As a hero.
Several thousand people gave Laurent Gbagbo a triumphant welcome this Sunday.
The ex-president was back in his native village of Mama, in west-central Côte d'Ivoire, ten days after his return to Abidjan following his acquittal by international justice.
As soon as he got out of the car, the former president took a walkabout.
He thanked the people "for coming so many".
"Ten years [of absence] is a lot, tomorrow [Monday] I will give you some news," he added.
Acquitted by the ICC
News of her arrival continued to draw hundreds of people from surrounding villages to Mama.
Before arriving in Mama, he went to Blouzon to meditate at the grave of his mother Marguerite Gadô, who died in 2014 while he was imprisoned in the prison of the International Criminal Court (ICC).
Laurent Gbagbo, in power since 2000, was arrested in April 2011 in Abidjan, then transferred seven months later to the ICC in The Hague, where he was accused in particular of crimes against humanity, for the violence committed as a result of the presidential election at the end of 2010.
Gbagbo's refusal to admit his defeat to Alassane Ouattara had caused a bloody post-election crisis that left 3,000 dead.
Reelected in October 2020 for a controversial third term, Ouattara gave the green light for the return of Laurent Gbagbo a few days after his acquittal by the ICC.
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