Ministry Details
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[ President ] [ Prime Minister ] [ Ministers ] [ Parliament ] [ Political Parties ]

President

Laurent Gbagbo (2000) FBI, formerly Henri Konan Bédié (1993/5) PDCI

The president is elected for a five year term by the people.

Veteran politician Laurent Gbagbo, who was elected president in 2000 for a five-year mandate, was given a seventh successive year in power in November 2006 under a UN plan to find lasting peace. The opposition and New Forces rebels said they did not want him back in office but a UN Security Council resolution, proposed by the African Union, allowed him to keep his job for a final year.

A historian by profession, Laurent Gbagbo is a former trade union activist who, since the 1980s, has taken a strongly nationalist stance, espousing the concept of pure Ivorian parentage. He spent two years in prison in the early 1970s for "subversive" teaching and eight years in exile in France in the 1980s, before returning in 1988 to campaign for multi-party democracy. Amid an uprising against his predecessor, he proclaimed himself president in October 2000, at the age of 55. He derives much of his support from the mostly-Christian south and west.

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Prime Minister

Guillaume Soro

The president appointed rebel leader Guillaume Soro in March 2007 weeks after the former arch rivals signed a power-sharing peace deal which handed positions in a transitional government to Mr Soro's New Forces.

The deal envisaged that elections would be held within 10 months and foresaw the dismantling of the buffer zone between the rebel north and the south.

Mr Soro, a former student leader, came to the fore during the 2002 rebellion that led to the country's division. He served in the reconciliation government of his predecessor, Charles Konan Banny.

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Ministers

Defence Minister: Michel AMANI
Foreign Minister: Youssouf BAKAYOKO
Interior Minister: Desire N'GUESSAN
Economy and Finance Minister: Charles Koffi DIBY
Min. of Transport: Albert Mabri TOIKEUSSE
Min. of Trade & Commerce: Moussa DOSSO

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Parliament

The Assemblée Nationale (National Assembly) has 175 members, elected for a five year term in single-seat constituencies. Parliament was dissolved after the coup d'état in 1999. New elections have been postponed.

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Political Parties

- Democratic Party of Côte d'Ivoire / Parti démocratique de la Côte d'Ivoire
- Ivorian Popular Front/ Front populaire ivoirien
- Ivorian Workers' Party / Parti ivoirien des travailleurs
- Rally of the Republicans / Rassemblement des républicains
- Union of Democrats of Côte d'Ivoire (Union des Démocrates de Côte d'Ivoire)
- Movement of Future Forces (Mouvement des Forces de l'Avenir)
- Citizens' Democratic Union (Union démocratique citoyenne de Côte d'Ivoire, UDCY) [1]
- Ecological Party (Parti Ecologique Ivoirien PEI)
- Ivoirian Communist Party (Parti communiste ivoirien, PCI)
- Liberal Force (Force liberale, FL) [2]
- Movement for the Total Liberation of Côte d'Ivoire (Mouvement pour la libération totale de la Côte d'Ivoire, MLTCI) [3]
- Party for the Protection of the Environment (Parti pour la protection de l'environnement, PPE)
- Party for Progress and Socialism (Parti pour le progrès et le socialisme, PPS)
- Revolutionary Communist Party of Côte d'Ivoire (Parti communiste révolutionnaire de Côte d'Ivoire, PCRCI)
- Socialist Front for Independence and Liberty (Front socialiste pour l'indépendance et la liberté, FSIL)
- Socialist People's Union (Union socialiste du peuple, USP)
- Union for Democracy and Peace in Côte d'Ivoire (Union pour la démocratie et la paix en Côte d’Ivoire, UDPCI)
- Union of Social Democrats (Union des socio-démocrates, USD)

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