Presidential election in Côte d'Ivoire: the GPS symbolically invests Guillaume Soro
Former Ivorian rebel leader and presidential candidate Guillaume Soro here in Paris on January 29, 2020 (illustration).
Lionel BONAVENTURE / AFP
Text by: RFI Follow
3 min
Guillaume Soro, 48, was officially invested this Sunday as a candidate for the presidential election of October 2020 by his movement, Generations and Solidarity Peoples (GPS).
The investiture convention took place in Abidjan in his absence.
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With our correspondent in Abidjan,
François Hume-Ferkatadi
Will come or will not come?
For a little over four hours, the organizers of
Guillaume Soro's
investiture convention
amused themselves with the rumor of an imminent return of their leader, holding in suspense the some 600 supporters gathered in the reception hall of the Belle Côte hotel.
“
He will come back!
“, We promise in the gallery.
“
Besides, who tells us that he is not already there, in Abidjan?
".
The room is seething and some are starting to believe it hard as iron.
"
He's going to land, that's for sure,
" whispers a young man to his neighbor.
Despite a last subterfuge from the spokesperson for Generations and Solidarity Peoples, Minata Zié, inviting the audience to fix the front door, the Hollywood scenario will not take place.
And if his portrait stands in 4 by 3 above the main stage, if his name is honored by all the speakers, Guillaume Soro does not appear among his.
Members of the “Soroist galaxy” - a constellation of political parties, movements, support clubs or pro-Soro associations - will not even have anything to console themselves with a video intervention by the man they nickname “President”.
Former rebel leader, ex-Prime Minister (2011-2012) and ex-president of the National Assembly (2012-2019), Guillaume Soro has been living in France since an arrest warrant was issued against him in December 2019 by Ivorian justice.
He was also sentenced to 20 years in prison
in absentia
last April for "concealment of embezzlement of public funds", a judicial decision that his supporters consider unfounded and politically motivated.
In addition to the praise addressed to it, the convention was marked by the minute of silence in tribute to the victims of the August demonstrations in Côte d'Ivoire, and by repeated calls for the release of parliamentarians and activists of the movement. , 14 of whom have been imprisoned for a little over eight months.
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Guillaume Soro