Jean-Lucien Savi de Tové, opponent appointed President of the Republic of Togo

Aged 86, Jean Lucien Savi de Tové was elected new president of Togo after the appointment of Faure Gnassingbé as President of the Council of Ministers on Saturday 03 May 2025.

The only candidate proposed by the Union for the Republic (UNIR), the ruling party in Togo, Jean Lucien Savi de Tové was unanimously elected by the 150 members of the Congress, bringing together deputies and senators during a special session.

Togolese politician, this opponent was a former minister of Commerce, Industry and Crafts in the governments of Edem Kodjo and Yawovi Agboyibo from 2005 to 2007. He also held the post of secretary general of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs after the coup who brought Gnassingbé Eyadéma to power in 1967.

Accused of having fomented a coup with other political figures, including Gilchrist Olympio, he was sentenced in August 1979 with four other people to ten years in prison.

Holder of a doctorate in political science in Paris-Sorbonne, Lucien Savi de Tové is a significant figure in Togolese political life.

After opening up to multipartyism in Togo in the 90s, he founded the Party of Democrats for Unity (PDU). In March 1993, the opposition coalition proposed him as Prime Minister at a meeting in Cotonou, Benin, but President Eyadéma rejects the proposal and appointed Joseph Kokou Koffigoh.

In the 1994 legislative elections, Jean Lucien Savi de Tové presents himself as an independent candidate for deputation, without success.

Five years later, in 1999, he was appointed first vice-president of Pan-African Patriotic Convergence, (CPP), a training born from the merger of the main political parties of the opposition namely the UFC (Union of change Forces) of Gilchrist Olympio, the UTD (Union Togolese for Democracy) of Edem Kodjo and the UDS (Union for Democracy and Solidarity.

In May 2009, he was appointed President of the Permanent Dialogue and Consultation Cadre (CPDC). Since May 3, 2025, he is the first President of the Republic under the newly established fifth republic.

The Fifth Togolese Republic has now entered into force following the election of Faure Gnassingbé and Jean Lucien Savi of Tové respectively as President of the Council of Ministers and President of the Togolese Republic by the deputies and senators gathered in Congress.

Planned by the new Constitution of May 6, 2024, this fifth republic consecrates the advent of a parliamentary regime in place of the presidential regime hitherto in force in Togo since the independence of the country in 1960.

After a one -year transition which allowed the installation of a Senate, the parliamentarians gathered in Congress elected the President of the Council of Ministers and the new President of the Republic.

According to the new Constitution, the president of the Council of Ministers (new name of the Prime Minister), has almost all the powers of the executive and receives the allegiance of the army, while the President of the Republic, occupies only a honorary title now.

The opposition and civil society denounce “a crime against the people ”

While the ruling party is delighted with the election of the former qualified minister ” of moderate opponent, who has long embodied dialogue and reconciliation within the national political landscape ”, the opposition and civil society denounce a ” crime committed against the Togolese people ”.

“The parliamentarians as well as the members of the Constitutional Court who participated in the crime committed today against the Togolese people, by validating the choice of an all -powerful council of ministers although not elected by the people, by electing a President of the Republic in place of the sovereign people, and by receiving the oath of the new illegitimate officials, will be held responsible before history. They will have betrayed the sovereignty of the Togolese people ” denounced several parties and organizations of civil society in a introductory statement during a political rally in the Togolese capital.

Two emblematic figures of the opposition, Jean Pierre Fabre, ex-head of the Togolese opposition, president of the National Alliance for Change (ANC) and Me Paul Dodzi Apevon (Leader of the Democratic Forces for the Republic (FDR), both deputies in the National Assembly, boycotted the session of the Parliament as a protest against the new Constitution of May 06, 2024.

Now holder of all powers as president of the Council of Ministers, Faure Gnassingbé elected for a new term of six years has already spent 20 years in power as President of the Republic from 2005 to 2025.

The new constitutional reform establishing the fifth republic is perceived by certain observers as a desire for the now president of the Council of Ministers to maintain himself in power, despite the change in political regime.