The visit was short-lived. The former head of state of Benin and opponent, Thomas Boni Yayi, arrived Wednesday afternoon in Cotonou, after several months of exile. He had fled the country after the April legislature - ostensibly for health reasons - which plunged the West African country into a serious political crisis.
On its way down the afternoon of a plane chartered by the Nigerian Air Force, Boni Yayi, dressed in a big white boubou, was warmly welcomed by a hundred supporters, according to journalists from the United States. AFP on the spot.
He visited another opposition leader and former president, Nicéphore Soglo, and then went to the presidency.
"The president has expressed his wish to see our former president come back that nothing has forced him into exile and it is quite natural that he will receive it at his request," the press had earlier announced to the press. - Spokesman of the government, Alain Orounla, at the end of the council of ministers.
The spokesman had mentioned a "festive meeting between two great statesmen" to be held "in the coming hours".
An aborted meeting
However, the meeting did not finally take place: Boni Yayi chose not to participate in this meeting with President Patrice Talon.
On condition of anonymity, the entourage of Thomas Boni Yayi said that President Talon refused to receive an opposition delegation, the former head of state refused to see him.
According to one of his relatives interviewed by RFI, it is to avoid that we summarize the Benin crisis to a conflict between him and Patrice Talon. "The crisis is much deeper," says this close. "This is the future of Beninese democracy," he says.
The former head of state should be accompanied by a large delegation of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), implied for months in the resolution of the crisis in Benin.
An exile after the post-election violence
Boni Yayi was exiled after his home in Cotonou was surrounded for nearly two months by the police, following the disputed April 28 poll, whose opposition had been ruled out.
The ensuing crisis led to demonstrations and violence with a dozen gun deaths.
President Talon has since multiplied acts of appeasement such as the amnesty of the perpetrators of violence during the demonstrations, or the organization of a political dialogue to which the main opposition parties were not invited.
He has also passed a new Constitution limiting the number of terms to two "in the life" of a president while it previously limited the possibility of being a candidate more than twice in a row. Boni Yayi's entourage then denounced a measure designed to prevent the former president-in-exile from representing himself in the future.
The main demands of the opposition have not been met so far, namely the relaxation of new conditions for political parties to obtain legal recognition. This prevented Patrice Talon's main detractors from participating in the elections six months ago.
With AFP