within the population. Hardly can you see a neutral Ivorian on the street these days. The Twitter platform that was overtaken by the #civ2010 tweets is also running viral between two extremes. The "objective" tweets are getting rare.

So Mbeki has come and gone. The United Nations, the African Union, the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie, The Africa-Caribbean-Pacific organisation,the Economic Community of West African States and a host of international financial institutions have made their declarations and have all called for this or that.

Are issues getting sorted out? Is the situation seeing the end of the tunnel? Are the fuzzy areas getting cleared? I cannot say. What we have now is talk of a "unity government", a power sharing government or a national unified government.

For me, here are a few questions that are begging answers..

1. There have been instances in Zimbabwe and Kenya. Do we have an instance in Africa with the French-speaking countries?
2. Will the opinion of the voters/population count?
3. What arrangement will there be for the armed men (since women do not join the army in the country as of now)?
4. Will this power-sharing be facilitated? If yes, by who?
5. What will this mean for the electoral commission and the constitutional council? Will they share power too?
6. In the other elections that follow, if the same "presidential condition" arises, will power sharing also be the option?
7. Will this hasten or lengthen the peace process in the country or not?
8. Will the HIPC (Highly Indebted Poor Countries) debt cancellation come through?
   
9. Will this power-sharing become a trend in Africa, with the host of elections scheduled for the next years?
10. To whom will power ultimately be given to? Knowing fully well that in both power sharing instances, ultimate power finally came down to one of the parties.
    

Just asking...