Working environment
Côte d’Ivoire is host to some 700,000 persons at risk of statelessness; 270,650 returnees, of whom 198,610 returned spontaneously and 72,040 were assisted by UNHCR; and 1,810 refugees in a protracted situation. Party to the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees, its 1967 Protocol and the 1969 OAU Convention Governing the Specific Aspects of Refugee Problems in Africa, Côte d’Ivoire’s constitution underscores the granting of asylum in accordance with international standards. While the draft national asylum law is yet to be validated, the refugee determination process, embedded in the organization and the responsibilities of the Directorate for Aid and Assistance to Refugees and Stateless people, is carried out by a National Eligibility Commission and an Appeal Board. After a tripartite agreement was signed between the Ivorian Government and the main host countries, a regional conference on voluntary repatriation and reintegration being hosted in Abidjan in November 2018 to discuss the facilitation of a safe and dignified return for Ivorian refugees. This was followed by a shift from facilitated to promoted repatriation and the adoption of a roadmap for the return and reintegration of the residual Ivorian caseload. Finally, about statelessness, Côte d’Ivoire has acceded to the two international conventions on statelessness and adopted the Abidjan Declaration and the Banjul Regional Action Plan to eradicate statelessness. The current Government has demonstrated its commitment to fight against statelessness, but it is yet to adopt the national action plan to eradicate statelessness and domesticate the conventions to render them operable and enforceable. A presidential election is scheduled to take place in 2020.
Key priorities
Prevention and reduction of statelessness remains a strategic priority for UNHCR in 2020. The search for durable solutions for refugees and returnees will remain a primary concern in 2020 and beyond. To this end, UNHCR, based on its multi-year strategy to eradicate statelessness in Côte d’Ivoire, will continue underscoring the legal and administrative causes of statelessness and initiate concrete actions to address them. The durable reintegration of returnees and the local integration of protracted refugees will be supported by a multi-faceted approach combining community-based participation and increasing involvement of government and development actors, including financial and technical partners such as the World Bank and the African Development Bank.
In 2020, UNHCR will:
- coordinate and support activities that reduce and prevent statelessness, and protect and identify stateless persons;
- advocate the adoption of a national action plan to eradicate statelessness and the creation of a statelessness determination procedure;
- support the repatriation of Ivorian refugees hosted in neighbouring countries, in accordance with the Ivory Coast’s roadmap for return and reintegration;
- continue implementing an incremental exit and complete handover of the refugee and returnee assistance programme to Ivorian authorities.