Laurent Gbagbo
“agrees to be the candidate of the PPA-CI (African Peoples’ Party – Ivory Coast) in the 2025 presidential election”
, announced his political party after a meeting of its central committee .
The former president of Côte d'Ivoire (2000-2011) is however ineligible.
Acquitted by international justice of crimes against humanity committed during the bloody post-electoral crisis of 2010-2011, Laurent Gbagbo was sentenced in 2018 in his country to 20 years in prison for the
“robbery”
of the Central Bank of West African States (BCEAO) in 2011.
He was pardoned in 2022 by current President Alassane Ouattara, but not amnestied.
If pardon allows the convicted person not to have to serve his sentence, it does not cancel it unlike amnesty.
And a convicted person cannot run for office.
The PPA-CI says it is planning an
“extraordinary congress for the formal designation”
of Laurent Gbagbo as candidate and announces that the
party’s
“priority” is
“now given to the presidential election and other electoral deadlines of 2025”
.
Read alsoThe return of Laurent Gbagbo ten years after his fall puts Ivory Coast under tension
He also wishes to obtain
“the re-registration of the name”
of Laurent Gbagbo on the electoral list.
The conviction handed down in 2018 resulted in the forfeiture of the former president's civil and political rights and therefore his removal from the electoral rolls.
He was unable to vote in the last municipal and regional elections in September, during which his party failed to win and of which he contested the results.
For its part, the Democratic Party of Côte d'Ivoire (PDCI), the leading opposition party, elected a new president, Tidjane Thiam, in December.
Neither he nor Alassane Ouattara have commented on their possible candidacy for the presidential election.