Ouatarra nominated RDHP candidate, appoints Hamed Bakayoko as prime minister
Africa
Ivorian ruling RDHP party has finally named President Alassane Ouattara, 78, as its candidate for the crucial October 31, presidential election.
The controversial move coincides with the president’s appointment of Defence Minister Hamed Bakayoko, a fellow Northern as the new prime minister to replace Amadou Gon Coulibaly, who died earlier this month.
Official sources said Thursday, July 30, the party took the decision at its just-ended national Convention and Ouattara has until August 6, to make up his mind.
Ouattara is serving out his second five-year mandate and had promised to hand over to a younger generation until the sudden death this month of Prime Minister Gon Coulibaly, the RDHP’s anointed presidential flag bearer.
Should he decide to run, Ouattara would argue that his two mandates were under the old Constitution. The 2016 amended Constitution permits a presidential two-term tenure.
But the opposition has already rejected that line of argument, saying it would amount to a controversial third term mandate for the president Ouattara.
Hard times in the #ECOWAS region with political tension and uncertainty in Cote d’Ivoire, leadership crisis in Mali, amidst a deadly global health pandemic.
*Paul Ejime is an international affairs analyst.
– July 30, 2020 @ 6:42 GMT |
Tags: Hamed Bakayoko President Alassane Ouattara Prime Minister Gon Coulibaly RDHP
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