THE post-electoral upsurge in violence in Côte d'Ivoire has ruined the former French colony's tourist trade. Already the Ibis, one of the four big hotels in Abidjan, the business and administrative capital, has been forced to close on account of a dearth of bookings. Another, the Novotel, is considering doing so after laying off half its staff. Those remaining are working part-time. A third has guests in only three of its rooms. But the 300-room Hotel du Golf on the palm-fringed Ebrié lagoon, a five-minute helicopter hop from the city centre, boasts the highest occupancy rate in west Africa—a steady 100% for the past three months. For it has become the redoubt of Alassane Ouattara, the UN-certified winner of November's presidential election, which Laurent Gbagbo continues to contest, insisting that he is still the president.

It is here that Mr Ouattara, his ministers and other staff are holed up, protected by some 800 UN blue-helmets. UN helicopters, which keep the hotel stocked with food and other supplies, are now the only way in and out of the hotel. All the access roads have been blocked by Gbagbo loyalists. It is a suffocating existence, but today everyone is happy. They believe the end to the crisis may be in sight. Mr Ouattara and Mr Gbagbo have been "invited" (read "summoned") to the Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa on Thursday (March 10th) by the African Union's Peace and Security Council. Mr Ouattara has already left. His aides claim to have it on good authority that the AU will formally proclaim him president and demand that Mr Gbagbo go—or else.

Or else what? No one is willing to say, or even knows. Given that Mr Gbagbo has so far refused calls by the UN and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to step down, he seems unlikely to do so now. He has refused to go to Addis Ababa. (As I write, a volley of gun-fire rings out from across the lagoon, near Abidjan's cultural centre, opposite my hotel—a reminder that all is not as peaceful as it sometimes seems, even in Abidjan's business and financial centre.) Mr Ouattara's aides claim that "more than 75%" of the army, supposedly still under Mr Gbagbo's control, have "defected" (presumably mentally, rather than actually physically) and that it is just a question of time before the Forces Nouvelles (FN), the former rebel forces now backing Mr Ouattara, descend from their stronghold in the mainly Muslim north and take Abidjan. Several towns in the west of the country, traditionally loyal to Mr Gbagbo, have already fallen in fierce fighting between government forces and the FN over the past few days.

Ivorians dispute whether the country is heading for a civil war or is already in the midst of one. The question may soon become academic if the "cash crunch" advances as rapidly as it seems to be doing. Mr Gbagbo's parallel "government" is already virtually bankrupt. Most of its funds are blocked in the central bank of the eight Central African Franc countries in Dakar, the Senegalese capital, which has cut off all relations with the Côte d'Ivoire. All the foreign banks in the country have likewise closed down their operations, stopping the funds of both the government and private individuals. It is no longer possible to make payments by cheque, bank transfer or credit card. Côte d'Ivoire become a cash-only economy and sooner or later that cash will run out.

On Monday, thousands of civil servants could be seen queuing under the hot sun at branches of the two state-owned banks that remain open, hoping to lay their hands on their February salaries, as Mr Gbagbo had promised. His government's official newspaper proclaimed proudly yesterday that 62% of the state's 100,000-plus employees had been able to do so. But what about the other 38%? How are they going to live? And what about this month's salaries? Who is going to pay them? Mr Gbagbo announced yesterday that he had "nationalised" the cocoa and coffee industries, the mainstays of the country's economy. It is an act of bravado, designed to calm the "ignorant masses", as snooty Ivorians refer to them. EU and US sanctions mean that European countries and America will not buy the stuff themselves nor are EU- or American-registered vessels allowed to carry it.

Mr Ouattara's call to his fellow citizens to starve Mr Gbagbo's government of funds by refusing to pay their taxes has become redundant. No one has the wherewithal to pay even if they wanted to. People are having shell out for their electricity and water in hard cash. Employers are unable to play their suppliers or their employees. Chemists and hospitals are beginning to run out of drugs for want of ready cash. The country's oil refinery has come to a virtual halt because sanctions are preventing crude from coming in. Most of the schools and universities are closed. For the moment, the open-air markets are full, but those too will be forced to close once the flow of cash dries up. Côte d'Ivoire is grinding to a halt as the two political protagonists, both with almost identical programmes, continue to slug it out.

It seems almost obscene, this battle for personal power, as hundreds die, with perhaps many more hundreds of deaths to come. Yet the principle is important. Too often in Africa, the incumbent Big Man has been allowed to cling on to power after being defeated in reasonably fair democratic elections. As Kofi Annan, a Ghanaian former UN secretary general said last month, if Mr Gbagbo is allowed to prevail, "elections as an instrument of peaceful political change in Africa will suffer a serious setback."

Read on: This is day two of a three-day diary. Continue on to day three, or return to day one.