The former President of the Ivorian Republic, Laurent Gbagbo, arrived Thursday, June 17, 2021 in Abidjan in the early evening, after ten years of absence from Côte d’Ivoire.

The plane from Brussels, a regular flight, landed at Félix Houphouët-Boigny airport in Abidjan at 4:15 pm

Three months after his final acquittal of crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court (ICC), Mr. Gbagbo returns, according to his relative, “without a spirit of revenge”, but to work for the policy of “national reconciliation” initiated by the government.

Laurent Gbagbo, born May 31, 1945 in Gagnoa, is an Ivorian historian, writer and statesman, President of the Republic from October 26, 2000 to April 11, 2011. Founder with his wife Simone of the left-wing party Front populaire ivoirien ( FPI), he is a historic opponent of Félix Houphouët-Boigny.

He refuses to leave power, which leads to a politico-military crisis lasting several months while his opponent’s victory is recognized by almost the entire international community. He was finally arrested on April 11, 2011.

Jailed at the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, he was acquitted in 2019

His opponents still believe that he threw his country into chaos by refusing his defeat to Alassane Ouattara in the 2010 presidential election. This refusal caused a serious post-election crisis, during which some 3,000 people were killed. It is for this violence that Mr. Gbagbo was arrested in April 2011, first detained in northern Côte d’Ivoire, then transferred at the end of 2011 to the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague.

In the wake of his acquittal and in the name of “national reconciliation” in a country bruised by political and ethnic violence for more than twenty years, Alassane Ouattara had given the green light to the return of Laurent Gbagbo, assuring that he would benefit from the benefits due to train presidents.

Source: Agence Ivoirienne de Presse