By RFIPosted on 06-01-2020Modified on 06-01-2020 at 20:17

It is one of the most famous "comzones" of the Ivorian rebellion between 2002 and 2011. Colonel-major Issiaka Ouattara, aka Wattao, died on the night of Sunday to Monday January 6 in New York where he had been treated for three weeks for diabetes. He was 52 years old.

Born in 1967 into a poor family in the far northeast of the country, little Issiaka Ouattara left school in 5th grade. He joined the army very early on, where a Japanese judo teacher, unable to pronounce his name correctly, Ouattara, called him " Wattao ". The nickname will remain with him.

At the end of the 1990s, Wattao was in the close guard of the putschist general Robert Gueï . It was at this time that he met Guillaume Soro with whom he remained close. Robert Gueï, who then suspected him of plotting against him, had him arrested and tortured. Wattao manages to escape and go into exile in Burkina.

In 2002, he participated in the attempted coup against Gbagbo and fell back on Bouaké, of which he became one of the masters. For nine years, Wattao gained importance in the New Forces and enriched himself.

In 2011, after the election of Ouattara, he was appointed second in command of the Republican Guard, then of the Coordination Center for Decision-Making Operations (CCDO). At that time, the media officer, always smiling, willingly displayed his immoderate taste for sports cars and the flashy. It is a long time in Morocco , for training, then comes back and is more discreet.

In 2017, he reappeared during the mutinies that rocked the country, on the front line, to discuss with the mutineers, alongside the Minister of Defense. He then inherited the command of the Republican Guard, before being entrusted, in March 2019, with the " units attached to the staff ", a prestigious position, but without direct link to the troop.

Already nailed to his hospital bed, Wattao had been promoted to colonel-major on December 18.

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