Laurent Gbagbo

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Laurent Koudou Gbagbo

4th President of Côte d'Ivoire
Incumbent
Assumed office October 26, 2000
Preceded by	Robert Guéï
Succeeded by	Incumbent

Born	December 31, 1921 Gagnoa, Côte d'Ivoire
Political party	Ivorian Popular Front
Spouse	Simone Gbagbo

Laurent Koudou Gbagbo (born May 31, 1945) has been the president of Côte d'Ivoire (Better known in English as The Ivory Coast) since 2000.

A member of Bété people from Gagnoa, he was professor of history at the University of Cocody-Abidjan, and later dean of the faculty of Languages and Cultures. He founded the Ivorian Popular Front (Front Populaire Ivoirien, or FPI) in 1982, but went into exile in France in 1985. He returned in 1988.

Gbagbo ran in the presidential election of 1990, but received only 11% of the vote against the country's veteran leader, Félix Houphouët-Boigny. He ran for president against the military ruler Robert Guéï in the elections of October 22, 2000; when Guéï claimed victory, a popular revolt in favor of Gbagbo (who claimed he had actually won with 59.4% of the vote) broke out in the capital, Abidjan. Guéï was forced to flee, and Gbagbo became president on October 26.

On September 19, 2002, a coup attempt against Gbagbo's government failed and turned into a rebellion. The rebellious soldiers attempted to seize the cities of Abidjan, Bouaké, and Korhogo. They failed to take Abijdan, but were successful in the other two, respectively in the center and north of the country. The situation quickly developed into a civil war between a government-held south and a rebel-held north, but after several months of fighting a peace agreement was reached and French peacekeepers arrived to patrol a cease-fire line. According to the terms of the agreement, Gbagbo would remain in office (the rebels had previously demanded his resignation), but a new unity government would be formed under a "neutral" prime minister, including the FPI, the civilian opposition and representatives of the rebel groups. The agreement has been opposed by many of the president's supporters, who believe too many concessions are being granted to the rebels and that the French are supporting the rebels' political objectives.

Early in November 2004, after the peace agreement had effectively collapsed following the rebels' refusal to disarm, Gbagbo ordered airstrikes against the rebels. During one of these airstrikes in Bouaké, French soldiers were hit and nine of them were killed; the Ivorian government has said it was a mistake, but the French have claimed it was deliberate. They responded by destroying most Ivoirian military aircraft, and violent retaliatory riots against the French broke out in Abidjan.

Gbagbo's original mandate as president expired on October 30, 2005, but due to the lack of disarmament it was deemed impossible to hold an election, and therefore his term in office was extended for a maximum of one year, according to a plan worked out by the African Union; this plan was endorsed by the United Nations Security Council.^[1] With the late October deadline approaching in 2006, it was regarded as very unlikely that the election would in fact be held by that point, and the opposition and the rebels rejected the possibility of another term extension for Gbagbo.^[2] The U. N. Security Council endorsed another one-year extension of Gbagbo's term on November 1, 2006; however, the resolution provided for the strengthening of Prime Minister Charles Konan Banny's powers. Gbagbo said the next day that elements of the resolution deemed to be constitutional violations would not be applied.^[3]

Laurent Gbagbo is married to Simone Gbagbo.