Former Ivory Coast prime minister plans to return home after 4 years exile

The Former prime Minister of Ivory Coast, Guillaume Soro, who took himself into exile in 2019, has declared his plans to return home despite having two criminal cases.

Guillaume Soro on November 12, 2023, took to his Twitter page stating that he was guilty of no crime. “ I will not go further in my exile, I refuse to be a fugitive especially since before God and men I am not guilty of any crime that will merit such punishment. This is why here and now, I announce that from today I am ending my exile because it is painful for me to live far from my ancestral and native land of Africa,” he stated.

Soro was sentenced to life imprisonment in absentia for undermining national security in 2021 by an Ivorian court. In 2020, he was also sentenced to 20 years on charges relating to the embezzlement of public funds. Both convictions occurred while Soro was in self-imposed exile, which began in December 2019.

Although he did not specify the date for his return, he had announced in May that he intended to run in Ivory Coast’s 2025 presidential elections.

Guillaume Soro was the right-hand man to President Alassane Ouattara and provided crucial military support to him in his scuffle with the then-president, Laurent Gbagbo, who was ousted in 2011 after a brutal post-election conflict. Soro then became Ouattara’s first prime minister and in 2012 was named speaker of the National Assembly.

To prove a point, the former President of the National Assembly arrived in Niamey, Niger where he was received by the military junta leader, General Tchiani.

Re: RFI
Image :Financial Afrik