A meeting scheduled for Thursday in Abidjan of the main Ivorian opposition party in support of his candidate Tidjane Thiam, excluded from the October presidential race, was not authorized by the police for reasons of “public order”, it was learned Wednesday from security source.
The Democratic Party of Côte d’Ivoire (PDCI) had announced “a protest meeting” against the radiation of its president Tidjane Thiam on the electoral list Thursday morning, to the permanence of the party, in the business district of the Plateau.
On the same day, a plateau court, next to the permanence of the PDCI, must look at a file which could dismiss Mr. Thiam from his functions as president. An activist of the PDCI indeed challenges her legitimacy because of her nationality.
“The permanence of your political training being inside this security perimeter, it will not be materially or safely possible to guarantee free and secure access to your activists, or to authorize any gathering whatsoever in this area that day,” the Abidjan police prefect said on Wednesday in correspondence to the PDCI.
“Consequently, and for reasons of strict preservation of public order, your projected activity cannot be held in this place and on this date,” he added.
-The PDCI invited its activists to a rally Thursday morning at the party headquarters in Cocody, Abidjan, in place of the meeting initially planned.
On Wednesday evening, the party announced the death Tuesday in France of its honorary president, Philippe Cowppli-Bony, over 90 years old.
Mr. Cowppli-Bony had been the interim president of the PDCI after the death in August 2023 of Henri Konan Bédié, former head of state, and before the election of Tidjane Thiam in December of the same year.
62 -year -old international banker, Tidjane Thiam, currently in France, was struck off from the electoral list after a court estimated on April 22 that he had lost his Ivorian nationality at the time of his registration in 2022. This radiation makes him ineligible.
Less than six months from the election, the opposition parties rise to tone and multiply criticism towards power, denouncing the ineligibility of four opposition figures, including Mr. Thiam.
