Former President Jacques Joaquim Yhombi Opango, who ruled Congo-Brazzaville between 1977 and 1979, died Monday in France of the Covid-19 at the age of 81, his family told AFP.
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“My father, former president Yhombi Opango, died on Monday afternoon at the American hospital in Neuilly-sur-Seine near Paris. He was a victim of the Coronavirus, "his son, Jean-Jacques Yhombi Opango, told AFP on the phone. Public television, Télé-Congo, confirmed the information in its evening newspaper at 8:00 p.m. (7:00 p.m. GMT).
His state of health had deteriorated in recent times, forcing him to live far from the Congo, in France in particular, according to his family.
Two years in power, ten years in exile
Originally from the Basin (north), Jacques Joachim Yhombi Opango was born in 1939. This officer had been brought to the head of the country just after the assassination of President Marien Ngouabi (1968-1977), at the time when the ex - French colony was aligned with the Soviet Union.
He would only run the country for two years before being ousted by President Denis Sassou Nguesso, from the same region as him, who had accumulated 35 years of power since then, with a five-year break between 1992 and 1997. Imprisoned after his ouster, Mr. Yhombi Opango was released shortly before the 1991 national conference which opened the country to a multi-party system.
He then founded the Rally for Democracy and Development (RDD). Unhappy candidate for the presidential election of 1992, he joined forces with the elected president Pascal Lissouba of which he became Prime Minister between 1994 and 1996.
He went into exile in France when the civil war broke out in 1997 which allowed President Sassou Nguesso to return to business with the help of Angolan troops. His exile ended in 2007 and since then he has lived on horseback between France and the Congo.