IVORY COAST: LAURENT GBAGBO ELECTED AS OPPOSITION IVORIAN POPULAR FRONT CANDIDATE IN OCTOBER PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS

Record ID: 183456

  • Title: IVORY COAST: LAURENT GBAGBO ELECTED AS OPPOSITION IVORIAN POPULAR FRONT CANDIDATE IN OCTOBER PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS
  • Date: 25th June 1995
  • Summary: ABIDJAN, IVORY COAST (JUNE 25, 1995) 1. WV EXTERIOR HOTEL IVOIRE, CONFERENCE VENUE 0.08 2. MV HOTEL SIGN 0.18 3. MV/GV IVORIAN POPULAR FRONT (FPI) PARTY LEADER LAURENT GBAGBO INSIDE CONFERENCE HALL SHAKING HANDS WITH SUPPORTERS, SUPPORTERS (3 SHOTS) 0.48 4. GVS GBAGBO WALKING ONTO STAGE, GBAGBO AND LEADERS SEATED ON STAGE (3 SHOTS) 1.06 5. CU FPI BANNER AND FLAG 1.14 6. MV UNIDENTIFIED TRIBAL CHIEF BLESSES PROCEEDINGS 1.24 7. MV GBAGBO SHAKING HANDS WITH TRIBAL CHIEF 1.29 8. GV CONFERENCE HALL 1.42 9. MV FOREIGN OBSERVERS 1.50 10. MV TRIBAL CHIEFS IN AUDIENCE 2.01 11. GV PAN AUDIENCE LISTENING AND APPLAUDING 2.40 12. CU HYACINTHE LEROUX OF ALLIED RALLY OF THE REPUBLICANS (RDR) ADDRESSING CONFERENCE (FRENCH) 2.57 13. MV GBAGBO AND FPI CENTRAL COMMITTEE MEMBER BOGA DOUDOU APPLAUDING 3.02 14. CU GBAGBO SMILING AND APPLAUDING 3.06 15. MV GBAGBO EMBRACING LEROUX, ACCOMPANYING HIM ACROSS STAGE AND SHAKING HANDS WITH LEROUX 3.28 16. MV FULBERT GNAGNO, WHO STOOD AGAINST GBAGBO IN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE ELCTION, MAKING HIS WAY TO THE STAGE 3.36 17. CU GNAGNO ADDRESSING CONFERENCE (FRENCH) 3.48 18. MVS AUDIENCE LAUGHING AND SMILING (2 SHOTS) 4.04 19. GVS GNAGNO SURROUNDED BY SUPPORTERS (2 SHOTS) 4.12 20. GV AUDIENCE 4.18 21. CUS GBAGBO ADDRESSING CONFERENCE, AUDIENCE LISTENING (FRENCH) (3 SHOTS) 5.24 22. GV GBAGBO SUPPORTERS WITH HANDS RAISED 5.31 23. CU BALLOT BOX 5.38 24. GVS GBAGBO VOTING (4 SHOTS) 6.10 25. CU LIST OF VOTERS NAMES 6.17 26. GVS GNAGNO VOTING (3 SHOTS) 6.50 27. MV/CUS OFFICIAL READING OUT VOTING SLIPS, MAN WRITING VOTE TALLY ON BLACKBOARD (5 SHOTS) 7.28 28. GVS GBAGBO CELEBRATING HIS ELECTION AS PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE (2 SHOTS) 7.44 29. GVS GBAGBO AND SUPPORTERS CELEBRATING RESULT (3 SHOTS) 8.18 30. CUS/GVS GBAGBO GIVING VICTORY SPEECH, COMMENTING ON CLASHES ON IVORIAN BORDER INVOLVING LIBERIAN MILITIA AND SPEAKING ABOUT ASSISTANCE FOR IVORIAN MOSLEMS (FRENCH) (5 SHOTS) 9.48 31. GV SUPPORTERS GIVING STANDING OVATION 9.57 32. MVS GBAGBO THROWING ROSES AND KISSES TO SUPPORTERS (2 SHOTS) 10.22 33. MV CHEERING SUPPORTERS 10.31 Initials Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
  • Embargoed: 10th July 1995 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: ABIDJAN, IVORY COAST
  • City:
  • Country: Ivory Coast
  • Reuters ID: LVA1ZJ51484G6V9X68O6MC20754S
  • Story Text: Opposition leader Laurent Gbagbo won the right to a second tilt at Ivory Coast's presidency on Sunday (June 25) and immediately pledged to do more to make its Moslems in the north feel at home.

    Gbagbo, defeated by the country's late founding father Felix Houphouet-Bogny in its first multi-party elections in 1990, was elected as his Ivorian Popular Front's (FPI) candidate for the October poll at a special one-day congress.

    His promise to help the Moslem north was part of a wide-ranging acceptance speech during which he picked on grievances around the country and urged the ruling Democratic Party to debate issues rather than indulge in rhetoric.

    "I would like to tell them (moslems of the north) that in the light of the false charges that they are fundamentalists or opportunist Ivorians that I will stand by them," Gbagbo told party militants packed into the balloon-festooned conference hall at the top hotel in the commercial capital Abidjan.

    An estimated 40 percent of Ivory Coast's 12 million people are Moslems.

    "Those of the north with whom I have spoken in the mosques after the meetings have told me of their bitterness," he said, adding that French colonial power, largely opposed in West Africa by Moslem leaders, had promoted Christianity.

    Gbagbo, an academic who almost became a Roman Catholic priest, said not enough was done after independence to restore the balance and ensure that the state was secular. "The state has not remained very secular," he added.

    He suggested Ivory Coast should encourage Saudi Arabia to open an embassy to help pilgrims to Mecca obtain visas without going via Mali or Senegal. He also pledged to introduce the teaching of Arabic as a foreign language in university.

    "It doesn't cost very much but it could reap huge dividends.

    It could bring social peace between two communities who could perhaps fall apart tomorrow," he said.

    The opposition cried fraud after the 1990 poll, which Houphouet-Boigny won with almost 82 percent of votes cast, but the supreme court turned down their appeal for a rerun.

    President Henri Konan Bedie, who took over on the death of Houphouet-Boigny in late 1993 after a brief power struggle with the then prime minister Alassane Ouattara, faces his first electoral test as president in October.

    His ruling Democratic Party, which has a large majority in parliament, faces a general election in November.

    Ouattara, now a deputy director with the International Monetary Fund, has not said whether he will stand but critics of a new electoral code which became law in December see it as a bid by the ruling party to stop him taking part.

    The Rally of the Republicans, which broke away from the ruling party last year, has made no secret of the fact it wants Ouattara, who is a Moslem from the north, to represent it.

    Along with the Front and six other parties it forms the Republican Front opposition alliance.

    The Democratic Party, founded by Houphouet-Boigny, has had a virtual monopoly on power since independence from France in 1960. It was the only legal party until 1990, when Houphouet-Boigny conceded democratic reforms.

    The Front congress followed the June 14 beating in the security minister's office of its deputy leader, Abou Drahamane Sangare. In special resolution it called for the resignation of the minister, General Gaston Ouassenan Kone.


  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
  • Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2015. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
  • Usage Terms/Restrictions: None
Register